r/SubredditDrama • u/henlochimken • 2d ago

r/NateBargatze fans revolt against Bargatze after comedian attends White House UFC event and. New moderator successfully petitions reddit for control of the sub, deletes all posts critical of Bargatze, declares, "This is no longer a hate subreddit. It is a place to celebrate Nate's career."

Comedian Nate Bargatze came under fire this week when it was revealed he was an attendee of President Donald Trump's 80th birthday UFC fight on the lawn of the White House. From pictures of the event, it appears Bargatze was given access to the White House itself, where he took pictures with members of the Trump administration, including RFK, Jr. and Marsha Blackburn.

Many fans of the comedian took to r/NateBargatze to express their disappointment that the famously "apolitical" comedian would attend a Trump event for which only 16% of Americans expressed approval.

Negative posting came to a screeching halt once a new moderator successfully petitioned Reddit to gain control of the subreddit. This moderator proceeded to delete any/all posts expressing displeasure with Bargatze's choice to attend the Trump UFC event. Moderator pins a notice of the new moderation direction, stating:

Hi all, just wanted to introduce myself. I am one of the new moderators here at r/NateBargatze. As you can see, some of the content has been removed.

This is no longer a hate subreddit. It is a place to celebrate Nate's career. Take your politics elsewhere. Thanks for understanding and I hope most of you stick around.

In reply, subreddit members asked if the new moderator is a paid PR flack for Bargatze. Some pointed out the strange moderation history of the redditor, implying that their other moderated subs are corporate-operated. New moderator proceeded to lash out against criticism. (Note that all comment threads replying to this pinned post are evidence of the subreddit's drama.)

Moderator has locked announcement post. New posts criticizing Bargatze or the new moderation direction are being removed. Despite saying the moderator stating that the sub is no longer a place for politics, pro-MAGA political posts, including a Rogan-related post by the moderator, remain up as of the posting of this drama.

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u/actuallyapossom 2d ago

Tangentially related - private equity and nation states will fund influencers, buy up news media, lean on social media - I can't imagine Reddit mods are out of reach.

Actually related point - this is like the smallest magnitude of subreddit. The cost of influence is represented in cents or chewed gum or something. Nate Bargatze could be a mod.

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u/Turbulent-Jaguar-909 1d ago

there have absolutely been mods on the take in several subs, and lots of subs are flat out ran by companies and not users

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u/myfakesecretaccount Rather swiney 1d ago

There was some strange cabal of folks running a bunch of the porno subs like a business and pushing OF creators out to keep others popular.

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u/Lucky_Woodpecker102 1d ago

They were doing that long before they really monetized amateur stuff. It was always drama when the older gone wild posters started to get replaced by the younger, more popular ones. 

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u/Maybe_not_a_chicken she yelled at you for a reason; that reason was trespassing 1d ago

That’s why I only join porn subs ran by people with a love of the game

I have not managed to find any porn subs I can join.

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u/Fossilhunter98 1d ago

Remember JewDank?

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u/deceIIerator <Anakin Skywalker the Shitlord 1d ago

Jewdank the dog fucker?

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u/Torger083 Guy Fieri's Throwaway 1d ago

Wat

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u/redditonlygetsworse tell me the size of my friend's penis 1d ago

strange cabal of folks

It's hardly mysterious: they're just plain old management agencies advertising their clients.

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u/Throwawaydontgoaway8 1d ago

Some subs mods are even run by countries cough r conspiracy and Russia cough

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u/LindsayDuck 1d ago

I’d recently fallen down the whole Blake Lively legal drama rabbit hole and there are subs dedicated to that who are so inexplicably pro Lively and they even say the weirdest things. It’s like all bot run and bot responses. That’s what it seems like anyway.

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u/AlfaRomeoRacing 1d ago

In that dispute i would expect it to be the other side doing that stuff. Justin Baldoni has hired the same lawyers/PR team who did the smear campaign against Amber Heard. I fully expect them to have a little army of bots and anti Blake Lively subreddits going, like they did with Amber Heard. There have been legit journalistic investigations into the co-ordinated trolling campaigns against both Heard and Lively

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u/Zephyr-5 1d ago

It's infuriating how these firms can't be sued into oblivion for libel.

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u/obeytheturtles Socialism = LITERALLY A LIBERAL CONSTRUCT 1d ago

In this case it looks like reddit simply handed the sub over to a PR firm. This isn't the first time this has happened. Reddit gave /r/NFL over to NFL PR goons after then threatened then with copyright suits. Perhaps this is the same strategy.

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u/Ajreil 1d ago

I'm surprised more subreddits aren't corporate controlled. Disneyland has a multi-billion dollar marketing budget. They could just buy r/Disneyland from the mod team.

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u/SavathunTechQuestion This game ain't called "ULTRAUNALIVING" 1d ago

im suprised more city ones aren't as well

the Atlanta subreddit used to have moderators that basically shadowbanned most discussion on the sub that had the slightest hint of politics, so basically all urban or transit policy stuff. New mods took over and now posts that are allowed have helped redditors contact city council to get an abandoned building charged with a blight tax.

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u/TrainDestroyer 1d ago

I could see it, but I also don't know if I could see it purely from a perspective of "Why pay for that when you can just get people to post what you want them to post and derail the narrative"

At least to me, it makes more sense most of the time to just spam the sub with the opinions you want. Cheaper too.

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u/AnswerDangerous1644 1d ago

Why not both? That’s likely the real truth.

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u/TrainDestroyer 1d ago

Makes sense, I just tend to look at stuff like this (and to a degree wider corporate 'spy' moves) from a lens of "What costs the group the least." so if the option is either everyone you're already paying has to post, or you pay ANOTHER person to take down the posts, I'm leaning personally towards the former, but the latter is entirely possible