As some on the internet celebrate a CEOs murder, content moderators are at a crossroads

Following the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson on Wednesday, the internet erupted with jokes, memes, and, later, thirst posts for the insurance magnate’s shooter. The assassination was an event that could, for many, signal the start of a more critical look at corporations, how the people leading them treat the public, and how the public responds to those executives’ choices.Or it was just a perfect opportunity to laugh in the face of a bleak political and economic reality. The internet is as the internet does. Tweet may have been deleted But the online fete has stirred even more debate behind the scenes: In the age of re-contested free speech, where does content moderation (and platforms’ anti-violence policies) fit into the class conversation? SEE ALSO: Bluesky ramps up content moderation as millions join the platform Nowhere has that been more documented than on Reddit. According to a 404Media report, the platform has removed dozens of posts about the CEO’s death, tracked by a platform subbreddit known as r/undelete which grabs content that reaches the top 100 most popular on the site before being deleted. Many of the posts, the publication found, had thousands of upvotes and even more still exist on industry related subs like r/nursing and r/medicine. Subbredit moderators are struggling to curb the plethora of posts, which they say will inevitably be removed by Reddit for violating anti violence policies, if not first removed by moderators for violation of “no politics” and “no death” rules. There isn’t resounding…As some on the internet celebrate a CEOs murder, content moderators are at a crossroads