This is a moral conundrum. Yes, some of the smaller sub-reddits are good, but by participating, you legitimize the conflict/fakenews/horrorshow that is the main website. It's like saying you enjoy the trains running on time in Nazi Germany whilst ignoring the rest of what the regime is.
Is Snopes having a hard time with money? The article (on mobile) had two huge full-width ads that you had to scroll past, and a persistent banner ad at the bottom, and they're still asking for donations:
But the page isn't covered in user-hostile ads that rely on intensive surveillance and sharing your personal data with dozens of shady companies.
Edit: Your comment really bothers me. At no point did I suggest that websites should not ask their users for money. I was wondering about and criticizing their apparently heavy use of user-abusive ads, while still asking users directly for money. Usually on the Web we see one or the other but not both.
I sorry to disturb you. It was not my intent. I just disagree about the seriousness of the ads displayed in your example. An ad for Whisky and/or Walgreens(a pharmacy) don't seem too bad compared to other ads I have seen.
Snopes probably gets a lot of bandwidth (and probably attacks) just due to them being very mainstream.
Those smaller communities will realize (mostly too late) that they've built themselves on a platform that can't be trusted and one day will probably not be archivable.
It's really too bad that the StackExchange "OpenID" thing never went anywhere. Otherwise we'd get the same kind of "one login, many communities" benefits of Reddit without forcing everyone to use a centralized platform like Reddit (even if authentication is still centralized in OpenID).
It's not a moral conundrum, and reddit is nothing like a genocidal fascist government.
There are times when I argue that "apps" or sites must be thought of differently than the Internet itself, but this is not one of them. Reddit has no monopoly on hobby chat, or on tiktok garbage, or on local communities, or on news commentary. It is not the same kind of network-effect trap as, say, Facebook.
If ever someone asks me about reddit or if it's useful, I say to stay off any community greater than about 100-150k. Use it for discussing specific video games or hobbies, or on tightly moderated subs with focused discussion.
If any sub has posts from "karma farmers", accounts with super high karma like 500k or more, then it's probably a place worth being suspicious of from either a utility OR an astroturfing standpoint. Lots of agenda-pushing.
