A lot of people don’t want discussion. They want a “safe place” where they don’t have to deal with whatever they don’t like (for whatever valid or invalid reasons in their opinion). A lot of the demographic that they attract or support are polarized or feel the internet (in general) is for emotional hot topics where they can act out whatever real or imagined differences. The evolution of the internet bravado of anonymity.
Edit: If it wasn’t clear, I don’t have any issue with what they do. Even Qt3 had to lay down the law of what kind of place it wanted to be at various times, which it has every right to do so.
These are really important issues, that extend well beyond gaming. In the classroom I wrestle with this stuff all the time, balancing creating safety and helping people feel welcome with the need to challenge people intellectually and critically. I usually err on the side of compassion, even if sometimes I think we might lose some of the intellectual edge or impact I really would like to have. If I was teaching grad students in specific fields, it would probably play out differently, but teaching undergraduates who did not really sign up for a harrowing journey through the evil that men do but rather are trying to get a degree and go have successful lives as game developers or network security engineers or what not makes for a very different landscape.
Also, as a cis-gendered, heterosexual white man, I often feel a degree of humility in thinking about aggressively demanding full and untrammeled discourse on all subjects, because for the most part none of what we might work with strikes at my identity or my existence (as a Jew there are, yeah, some things that get a bit skeevy for sure though).
Certainly. Comes down to whether you can separate an artist from their work, and it’s all subjective. I myself couldn’t enjoy Cosby’s work, but Louis CK is just barely under the line, and Aziz Ansari I have no concerns about at all. Weinstein was WAY over the line (that poor fern!) but I’ll still watch Inglorious Basterds, Django Unchained, and Pulp Fiction, because he doesn’t profit from them anymore. Blizzard I find distasteful, but not sufficient to boycott. Your take is likely different across the board.
That said, this particular how-do-you-do isn’t about whether you enjoy the product of a terrible company or person, but whether discussion of that product should be banned. That comes down to community standards. Personally, I don’t believe in preemptively chilling conversation. My preferred approach would be to have a politics thread in that forum and a gaming thread in this one. Then if the gaming one turns into a flamewar, separate them via aggressive moderation.
Which makes sense, but is hard to do. Everything is connected; everything is in some way political. While with good moderation, and more importantly, good will among the members of the community, you can create something of a separation, it won’t be easy and it probably won’t satisfy anyone.
Yeah, separating the Art from the Artist has long been a strange rabbit hole to go down. The truly creative artists tend to have some some really strong issues alcoholism, drug addiction, violence towards women, etc.
In some ways, I do think that the part of them which can create great art is tied to many other less savory pieces.
As indicated per above, I find that the strong themes of inclusion and family/friends in the Harry Potter books are so strong, they will outlive anything JKR says/does (and that I can even make the argument that HP’s ridding himself of Voldemort’s Horcrux/Soul via the Resurrection Stone can be seen as a metaphor for something akin to Trans surgery, as much as JKR would want to deny it). So, to me, this is a nothingburger. YMMV, of course.
This is the kind of reaction that rankles folks. You elaborated well on your stance and why you interpret the books the way you do, but when you end with this, it’s sort of a blunt admission that since the issues don’t impact you, they don’t matter. If you didn’t mean that, that’s cool, but just know that “nothingburger” is a pretty dismissive term in most interpretations.
Personally, I get that Rowling’s work has themes that are inclusive and will outlive her. The problem is that she’s alive now and using her platform to boost anti-trans garbage.
Well, to me too because I’m not trans. If I was I wouldn’t want to support that odious woman even peripherally. But the fact is everybody’s approach is different, this is a gaming forum, and banning discussion of a game is weird. I wouldn’t feel comfortable banning discussion of a blizzard game either, and there are a lot more cis women than trans people.
That’s different from banning hate speech itself. No problem with that.
Note this is just my opinion. I don’t make the call on such things. But I can say I wouldn’t want to be a part of any gaming community that went so far.
Edit: exactly. It’s not fair to dismiss someone’s concerns just because you aren’t trans or gay or black or Jewish or whatever. But I wouldn’t ban discussion of a game produced by an anti-semite either. A game itself prompting ant-semitism would be fine to discuss too. Posting something promoting hateful ideologies is a different matter.
Yeah, we have threads here for games from all kinds of odious developers. I don’t advocate banning discussion in any of them. Discuss away!
I just kind of bugs me a bit when a bunch of majority older straight white dudes sit around and grouse about the youngin’s being sensitive about bigots.
It’s mostly because I go with the message of the books rather than the garbage she is spouting, and as such, support the books and movies and games as I choose, for those messages. I argue against her garbage in just about every way (IMHO, trans surgery will be as common and reversible as plastic surgery in a couple of decades tops, and will likely include the ability for XY folks to be pregnant and carry a baby to term somehow, should they desire, so I do find the entire argument silly).
Back to the game…I’m also very on the fence about this, because like @triggercut I just can’t get a good read on it. But I do need something to play otherwise I have to resub to WoW and no one wants that. I guess i could wait for actual impressions, but where is the fun in that.
I imagine it’s a performative action by head admin there in the hopes to finally placate a few of their more very unwell and severely-online members. Unlikely to actually stick too, I bet, not once any of their more-equal-than-others members wants to be very vocally upset about the game for whatever reason (sales, reviews, Rowlings apocalyptic trans-genocides sweeping the globe, etc.), after which discussion will probably be conditionally allowed.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think the rest of the world operates like that forum; just rare exceptions such as that. For the most part in my experience, people on forums would rather discuss things and connect with one another, than play king of the hill, and that’s anathema to the posters that most frequent ResetEra.
Edit: apologies for the meta-commentary, I don’t really have much to add to the Hogwarts discussion itself other than I too initially thought it was the Just Cause team making the game, and have been having to temper my expectations ever since learning differently.
