Hey there, friend :)
I just wanted to mention to you directly that you are a human being and you have choices here.
First acknowledging that you do need to stay employed of course and I don’t blame you, as the worker, for helping Reddit during this moment. But there are these few moments each day at your work where you can make small, deliberate decisions on behalf of your fellow human beings over hollow corporate furtherance.
Just do a bit less each day. Forget to send an email here and there. Copy the wrong “Debbie” or “Todd” in that email that you do send - honest mistake. Forget to ban that mod you are asked to ban, or forget one in the group. If you’re feeling bold, get off of your work machine and reach out to those mods on a dummy account with a heads up.
Again, not your fault as an individual either in a broken system, but you probably have small opportunities every day to help the world (and hurt Reddit a bit). Embrace those opportunities.
We believe in you.
(Addressing Reddit employees…)
Also, as someone that has been engaging with many protestors (users and mods, across several platforms), I have heard exactly ZERO badmouthing of regular Reddit employees. Despite what spez would have you think, everyone understands the difficult place you’re being put in.
One thing I wanted to point out is that spez appeared to be concerned for his employees’ safety, yet downplayed the protest by stating that only 1,000 subreddits went dark, when the real number was over 8,000. The entire site has been besieged and he wants you to think it’s a little kerfuffle. Shouldn’t he tell you the real magnitude of the protest is he really cared for your safety?
If you can help in any way, that’s great, but don’t jeopardize your job. The only reason I mention that is because there will almost certainly be at least one more round of layoffs to make the company seem more profitable to investors.
Regardless of you position on all this hub-bub, get your resume updated and start looking for greener pastures. That place (Reddit HQ) will be getting toxic. Toxic now? No, no, no. As the IPO approaches, management will start to squeeze. They know they are hated and significant long-term damage has been done, so they’ll likely cash out right away. That means boost every visible metric as much as possible. They will already be checked out and their interest in the employees’ health and safety will be near nonexistent.
Good luck in there!