>


The messages out of the blue are almost certainly unwanted 

the user joined a subreddit.  A notification that the user no longer can use that subreddit is not "out of the blue", as such a notification should be reasonably expected when you join a subreddit.  The notification could be unwanted by some users, but I would imagine many people would prefer to be informed of their status related to a subreddit they joined.

following them around the site

this is not a prohibition of looking up post history, as you have framed it.  Instead, it is a prohibition of chasing the user around other subreddits posting replies.  Someone commenting here to note that I've frequented r/fpga is not inherently a violation of reddit policy.  Replying to my posts on r/fpga to gripe about the views I posted here would be a violation of this "following ... around the site" rule.  
"following around" is referring to posting replies, not merely reading post history.
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I have a dummy account I use to test mod stuff, and just now I used it to confirm that a message must be sent to a user when they are banned from a sub. It is not possible to issue a ban for what you describe, or for any other reason, without messaging the banned user.
Since Reddit requires a message to be sent, even if the subreddit doesn't want to send one when it bans you, it's safe to assume that this does not violate the harassment policy. >

Why would you ban someone for posting in another subreddit though? >

The "why" is easy.  Because it makes moderating some subs easier.  Let's say I run a Pro X sub, and people from the Anti-X sub keep showing up and harssing people.  I can pre-emptively have a better experience for my user by not allowing anybody from the anti-x sub from posting.
If you think that is right or wrong, that's a different question, but the "why" is "it pre-emptively bans a number of users who you would have to ban anyways" >

A cynic might also point out that it helps create and enforce a certain ideological homogeneity that has become a defining feature of post-2016 Reddit. >


it helps create and enforce a certain ideological homogeneity

Yes, exactly.  The subreddit for trans people to talk about trans people things is not the place for anti-trans people to come debate whether trans people's gender identities should be respected.  If you want to argue about that shit, take it somewhere else. >


If you want to argue about that shit, take it somewhere else.

Where? There is no where else to take it, at least not on this site. Subreddits like r/gendercritical were very careful about enforcing site rules, but they were still banned because it was a feminist sub that disagreed with Reddit on trans issues. >


Where? 

Not my problem.  It's discussed in a number of subs on a regular basis. This one, for instance. Not in the trans subs.  That's not what they're for. >

The point is that reddit eliminated the places where it was appropriate to discuss them.  There is nowhere on reddit transgenderism is discussed without walking on eggshells, because the subs run the risk of getting banned if they don’t heavily moderate the discussion.  Even, for example, r/4chan heavily censors it. >

Can you find any examples of trans critical posts in those subs? Actual examples that show the conversation wasn't shut down?
Even in r/conservative they put out an announcement that reddit has threatened to ban people over "misgendering" so they recommend all those discussions be moved to discord instead. 
Let's be clear. I personally know accounts that have been banned for disagreeing that transwomen are women. You can say the Earth is flat, you can believe in witchcraft, you can openly be a communist. But to say that transwomen aren't women invites banning. 
In fact, in /r/askaconservative/ there was a post asking conservatives why they disagree with trans ideology. I answered and gave my reasons. I was very careful not to use any insulting language. But still I got a message from Reddit that someone had reported me to admins for "hate" and warned me that future violations would suspend my account. So how the hell was I even supposed to answer the question??  I alerted the mods, who told me yeah that sucks, Reddit does that, but it's out of their hands. >


That felt like harassment, and I know for a fact that many, many other users like me got the same messages, which seems like harassment in bulk.

Question, how would Reddit inform you were banned without a private message? Would no message be acceptable to? Your account just restricts some unknown of subs? >

It wouldn't matter unless I tried to interact with the sub in question, at which point, I initiate contact. Being unable to post, being met with a message that "You have been banned for XYZ" would not constitute harassment. >


"...behaving in a way that would discourage a reasonable person from participating on Reddit...:

Doesn't that depend on what subs get flagged? >

I'm not sure what you mean, but since the dangerous/subversive subs are now banned by Reddit as a matter of rule, you should be able to assume that any remaining sub is allowed by Silicon Valley standards. Therefore participation in any remaining sub should not be "discouraged" by the terms of the harassment policy.
Disclaimer: I am not a subreddit expert; I have no idea what may or may not exist out there. I do know that the flagged subreddit that sparked this CMV is incredibly mainstream. >


I'm not sure what you mean, but since the dangerous/subversive subs are now banned by Reddit as a matter of rule,

Redpill

I do know that the flagged subreddit that sparked this CMV is incredibly mainstream.

So mainstream you won't even name it. >

I mean I've posted there in the last day or two. My original post invites you to check my history. FFS, man :) >

And now I know why you couldn't just name it. >

Do you? Seems like maybe you don't... since, you know, I told you to go look... >

I looked and found you posted on Joe 'Dr Horsepaste' Rogan defending Ayn Rand. I'd be embarrassed too. >

I'm not embarrassed, but I respectfully invite you to educate yourself. >

I agree with OP but I like to remind people that it should be at the discretion of the community not the individual. >

I've never posted or commented on r/conservative, but am permabanned and never got a message about it >

Yeah, iirc you don't receive a ban message if you haven't posted in a sub. Someone got into a spat with a member of the mod team of /r/cozyplaces and used a script to ban every mod on the team (including our internal bots that never post outside the sub lol) from all 20ish subs they mod, I didn't get a message from any of them. >

I don't understand how I got banned then. The only thing I ever did in that sub was comment. Wasn't even in favor of that sub reddit community. 
Edit: I have one intentions of joining the BLM subreddit, I just thought it was a little stupid. >

I really like how you broke it down to show the irony of such messages against Reddit harrassment policies.  I share your view in that it seems to oppose discussion on Reddit, to follow someone & ban them for mere participation in another sub. I was shocked the first time it happened to me. But it may not fall under harrassment because it's not plural messages, but rather silencing, blacklisting, and possibly bullying to get people to leave certain subs or fearful to join certain subs. >

A couple of points:

You have to have had a history in that subreddit for the automod script to be able to automatically ban you. There's no way for the bot to automatically get a list of users and check their comment / post history, unless those users have interacted with the sub the automod is set up for in the recent past.
In other words, you can't be banned from Community A for interacting with Community B unless you're already interacting with Community A, in which case you should've read its rules (which presumably say "don't interact with Community B").
It isn't a threat, or harassment -- nor does it follow the user from sub to sub. It's a direct message (doesn't appear on any sub), informing the user that they do not have access to a particular community; after that, there are no more messages.
Subreddit mods can't ban users without notifying them (reddit employees can, but not the volunteer sub mods). In other words, if ban notifications could count as harrassment, reddit would have had to give subreddit mods the ability to shadowban people, which they didn't.

BTW, I'm a huge critic of this kind of "autoban" approach from moderators. I think generally it reflects a mod style that's super autocratic and heavy handed, and intended to create as much of an echo chamber for that mod / mod-team as possible. At the same time, being able to create your own echo chamber is part of what reddit offers, so it is what it is I suppose. >

This recently happened to me with r/justiceserved.  I haven't even dropped a comment in that sub for months, and all of a sudden, I recieved a permaban for participating in a sub they don't like...and they wouldn't even tell me which one it was.
This is literally how subreddits turn into little safe-spaces, where no one is ever challenged on their worldview, or introduced to something outside that cognitive bubble.  No one will ever learn, grow, or adapt to new information, if you are never exposed to anyone other than those who already agree with your preconceived opinions. >

Would it not count as harassment if the message was written by a person? That is to say, if I was a moderator and you joined my sub, and upon reviewing your history, I determined that you displayed behavioral signs that are inappropriate for my sub . . . well, you're not saying that I shouldn't be allowed to preemptively ban you . . . you're just saying that an automated message telling you about the ban is "harassment."
So if I hand-type a message to you which effectively does the same thing . . . is that acceptable? >

This is a perfect test, actually. If a person was going around targeting users of a certain subreddit to tell them that they were banned from another unrelated subreddit, that action would almost certainly be considered harassment. The key element is the active initiation of the conversation by the person going out of their way to track down people to ban.
Like, it would be different if someone posted on a sub, and then the mods messaged them, but here we're talking about following the user to a different sub and then messaging them out of the blue.
Just because it's being done en mass and by bots doesn't seem to me to alleviate it of the harassing elements described above. >

In other words, if the hypothetical situation above were the case, you'd argue that I'm harassing you by going through your history and preemptively kicking you out of my sub.
Which means you do want to have a conversation about the legitimacy of the core behavior, right? The presence of a bot only obscures the real issue. We should be talking about whether its ethical for a moderator to preemptively ban someone. >

No, I think you'd be wrong to do that, but you'd be harassing me if, out of the blue, you sent me a private message criticizing my post history and telling me you were banning me because of it. In that case, you're following me around reddit and sending me nasty PMs. >

Right. My point is that, in the OP, you made it clear you weren't interested in discussing the ethical status of such behavior. But we've just established that there's no functional difference between using a bot to do it and doing it yourself.
Which means the conversation is at an impasse . . . unless you want to discuss the ethical status of moderators preemptively banning people because of their platform history. >

I'm happy to discuss that (I think it's generally short-sighted approach and that a homogenous userbase won't be particularly interesting to anyone), but that's not the point of my CMV.
My point is that the sending of a private message - by a bot or a person - in that context constitutes harassment by the definition provided by Reddit. That seems to be true regardless of whether you think the underlying policy is ethical or not. >

Ok, so, if I've got you right, you're saying that a moderator just shouldn't bother with a message? That preemptively banning people is fine (or at the least, not the topic at hand), but that they just shouldn't tell the user they've been banned? 🤨 >

Well, I think auto-banning people is bad, but it's not harassment. This is essentially an accurate summation of my position, yes.
If you ban me and I try to post on your sub but can't, I initiated contact and you responded.
If you ban me and send me a message out of nowhere to tell me you've done so, despite my not having visited your sub, you're following me around reddit and sending me private messages. This seems to be harassment, by Reddit's definition above. >

So it's only the unexpected message that's harassment to you, not the content of that message?

you're following me around reddit

No one is following you, an automated system doesn't "follow" you, it monitors one sub in perticular (or maybe a few). If you go from a block sub to a non block sub the bot doesn't "know" this, it only knows when you cross specific thresholds. >

It's the unexpected message and it's explicit/implicit content. Certainly it's not enough to simply be an unexpected message, since that would make any unsolicited PM harassment. But an unexpected message designed to alienate and attack seems to trip Reddit's definitions.
Follows is a turn of phrase. >


the harassing message is private, but it's still harassing.

Harassing

the action of subjecting someone to aggressive pressure or intimidation.

In your view, what are the bots pressuring or intimidating a person to do? >

Obviously, they are casting a normative judgement on the users' participation in a certain subreddit or subreddits. They are seeking to pressure users at-large to not use those subreddits. That seems fairly obvious. >

Sure but can you tell me what you think the objective of auto-bans is so I have a starting point? >

I would imagine the objective is the mods giving out the bans do not value contributions from users who would visit the targeted subs, and consider those users to be disruptive or otherwise non-desirable for whatever reason. >

Interesting perspective. Problem with that is that blanket bans catch people who may go to these subs to disagree with the fundamental premise of the subs (i.e. people who stand opposed to the perceived "disruptive or otherwise non-desirable" and would therefore, in theory be contributive and desirable).
The objective of banning all users of targeted subs seems to me to to be about deincentivizing the use of those subs completely, by all users without prejudice.
I feel like this was the justification explicitly stated back when every sub had a stickied post about antivax or anti-science subs during the pandemic (I can't remember exactly). The goal was  to choke the subs out of existence. >


The objective of banning all users of targeted subs seems to me to to be about deincentivizing the use of those subs completely, by all users without prejudice.

But you that is just what you think, I think it's this 

the objective is the mods giving out the bans do not value contributions from users who would visit the targeted subs, and consider those users to be disruptive or otherwise non-desirable for whatever reason.

My reasoning makes more sence, because that is the outcome of the bans. Is it not possible that you are misinterpreting the purpose?

I feel like this was the justification explicitly stated back when every sub had a stickied post about antivax or anti-science subs during the pandemic (I can't remember exactly). The goal was to choke the subs out of existence.

Could that not lead credence to my view as well? That the mods felt like people who posted in anti-vax reddits offered no valuable contributions as opposed to trying to pressure people into not having those views? >


CMV: Using bots to send "permanent ban" messages to users who post in disfavored subs violates Reddit's Harassment Policy

In order for something to be Harassment is must meet the definition of Harassment 

subjecting someone to aggressive pressure or intimidation.

Is every single instance of bot informing  person of an automatic ban Harassment 
No, of course not, and I think you know that. Unless you can prove every single automatic ban includes langue to aggressively pressure a user into changing thier behavior, then your premise is false. 
Now, lets look at the language quoted.

" To be unbanned respond to this message with a promise to avoid that subreddit."

Is this pressure to change behavior? Yes indeed.
Is this aggressive use of pressure/intimidation? Id say no, probably not, but if you wanted to report it to the admins maybe they would look at it. The issue is this is just one example and it's not really clearly harassment anyway. 
Unless you can show that these automatic bans are de facto harassment in of themselfs, which they appear to not be, then you must admit your argument is flawed on some level >

Any automatic ban seems designed to influence behavior, but to be clear the definition you provide doesn't seem to come from Reddit's definition listed above. >

Do you think the phrase "depending on the context" matters at all?
The policy is not "every single unexpected or unwanted message is harassment"
It's that depending on the context they can consider something to be harassment. In the context of a single alert letting a user know they are banned I don't believe that would pass any threshold for harassment. >

I certainly think context matters; I dedicated a lot of words to explaining why the context of an out-of-the-blue ban message from a generally unrelated source provides context for harassment. It certainly seems to meet many of the criteria in Reddit's policy. >

And yet reddit do not believe it does. Your explaination does nothing to suggest how a single isolated non aggressive/sexual/weird message is harassment. >

Users may very well find the message aggressive and weird. Certainly sending such messages in mass shouldn't count as a single isolated message. They're sending thousands of them; maybe more. >

They aren’t sending these messages en masse.   It is a single message per user ban.  That’s a single pinpoint message to that user that if I understood you correctly is not repeated.  Additionally, harassment definitions generally include repeated or continuing behavior.
I’m having a hard part seeing how a ban message fits into this:

Reddit is a place for conversation, and in that context, we define this behavior as anything that works to shut someone out of the conversation through intimidation or abuse, online or off.

A ban is hardly intimidation or abuse, it’s a community deciding what they do and don’t want within their community. >

Let’s start with the definition, rather than the offered examples.

we define this behavior as anything that works to shut someone out of the conversation through intimidation or abuse, online or off.

I can see how this shuts someone out of a conversation, but not how it is intimidation or abuse. If I’m banned from a subreddit, I’m not intimidated or abused. I may be upset, but not every behavior which upsets somebody is abusive.
Now we can address the specific qualities enumerated in the policy that you think apply.

“Depending on the context, this can take on a range of forms, from directing unwanted invective at someone…”

“Invective” is insulting, abusive, or highly critical language. Conditional on the ban message being relatively professional, I can’t see how this applies. You say the “action is invective” which doesn’t really make any sense.

… to following them from subreddit to subreddit…

The bot isn’t following you from subreddit to subreddit. It sees you post in a particular subreddit, bans and messages you, and then doesn’t interact with you anywhere else unless perhaps you respond to the message. Watching who posts on a subreddit isn’t following anyone.

…behaving in a way that would discourage a reasonable person from participating on Reddit…

Does it though? Firstly, I think you have to argue that this even applies to banning people in the first place - because you could argue that by your interpretation this would apply to a mod of a subreddit banning somebody for not following the rules in that subreddit, and I think this is obviously not what Reddit would consider harassment.
But furthermore, does this really discourage someone from using Reddit? If I received a message informing me that I got banned from some subreddit I never participate in, my reaction would be a few seconds of confusion, then I’d probably never think of it again. >

Just to clarify, it's only the (supposed) messages you are talking about here, right? 
The actual ban is clearly not harassment. 
If the message is just the usual one sent by reddit when the ban is executed, there's an interesting reddit feature related to this: it only sends a message to the user for a ban if the user has participated in the sub they are being banned for in some way, whether a post, comment, or vote. The intent of this feature is to prevent "ban-spamming". 
At that point, though... it's literally no different from any other ban issued to any other user that participates in a sub and is banned for any reason. Clearly those can't be a violation of the rules, no matter how much one might try to read them that way, or bans wouldn't be allowed. 
So basically all we're talking about is separate bot-issued PM's to users that are being banned. I can at least understand the view in that very limited case. But it's a dangerous path to go down, because then is any unsolicited message to someone "harassment"?
I tend to think not, and that that rules are talking about persistent, repeated unsolicited messages. Or messages that are inherently harassment, such as sexual harassment, hate speech, etc.
I've never actually seen or heard of such a PM-bot being used, mind you. It sounds very hypothetical to me. I'm pretty sure the vast majority just rely on the reddit-sent message. If you think that is harassment, you're probably not going to get very far unless the message contains profanity, hate-speech, or sexual innuendo. >

I just tested it with a brand new account, and received no message. >

I want to argue this from another direction, harassment is the very problem automated ban messages are attempting to solve.
Take the fight between r/Conservative and r/BlackLivesMatter.  Conservatives would commonly call BLM protesters a bunch of treasonous terrorist assholes, and worse. So they started preemptively banning people by association with the other sub. Quite a nuclear response, but that underscores the scope of the problem.
By the way, which two subs are the subject of your post? >

So... I'll prevent you from harassing me by pre-emptively harassing you? Look, again, the banning seems like a bad idea, but that's not the point of harassment I'm evoking. Instead, it's the automated message that announces the ban that seems to be harassment.
I'd rather not explicitly name the subs; I don't want to be personal, or to be accused of brigading. >

Preventing someone from harassing you by not opening the door and giving them access is not harassment. There are perfectly lovely Jehovah's Witnesses out there. But I'm not going to open my door when one comes knocking, and no one in the world considers that harassing them. >

Locking your door isn't harassment. Going up to a stranger at the market and telling them you've locked your door specifically to keep them out is. >

Which subs are doing that? Because I sure haven't seen/heard about it. Only when someone from a banned sub tries to participate in their sub >

Go make a new account and make some comments in controversial subs without comments in any default subs and watch the ban bots spam you. >

In gonna need you to tell me what subs to go to for that, since I've already left comments in Conservative on one of my accounts and that hasn't happened. >

Try ChurchofCovid ,KotakuinAction,politcalcompassmemes,4chan,greentext, trump zone, timpool and conspiracy for a few off the top of my head. >

It's pretty similar to that reddit "get help bot" or whatever it's called that sends you info for mental health assistance. It's pretty much exclusively used for harassment and to directly negatively affect the mental health of the target it's sent to. I blocked that shit but it's pretty damn abusive. >

The problem is not the bots it's the people abusing the reporting feature that are the problem. Bots should only be used to report a review hold on posts and clarified seasonings why a post is banned.
I've been banned from 2 subs because I did not agree with a political view point and got trolled. There is a definite learning curve with different subs having a few different rules. There's also a lot if people on here who are very mean and nasty and somehow have avoided getting banned. All posts subject to a potential ban should be held and reviewed by a real person. the person reporting the alleged breaking of rules should also be checked and reporting history tracked. >


The messages out of the blue are almost certainly unwanted

They aren't out of the blue, they are direct result of behavior that caused a ban. They are operational messages that are used in a place you voluntary contributed to.

the context provided and, more importantly, the action taken are certainly invective

Nope, for context to be invective it would need to be insulting, abusive, or highly critical language. None of this applies to standard ban messages - they are informative and only serve to inform you that your behavior was judged to go against rules and resulted in a ban.

Here, a user is posting in a completely un-related subreddit and receives an automated invective from a third-party controlled bot. This is effectively following them around reddit

Nope, there is no "following around reddit" it is a message that is sent via channel that is designed for this (direct communication) only in response to voluntary participation in a place (you need to post/comment at subreddit to get automodded) that broke rules you were to accept before participating.

Aside from the literal fact that a permanent ban from a subreddit discourages participation in Reddit

Nope, it blocks you from a particular sub, that is a feature of Reddit.

the overarching policy of auto-banning users of certain subs is certainly an effort of mods from third parties discouraging the use of Reddit for entire swaths of users

How auto-bans in some subreddits discourage me from using Reddit? I can use it without problem. And getting banned on sub means I have broke rules of the sub, so I should expect to be banned.

My problem wasn't the ban, which I couldn't care less about, but the unwanted, unkind automated message that I got out of the blue.

But that has nothing to do with your CMV. Does auto-bot messages can be used as harassment? They may be. Does this mean that every message like that is harassment? Certainly not. >

I mostly agree with what you are saying, but I think autobans CAN discourage Reddit use.
I only have an anecdotal example, but I’ve been permanently banned from a few subs because I’ve posted on some conspiracy subs. I only post on those subs to try an counter the endless amounts of disinformation on those subs, especially related to COVID. 
It’s slightly discouraging that the context of my posts aren’t taken into account when I’m banned, but I understand those are the rules of the sub so I accept it. >

You’ve said that you aren’t opposed to the practice of banning itself. You’ve also said elsewhere that you don’t approve of mods sending you a personalized notification. Since you can join any sub with a single click, and moderators, as humans, can’t respond as quickly, how else do you suggest that they inform you that you won’t be allowed to subscribe?
You’ve painted yourself into a logical corner here. You say you accept the practice of this type of banning, but there are only two options for notification: bot and human, neither of which you will accept. Surely one should be notified somehow of their ban, so how do propose it be done? >

I'm absolutely opposed the the practice of preemptive banning, but that's not the point I'm making. Preemptive banning isn't "harassment." The unsolicited message is. Not my job to figure out how these mods should implement their policies without tripping up the Harassment Policy.
Logical corner neutralized. >

Here's how these mods should implement their ridiculous policy of banning everyone who posted outside of their safe space: Leave folks alone until they try to post in the sub they're banned from. Then inform them of the ban, and the pathetic reason for it, and their road to salvation.
I've had a few of these passive aggressive messages myself. I don't think "harassment" is quite the right word for it. "Spam," maybe. But I think they deliberately stay just on the right side of "abusive" to technically break no rules. >

Well, the rules aren't applied equally at Reddit. If I recall correctly, TheDonald sub was banned for threatening cops, while that became a central theme of the BLM sub. C'est la vie. >

I actually included words to that effect in my reply, before deleting that bit for the sake of brevity. If these messages did break any rules then I'm sure they'd be selectively enforced. >

Being banned is not invective. Its a ban. Case closed. >

Read my post again more carefully please. The harassment isn't the ban but the unsolicited private message announcing the ban. >


the action taken are certainly invective

I did, thanks. >


I did, thanks.

Looks like you forgot the first half of that sentence. Here it is again for you: "The messages out of the blue are almost certainly unwanted and the context provided and, more importantly, the action taken are certainly invective." >

I mean, are they invective when they can be summed up as "by participating in that sub, you are no longer welcome here"? >

"By being that race, you are no longer welcome here."
"By loving that gender, you are no longer welcome here."
"By being that sex, you are no longer welcome here."
"By holding that religion, you are not no longer welcome here."
"By belonging to that culture, you are no longer welcome here."
"By living in that neighborhood, you are no longer welcome here." >

Are you saying that posting to a subreddit is so integral to people's identity, that discriminating based on that is equivelent to discriminating on essentially unmutable characteristics?
Because participating in a sub is an action you took.  Almost everything else you posted is a thing you are. >

Oh, I don't know. The Frankfurt School made a pretty strong case that politics are derived from personality. My point, which you seemed to get, was that there's a spectrum and I don't know where to draw that line of acceptable exclusion and discrimination.
I suspect you'd have a problem with a subreddit that banned users from posting because they were, say, Muslim. I would too. Insofar as religion is a choice, so is ideology. I'm not sure where to draw that line... where would you draw it? >


I suspect you'd have a problem with a subreddit that banned users from posting because they were, say, Muslim. I would too. 

I wouldn't if the point of the sub was "this is a place for X religion to talk about their issues."  If it was only Muslims, I wouldn't be ok with it, but if it was "all other religions" I would be ok with it.  That said, I would object if it wasn't a specific religion subreddit. 
As for where I would draw the line, I am ok with "when tons of members of a sub keeps harassing/trolling another sub, the entire sub becomes banned with an appeal process for rejoining."  Because once again, participating in that sub is a mutable characteristic, even if you politically lean in that direction.
Like, if r/conservative wanted to ban anyone who posted in r/trans because they kept being trolled by them, I would be ok with it.  If they did it because r/trans people are trans, I am less ok with it. >

I agree 100000%, no need to change your view here partner. 
Honestly, having had friends who was in control of an account which many years ago was shadow banned... its downright cruel. They'd make these long, intricate, well-typed posts paragraphs long. They'd post it in their desire sub, after having been there for the required time with the required Karma. I presume most of us have typed a paper for school once or twice and remember just how much work that could be. Well, this was equal to that in effort and time. Alas, they'd post it. Anxoiously awaiting the many replies and deep conversations which were due to come. 
Nothing. & Nothing. & Nothing for all time for all posts. 
It wasn't until I confirmed for them that they had been shadow banned, and that nothing they posted was ever visible to anyone on the website. It hit me almost as hard as it hit them, that feeling that every minute every keystroke they'd put in on the site was completely wasted. It really was sad man. Worse yet, the reason for this shadow ban? Never disclosed. No real effective way to fight it. 
That is cruel and it goes against everything Reddit is for.
Honestly, Reddit is a steaming hulk of shit nowadays. I rarely post but this one reminded me of my friends devastating shadow ban. This place has been run into the ground and it will never be the same. But on the flip side, black people are now treated as the best thing since sliced bread on reddit! Yay!
P.S. - its not about black people, women, or anything of the sort. rather just making a point that in the name of going woke the site has been gutted and neutured beyond recognition and that is to everybody's loss. >

Are the bans appealable? 
My comments would get automoderated on a certain sub (to name is it even against Reddit rules) which effectively resulted in everything I posted being censored.  
It was a subreddit for my home city, but now it is a place where anyone with a dissenting view against the current Canadian government is banned/censored. 
Not sure how reddit got this bad so fast, but sometimes it feels almost too fast! >

Moderators are volunteers, and you get what you pay for >

Mods can generally ban users for any reason they wish. Furthermore, they are volunteers who are trying to keep their subreddits safe and tidy, with very limited support from Reddit itself. There's nothing wrong with using automation to make their jobs easier. 
There are valid reasons for considering users' general account history, or participation in other subreddits.
For example, suppose you moderate a subreddit for survivors of domestic assault. The subreddit is intended as a safe space for people to get help and support.
Then, you start getting harassing and abusive comments in your sub. You discover that a good amount of those users are also participating in a subreddit called "ILoveBeatingWomen."
If I were that moderator, I can't imagine any possible scenario where users of the BeatingWomen subreddit would ever participate productively in my support subreddit. A blanket ban would be appropriate, and it would save me the unpleasant work of dealing with the users who are coming from there. >


I can't imagine any possible scenario where users of the BeatingWomen subreddit would ever participate productively in my support subreddit

Replace BeatingWomen with the KKK - an equally abhorrent sub if it existed - and Daryl Davis is the exception to your rule. >

I guess, but that's a one-in-a-million example. Daryl Davis is welcome to appeal his ban, then. >

So you acknowledge that it's possible to post in a subreddit whose primary subject you adamantly disavow? Now, extrapolate to a community based on discussion in which highly ranked posts appear on a Front Page where they are seen by individuals who probably don't hold the views of the subreddit and who nevertheless wish to engage in the discussion to offer their perspective. It's a stretch, I know... >

What I'm wondering about is, if following a user around reddit is discouraged and against the policy, then why is everyone's comment history public? >

Automods always ban my accounts when I say ANYTHING even the tiniest bit controversial, so i guess >

I agree completely. I was banned from r/relationship_advice because I had posted a video that I had posted in there detailing ways in which men can get women to fall in love with them. I had first seen online of someone suggesting a potential marketing strategy and so I was testing it out to see if it would work since I am disabled and at that time I had nothing coming in. So I spent hours of time creating the video, trying to perfect it to the best of my ability, then I posted it in the subreddit and went to bed. When I woke up, I was bombarded with tons of incredibly insensitive comments (some even saying that men shouldn't respect women 🙄), and then I got a message saying that I had been banned from posting and commenting within the group. Imo the punishment never justified the crime because I was new to the subreddit and had no idea that something like that would go against their standards. I mean, maybe with all of the negative comments I was receiving it could have been interpreted as "controversial", but I digress. I think since I was a new member they should have just given me a warning and translated whatever terms that my video supposedly went against since I am autistic/ADHD and I often need things explained in a different way so I can understand it better and not make the same mistakes again. This has been one of the discouragements I have faced from posting things on Reddit because sometimes people just aren't aware of what they are going against. I mean, if it was for promotion, all my video had in it was a little message at the end stating if they liked the video and would like some help attracting someone to click on the link below. But it was completely optional, and I don't think anybody watched it far enough to get to that part anyway since they were so ready to explode in the comments section. >

It's definitely stupid to auto-ban someone for activity done outside of the banning sub, but I don't consider it harassment. >

I mean the alternative is by hand bans and for larger subs this basically means no other moderating could get done, which would ultimately undermine the whole point of trying to filter users who engage with subs which a mod team feels will only have community members not interested in good faith cross community engagement.  The ban bot tool you're talking about would basically just be the Reddit analogue for Mastodon's federation tools.  Users who link up to X node who's rules and community you find prone to creating hostile actors in your community get ban hammered, maybe after a given number of posts or comments or whatevs.  
In the fediverse you can take it a step further and refuse to federate with any nodes who federate with the problem node you're worried about hostile contact with.  This famously allowed the Fediverse to basically Chase Gab off when they tried to show up and flood all the other nodes with their garbage.  In Reddit's case this might be going as far as to IP, MAC, and linked identifying accound banning someone who you think engages too much with a problem community.
Back to why mods doing this isn't any real problem, chances are you weren't engaging with that community anyways, and even if you were, if you're really so opposed to someone banning along those lines, you're probably not gonna be happy with that mod team's community anyways, so favor done.  
Problem with advocating against these kinds of tools is that there are large communities which host a userbase and content base related to marginalized communities or folks of one side of a big societal argument who would like a space where they can discuss their views and not have it turn into a battleground with the other side.  They can't afford to be considerate to the cases of people trying to be open minded and talking to the other side, because trying to let them in creates ground for hostile actors to launch from in mass trolling campaigns or to pick fights with community members.
Plus, it just works.  In the early days of GamerGate, someone created a tool which autoblocked twitter users who followed any two of five different right wing influencers, and that did it!  'course the GamerGaters caught wind and launched an arms race to try and beat the mass block list in order to continue discoursing at women minorities and queer folks, but the point still stands that blanket bans do actually at least in the short term achieve the desired outcome of shutting down hostile actors before they become a source of reports mods and admins have gotta go through by hand. >

I agree, but for a different reason. It's ludicrous to be banned from one subreddit for participating in another subreddit. This is supposed to be the same site. If the other subreddit is so dangerous it shouldn't exist here in the first place. 
If you work for Ford trucks, should you be banned for buying a Ford Mustang? >

How does it work? If I visit r/RapeIsGoodActually does this mean I get a ban-message from some other random sub? Or do I need to post at that other sub?
If the later, I think a message (if worded respectfully) is a good service. Much better approach than shadowbanning.
If a moderator uses bots to sends automated rude messages, then they should have a site-wide ban, of course. (but there doesn't seem to be any accountability for mods) >

One has to apply a certain degree of common sense when interpreting guidelines. Clearly there is a need to send redditors information pertinent to their account in a factual manner, and that cannot be harassment any more than sending someone who owes you money an invoice can be harassment. If the messages were unnecessarily rude, or there were an unnecessary number of them, one may start to have an argument, but the behaviour you describe would seem to quite obviously fall under a common sense exemption to the policy.