I’m not a mod, but I think if I became one I would hold onto my position unless I knew my replacement would be good. Don’t want them removing the rule against calling people slurs, then I and many others might start avoiding the community that gave me joy. Of course, this is a more drastic example about concerns over how a replacement mod would moderate—but you’ve probably seen internet fights about seemingly niche problems and mods probably don’t want a stable community position on that topic devolving into firefights over it again. Could be taken as power tripping, enforcing your opinion on a specific small position and being unhappy that someone else might not do that anymore, but could also just be genuine desire for a peaceful place and not wanting flame wars over that contentious topic.

Right now, if you don’t quit protesting and get your entire mod team removed by Reddit, you will all be replaced by an unknown. Will they take the “wrong” stance on Niche Problem and upset the community? More importantly, will they even care and remove harassment and ban rule-breakers? Or will it be a free-for-all as they do absolutely nothing? Now this might not be a problem if everyone would just move off of Reddit, but that’s easier said than done.

Also, people who probably have history degrees may not be better people than me or superior to me in general, but I’d imagine they’re more highly qualified to run a history subreddit than I am. There’s the arrogant “I’m superior to everyone” and there’s also the realistic “I am superior to the average person at this one particular task.” Most average people have some level of competence in an area that surpasses that of others in at least their immediate social group. Maybe this friend grows really good tomatoes, you’d want them to teach you to do that and not your friend who doesn’t do that. You’re all equally worthy people, but tomato-growing friend is honestly superior to the rest of your social circle in that one task. You don’t have to believe you have some amazing special gift nobody else can acquire, just that you might have interests some others might not and spent time gaining skills related to that interest that others spent elsewhere.

Since when is Reddit the beacon of all that is right in regards of information? Why not pack up and start an community somewhere else?

Reddit is not the beacon of everything right, it’s also carried disinformation before. But it is a place a lot of people liked to source information from. People might want to leave up posts to help other people who search something, keeping in mind Average Joe who just wants his tech problem fixed (and of course, found nowhere else online where it got solved) and favoring his plight over leaving good data in Reddit hands for them to get more clicks and money from.

Also, packing up and moving somewhere else is easier said than done. I’ve been trying to get people to move from one nice niche community to a Fediverse replacement, messaging moderation teams and posting about the existing Fediverse replacement in the subreddit. A lot of people just kept posting on the subreddit. Sometimes this post about the Fediverse replacement has extremely restricted visibility because it gets removed if not put in a self-promotion thread nobody reads. Mod teams don’t always reply. It’s easier with official backing instead of one random user doing it, but even still a lot of subs with official Fediverse replacements still have people posting on the original.

Why even protest? The most ironic thing should be that r/AskHistorians should know of all people what happens with mutinies or strikes that have weak or no resolve.

I actually have no idea what their actions are besides not all abandoning stepping down, but I’m pretty sure they have posts about it. Will edit this post with links to them.

EDIT: most current post (link is libreddit and will not give Reddit traffic)

Why would you even strike when you would fold by the first sign of friction that is coming your way?

Why do people make New Year’s Eve resolutions that they break within the first month? Because they don’t have a crystal ball and think they can do it, and not everyone is exposed to statistics about how most New Year’s Eve resolutions get broken. I think it’s encouraging they at least tried, not everyone is born a perfect protestor.

As for your last three paragraphs, good for the union, honestly, it would be nice if stories like that were more common. Especially from people who have a ton to lose if it goes wrong—that goes above and beyond in my eyes.