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The moderators who run much of the site are not paid directly, but they're definitely in league.
Powermods took over reddit a long time ago. Hell, I'd go so far as to say reddit secretly promoted r/the_donald and other extremist subreddits, and had a direct hand in getting him elected.
they’re definitely in league.
They're really not. I got to interact with many of them during the vaxxhappened protest and I got the impression that they were largely rather timid people. I do think that Reddit management is happy with the arrangement though, because it means they can abuse the mods knowing they won't rock the boat.
The situation around the Donald is probably true, but the most telling thing is when they replaced the top KotakuInAction moderator in order to keep the subreddit not-private.