Blizzard bans pro hearthstone player for supporting Hong Kong protests

[spartaman64]

Just now, LAwLz said:

Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that an employee of Blizzard doing something? It's a bit different to ask for permission to do something when you're an employee, and someone else going rogue to spread a political message while live.

 

Just now, spartaman64 said:

their job itself is a political stance im just saying that blizzard has no problem taking a political stance on issues that wont cost them money thats all im saying

 

[spartaman64]

Just now, pas008 said:

what does this have to do with anything

 

please explain this logic please do

 

 

1 minute ago, spartaman64 said:

their job itself is a political stance im just saying that blizzard has no problem taking a political stance on issues that wont cost them money thats all im saying

 

[pas008]

Just now, spartaman64 said:

 

 

and what is that political stand of that job?

[spartaman64]

Just now, pas008 said:

and what is that political stand of that job?

diversity its right in the name

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, spartaman64 said:

thats exactly what i said. ive never said blizzard cant legally do this or anything i said they banned him because of money and they should own up to that and not this false narrative that they are being sensitive about people's feelings

What was the point of this ban? To avoid offending a giant market, right? Why would they then turn around and say "oh yeah fuck the people in terrible situations fighting for their rights we just want money LMAO "

You're yelling at a giant corporate entity that doesn't give a fuck about morals if they come at the expense of making more money. Of course they dodge around hot political topics that can offend massive markets and embrace positive, low risk ones. 

[Falkentyne]

1 hour ago, spartaman64 said:

ok guess ill consider myself banned by blizzard for offending the KKK and never playing any of their games again.

if you ask blizzard where they stand on that debate are they going to say we need to be impartial and not take a side? no they are going to say they support minorities because it doesnt cost them 

This is probably the absolute worst *Straw man* argument I've seen since...forever.

Dear God...

[LAwLz]

7 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

their job itself is a political stance im just saying that blizzard has no problem taking a political stance on issues that wont cost them money thats all im saying

I think you missed part of my post. I think the biggest difference here is that one is a decision from Blizzard which has probably had people vote and approve of it. The other was one non-Blizzard employee using their platform to spread their own agenda.

It's not that Blizzard don't pick sides on politics. It's that Blizzard don't want other people using their platform to spread their political agenda without permission or prior notice.

 

I am 99% sure their reaction would have been the same if the player had taken the exact opposite stance and promoted the bill.

 

 

And as ridiculous as your analogy is, I would not be surprised if Blizzard had banned someone if they hijacking the stream to talk about the KKK.

[spartaman64]

2 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

What was the point of this ban? To avoid offending a giant market, right? Why would they then turn around and say "oh yeah fuck the people in terrible situations fighting for their rights we just want money LMAO "

You're yelling at a giant corporate entity that doesn't give a fuck about morals if they come at the expense of making more money. Of course they dodge around hot political topics that can offend massive markets and embrace positive, low risk ones. 

i was interested in trying wow classic but i wont now and i was interested in ow2 but ill skip that also and i urge everyone that hold the same view as me to do the same. true theres much less people in the US so it wont be enough to make them regret it but at least i want to make it so blizzard doesnt get to have their cake and eat it too

[williamcll]

Imagine if right now, the confederate states decides not to stick with the rest of the United States and begins an international campaign to declare independence.

 

Would you let them state their intentions online or would you ban them?

[pas008]

7 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

diversity its right in the name

oh for some variety

 

so how in the world is letting someone talk one sided diverse?

 

hardly political imo

 

glad they nipped it in the butt all we need is more colin kaerpernicks in this world hahahaha

[Falkentyne]

I'm fully aware of that.  But what does having an African-American girlfriend have to do with using a gaming platform for political purposes?

 

I mean if you went on blizzard's tournament, showed your girlfriend on stream and said at the end: "All white supremacists must be rounded up and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law", Blizzard could ban you for that also.

 

 

[Bcat00]

This is reasonable on blizzards end, no issue with the ban. It’s fine to support a movement but to do it on someone else’s platform and drag the company into the hot mess is just asking for trouble. Dude should’ve thought better 

[Valentyn]

35 minutes ago, jstudrawa said:

Were they mages or warlocks?  Cuz mages suck.

 

No idea why, I am not Blizzard.  I'm just reading the words on the page, not looking for other reasons or agendas.  If I had to guess they did a blanket anyone-associated-with-him type thing.

Apparently they said they'd end the interview if he mentioned something, so he then talks about it, they try to duck under the desks to not be associated with it, end the interview as they said they would; and then get fired for it lol.

[The_Prycer]

They even fired the casters so they couldn't be asked about the incident in an official Blizzard capacity. Full scorched earth policy.

 

I like the games old Blizzard made and while I certainly support the protests in Hong Kong (1312), I can see why Blizz wouldn't want any political affiliations to a very ugly event, even if distancing themselves from anyone making a statement about it can appear like they are siding with Chinese money over everything else.

 

It's really, REALLY easy to sit here and say Blizz was the hero who lived long enough to see themselves 

becomes the villain and while I was certainly quick to jump to that conclusion, the more I think about it the more I am inclined to believe Blizz is just trying to take the neutral stance so they can do what game's companies do and make games that everyone can spend money on.

 

Now excuse me while I listen to some NWA

[RejZoR]

44 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

That makes very little sense. It seems to me they were upset about someone promoting their political agenda through blizzard which is not what any company wants. Blizzard is a company and 99.9% of companies want to stay away from politics in general and when someone is using them to broadcast a very political message then yeah they are going to ban them. I mean there is a time and a place to do these sorts of things and a post game interview isn't one of them. Its similar with politics and the work place. You can have whatever political beliefs you want but dont go bringing them to work because it will get you in trouble regardless of what you affiliation is. I think you are not understanding that this has basically nothing to do with what political stance they hold and how valid it is but rather that they used blizzard's platform without permission to broadcast their political stances. 

That makes even less sense. If you punish something, you're clearly catering to the opposition. Being neutral would be: "we make the game, the rest is on players". We don't endorse anything or anyone. If they feel they want or need to express anything, that's THEIR belief or expression. But they didn't run with that or express that stance.

[pas008]

12 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

That makes even less sense. If you punish something, you're clearly catering to the opposition. Being neutral would be: "we make the game, the rest is on players". We don't endorse anything or anyone. If they feel they want or need to express anything, that's THEIR belief or expression. But they didn't run with that or express that stance.

and then its not about the game anymore it becomes a platform for other movements

[Taf the Ghost]

1 minute ago, RejZoR said:

That makes even less sense. If you punish something, you're clearly catering to the opposition. Being neutral would be: "we make the game, the rest is on players". We don't endorse anything or anyone. If they feel they want or need to express anything, that's THEIR belief or expression. But they didn't run with that or express that stance.

The Chinese Government has "hard power" over anyone operating in China. Period. Let this be a good lesson to everyone about that. But, it's also a good lesson that these companies only "take a stand" when it's quite safe to do so. So what is safe, right now, is to be all for "diversity and inclusion" in Western Countries and cower in fear to the wraith of a mass-murdering, imperialist, racist Chinese Government.

 

I do enjoy the deep irony of watching people get tied into knots about HK when they called everyone that was against outsourcing so much manufacturing to China every horrible name they could come up with. Oh, look, you forced industries to give veto power to one of the most destructive & evil regimes in human history. What a shock it's gone badly!

 

As for Blizzard in this situation, the player should have known this was a kamikaze move. That's not really an issue. The issue is that the un-approved "politics" to Blizzard is clearly whatever is going to hurt their bottom-line. And firing the casters is pretty obscene, even if logical.

[Slayerking92]

No one watched South Park last week?

 

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/south-park-banned-chinese-internet-critical-episode-1245783

 

The most recent episode of South Park, "Band in China," has been generating loads of media attention for its sharp critique of the way Hollywood tends to shape its content to avoid offending Chinese government censors in any way whatsoever.

 

 

This is just Blizzard's way to stay in the Chinese market.

[samcool55]

This is really starting to become much more than just HK fighting for freedom imo.

Like, Blizzard did a dick move here, NBA apparantly also showed it being pro-china, some actors also went the pro-china route but then you have south park going full "f-you china".

 

This is more becoming a situation of which companies can we actually trust and which ones are corrupt because it clearly goes further than we expected.

[Leviathan-]

Blizz did the right thing for themselves. What they did not do was stand up for whats right. In the end, it's protecting the all mighty dollar and I need that stock number as high as possible.

[Blademaster91]

I agree with the other mentions this is clearly more politics than tech news, but Blizzard is caring only about money, even firing the casters was a sh*t move.

Many companies are doing anything to avoid upsetting China rather than doing the right thing.

[spartaman64]

On 10/9/2019 at 6:03 AM, WereCat said:

<snip>

Its hard to avoid all and any politics nowadays like for example the adobe Venezuela topic recently. And there were similar topics like the adpocolypse topic about the politics regarding company policy. I don't harbor any animosity towards anyone in this thread only the Chinese government and blizzard

[pas008]

8 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

Its hard to avoid all and any politics nowadays like for example the adobe Venezuela topic recently. And there were similar topics like the adpocolypse topic about the politics regarding company policy. I don't harbor any animosity towards anyone in this thread only the Chinese government and blizzard

agreed on politics comment everything is being tied to it now days

 

some here are shareholders on atvi

how do you feel about them?

 

[Mihle]

Most live broadcast that I have seen that it's not allowed to say anything political, don't ban the people and especially not the hosts/commentators of the show of it happens. Hosts/commentators didn't do anything wrong as far as I can tell.

 

Most I have seen have either given fines or taken back the money prize of the people that beaks it. Like for example Eurovision as a random example, they give fines. (Tho nothing of it's subtle politics, just if it's obvious to everyone)

[Brooksie359]

1 hour ago, RejZoR said:

That makes even less sense. If you punish something, you're clearly catering to the opposition. Being neutral would be: "we make the game, the rest is on players". We don't endorse anything or anyone. If they feel they want or need to express anything, that's THEIR belief or expression. But they didn't run with that or express that stance.

They are 100% allowed to say what they want and express themselves on their own free time on their own stream. They did so on blizzard's stream of a hearthstone tournament which is not the same at all. Again there is a time and a place for political activism and that is not when being interviewed after winning a match of hearthstone in a tournament. You can view it as supporting the opposing view if you would like but the way I see it they simply got banned because they were using the tournament stream to broadcast their political message and that isn't something blizzard wants regardless of the message. Now people will know what will happen if they do so.