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How Reddit would be in a very different parallel universe
In a very different parallel universe, reddit is the same as it currently exists. The system of upvotes and downvotes work just as they do now, except that there is one small difference.
In this very different parallel universe, the downvote button is a little bit more difficult to access. It's not impossible, of course; it just requires a slightly greater amount of effort.
The reason for this is to filter out spam downvotes. Spammers, of course, would be more than happy to waste that extra effort in order to ruin the day of someone they don't like. So reddit has a system in place to reduce the impact of these nefarious trolls.
The upvote/downvote system during the first few hours after a post is made has been proven to be ineffective in detecting troll posts. So instead, reddit uses what are known as 'active downvotes'. When someone attempts to downvote a post, they must select from one of three possible reasons for the downvote.
The first is 'This post is spam'. This one is self-explanatory. If a post seems to be blatantly advertising something, then it can be downvoted as spam.
The second is 'This post is offensive'. This one requires a little more consideration. If a user attempts to downvote something because they find it personally offensive, then reddit has the right to override that downvote. And if someone else disagrees and thinks that the post should not be considered offensive in any way, then upvoting will override the downvote.