I am banned from ‘subreddit’ threads on Reddit just about everyday. I want to spread ideas, so I post links and text or pictures on many different subreddit message threads everyday. People who are in charge of the subreddit, the moderators, often guard the subreddit and want a particular point of view emphasized. Fair enough. I am banned and have posts removed everyday. I just move on and post somewhere else. There are over 100,000 subreddit message threads on Reddit. The recommendation from the administrators of the site who want to keep conflict down and information flowing is that a person should simply set up their own subreddit when they are banned somewhere. If the topic of ‘knitting’ say is covered in r/knitting and you get in a conflict with the moderator – simply set up a new subreddit called r/knitting_ and the two threads can happily display what they want to different audiences who seek them out. Or someone could read both.

I was putting a few of my drawing videos on a Reddit subreddit called r/HowToDraw. I made a series of sketching videos for beginning drawing and related to the class I taught concerning rapid visualization. When I went back to the subreddit I saw that my post was not displayed. Why was I excluded? I have no idea. But I wanted to put my contribution to the practice of drawing before a public. Even a small public.

So, I created a new subreddit. All I had to do was have a title. I decided on r/HowToDraw101 using the standard college ‘101’ for an indication of a basic course number. All I had to do was type the name and then copy and paste the name at each of a blank fill-in space on the Reddit form to create a new subreddit. I picked a light grey motif and used no pictures for the top of the subreddit. A minute or two later I had the subreddit set up and I began to list videos I had posted to Youtube.

I organized this collection of drawing videos and present them anew to the public. The videos have been on Youtube for a while. Not many views of some of them – maybe 12 or 13 – a bakers dozen. Since I was banned from r/HowToDraw I assembled these videos that I made and watched them again. I have been re-drawing the exercises as I drink my morning coffee. I have gone through lots of scrap paper as I scribble with my broken crayon. As I look at the pencil drawings I wonder why I was banned. I have plenty of strong political opinions, or artistic criticisms, or personal favorites with movies that someone might disagree with. But… what could someone object to in the videos about line drawings above. They are just straight lines and curved lines and circles and ovals and squares and rectangles…. I’m not afraid to provoke people, but, I don’t get it.