This is only if you aren’t logged in. If you login to reddit you can use a VPN fine. It is still so incredibly annoying though.

Activists should not be using email for activism at all. I agree on mullvad for the VPN. This video does a good job explaining the issues with email for people who need privacy from groups like governments : https://youtu.be/iH626CXyNtE

I also question recommending signal over one of the decentralized alternatives like matrix or simplex, though really that’s probably fine.

IMO the signal matrix bridge solves this problem. It does not do video calls to my knowledge, but it does let me have all my signal messages on all my devices, with no limitations.