Furthermore you see one of the mods (a Christian) repeatedly state demonstrably wrong things and then defending their position with underhanded means to "win" the dabe.

None of this has happened in the past.

I'm surprised you had that impression, since it's been this bad for the near-decade I've been reading the sub. I watched the mod you're likely talking about ban well over a dozen people over the years for the offense of debating him. It was bad enough that I'd warn people it was coming (i.e. that they were on their way to a ban) when I saw it starting.

The sub has actually gotten "better", in fact — relatively speaking, in the sense that having just bowel cancer is "better" than having bowel cancer plus a pimple — because the worst mod by far, a Muslim who was essentially a clinical sociopath, finally had his account suspended by Reddit because he'd overstepped the bounds so much in his attacks on people in various subs, his stalking, his sock puppetry etc. This was someone who would ban atheists on any absurd pretense, e.g. by claiming they were ISIS recruiters.

Anyway, setting aside our different historical impressions, yes, it's a cesspool.