Moderators of a 50,000 strong community on Reddit pulled off a dramatic work of political satire earlier today that pokes fun at the site’s fascination with conservative presidential candidate Rep. Ron Paul.
The r/circlejerk community completely altered its appearance in order to mock the site’s ardent Paul supporters. The final product is a bizarre but gorgeous amalgamation of Paul’s official website and Reddit’s traditional design.
It’s as if producers of Comedy Central’s The Daily Show suddenly quit their jobs, taught themselves web design, and took over a Reddit community.
All r/circlejerk’s posts today poke fun at Ron Paul — and Reddit libertarians who support him.
For example:
[Today I learned] Ron Paul doesn’t need to work out. He stays fit by exercising his civil liberties.
“When I am elected, no longer will watery shit run out of the bottle before your ketchup does”- Ron Paul
Paul supporters are a noisy group on Reddit. The section r/ronpaul has about 7,500 hundred subscribers; r/libertarian counts nearly 40,000. Pro-Paul redditors frequently jump into other sections of the site, such as r/politics, and engage in intense politic debates.
The enthusiastic Paul promotion caught the attention of the site’s r/circlejerk community, where users devote themselves to mocking popular trends in Reddit culture.
Moderators on Reddit — who are volunteers and not employed by the Conde-Nast owned website — can edit their own section’s CSS code to affect its appearance. This usually involves changing a few colors here or there, or adding a header image to page.
But r/circlejerk opted for a complete makeover.
Reddit’s general manager, Erik Martin, told the Daily Dot he thought the work was “beautifully executed.”
It’s “top notch CSS work and top notch satire” Martin said. He added that he’s “not sure if there has been anything quite on this level” ever produced on the site.
