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Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

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Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#961

Post by bsanr »

Dove wrote: post #904

This is a very specific instance of a much more general problem. A lot of private companies control exclusive access to something with a value that dwarfs what you pay for it. I pay nothing for access to Twitter; if I build a business or a social life on the platform, it becomes something I would pay thousands of dollars to prevent losing. I pay nothing for access to Facebook; the memories they store at this point in…

>The problem is that since these companies control services so valuable to me, anyone who wishes to hurt me for any reason can do it through them. Since no one is paying them to defend me -- I'm certainly not -- they have no resources commensurate with the value of what they're defending.

I think that's beautiful, actually. Your ability to stay within this mini-society's good graces is entirely dependent on how you treat other people, and not on how much wealth you funnel in from the outside (to a degree).

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#962

Post by heed »

scoutt wrote: post #238

With the risk of being flagged I may say that Blizzard did the right thing BUT ONLY if the interview was a an official post-match interview. Otherwise they did wrong, since they cannot force people into not telling whatever they want by any other mean. I think it is the right thing to do in order to avoid future sociopolitical references in official post-match interviews: imagine someone saying 'power to the whites'…

I think it's also important for Blizzard to be consistent with their bans. Eg, if a player makes a comment about how much he/she supports American trade policy I would expect them to give out the same level of punishment.

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#963

Post by aymeric »

Dove wrote: post #904

This is a very specific instance of a much more general problem. A lot of private companies control exclusive access to something with a value that dwarfs what you pay for it. I pay nothing for access to Twitter; if I build a business or a social life on the platform, it becomes something I would pay thousands of dollars to prevent losing. I pay nothing for access to Facebook; the memories they store at this point in…

Thanks for this point of view. Very insightful and made me understand Blizzard perspective better.

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#964

Post by bayesian_horse »

trentnix wrote: post #468
streb-lo wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hate-speech laws exist because people are programmable. Try and tell me your opinions are your own and the books and media you consume do not own some portion of them. Hate-speech laws exist to prevent the programming of people to systematically hate and exterminate other people, a lesson that has been learned many times over in history.

If hate-speech laws exist to deal with people that are programmed, wouldn't it also follow that hate-speech laws might exist because programmed people want to control the speech of others? It would go like this: hate speech is first yelling fire in a theater, then it's espousing bigotry, then it's holding the wrong opinions, until it's finally speaking ill of the Party. That's also a lesson that has been learned many…

You should see Hate-Speech more like nuclear chain reaction and laws against that as neutron traps.

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#965

Post by wiz21c »

aeturnum wrote: post #502
wiz21c wrote: post #492

The rule is clear : >> Engaging in any act that, in Blizzard’s sole discretion, brings you into public disrepute, offends a portion or group of the public, or otherwise damages Blizzard image... It says : "Blizzard is a commercial entity and it doesn't want to be involved in anything else than gaming". For me Blizzard acts in a very corporate way. There's nothing wrong with that, provided you accept the corporate way…

No one is saying that Blizzard has broken laws. People are expressing their displeasure about how Blizzard has chosen to exercise their rights. I encourage you to hold companies to account for their actions even if those actions do not technically violate any laws. P.s. Political opinions are on the official schedule of Disneyworld: https://dl3.pushbulletusercontent.com/UW7YGjoleObdVw7HDPeapr...

I don't say Blizzard has broken any law. It hasn't. I just tried to remind people that Blizzard is a private/corporate entity that will not endorse political debate because it may hurt its commercial value.

I'll add that Blizzard is absolutely right in doing so. Because, it clearly can't be an open space for expressing opinions. That's because its values may be in competition with those opinions. So any opinions expressed inside Blizzard stuff would be "tainted" by Blizzard's nature/control. So Blizzard wouldn't be very good at letting opinion being expressed. So Blizzard's decision actually helps to maintain the expression of opinions in place where it is most efficient : the public places, the parliament, etc.

And yes, that holds for FaceBook, Google, etc. Much of Internet is privately held => expressing public opinions over the web is tricky.

Now, following you reaction, I've checked the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, specifically article 19 :

"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

Which basically says that Blizzard should not oppose the expression of opinion (provided one interprets "media" in a wide way : speech is a medium).

I admit that the more I look into it, the harder it gets...

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#966

Post by bayesian_horse »

umvi wrote: post #339
ekianjo wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's really hard to tell the difference between what is genuinely offensive and what is not. You can't have both "Free Speech" and "You Can't Say Anything Offensive" at the same time, because there is too much overlap. So you have to choose. The US constitution is pretty clear that "Free Speech" is the higher principle.

"Free Speech only protects you from the government, not private companies who don't want to tolerate your hate on their platform" I don't agree with this stance, but it is an oft-heard one defending companies who stifle speech (as long as the stifled speech was a far right Nazi website or anti-LGBT comments). As we see, that stance is dangerous and extends to companies stifling politically inconvenient speech like "I…

Then your definition of Free Speech is something different from the one generally agreed upon and implemented in many constitutions.

You can look at it that way: If a private entity is prohibited from deleting user content, isn't that also an infringement of free speech? And at what level are they prohibited to filter such content? Are they allowed to require an account? Are they allowed to delete spam?

No "Right to Free Speech" can be enforced between private persons or entities. Nobody can be forced to listen to you, nobody can be prohibited from taking measures to not read or hear you, just because you claim a right to free speech.

Thus the only correct level to fight against this particular instance of private censorship is indeed the private domain, and that's mainly counter-speech.

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#967

Post by [deleted] »

wiz21c wrote: post #965
aeturnum wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one is saying that Blizzard has broken laws. People are expressing their displeasure about how Blizzard has chosen to exercise their rights. I encourage you to hold companies to account for their actions even if those actions do not technically violate any laws. P.s. Political opinions are on the official schedule of Disneyworld: https://dl3.pushbulletusercontent.com/UW7YGjoleObdVw7HDPeapr...

I don't say Blizzard has broken any law. It hasn't. I just tried to remind people that Blizzard is a private/corporate entity that will not endorse political debate because it may hurt its commercial value. I'll add that Blizzard is absolutely right in doing so. Because, it clearly can't be an open space for expressing opinions. That's because its values may be in competition with those opinions. So any opinions expr…

[deleted]

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#968

Post by bayesian_horse »

thewholeview wrote: post #748
short_sells_poo wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think perhaps the more important point is that one should not be prevented from voicing an offensive opinion. If you look very hard in an extremely boring place, e.g. a phone directory, you might just by chance perhaps find something that won't be offensive to anyone on this Earth. Outside of contrived scenarios, the moment we let "being offended" be the watermark of censoring ideas, we might as well pack up the id…

I agree in principle, although in practice this is impossible to be preached. In China it's that political opinions aren't tolerated, especially anything that notes on the edge of separatism. In America it's the same, certain racial, gender chats are simply taboo, whether it's personal or national level. While there is no explicit governmental prosecution, you can be sure that you'll be punished in a way. The idea is…

You confuse state prosecution with private consequences.

A right to Free Speech can only protect you from government sanctions. How other private parties react to your "taboo" opinions cannot be legislated.

And I'd like to break a lance for "political correctness" here. Hate speech and offensive language in general do make a public or private space uncomfortable for certain people. Not all of this can be avoided, but in the case of race and gender, those who feel offended can't really change their offendedness. And because those people are usually a minority, it is usually someone else who steps up to the task of defending such a space.

Unfortunately, an aggressive climate fueled by hate speech leads to worse consequences than offended feelings. So, in many cases, why not avoid offending people? And in many cases at issue, the main motivation of the offenders is the offending, not what they believe is the "truth".

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#969

Post by bayesian_horse »

johnchristopher wrote: post #779
bayesian_horse wrote: post #215

It's really hard to tell the difference between what is genuinely offensive and what is not. No easy answers. In this case, maybe there is a relatively simple rule: Supporting democracy must not in itself be regarded as offensive...

> It's really hard to tell the difference between what is genuinely offensive and what is not. That's because it's not up to the prankster or the offender or a third party to decide if one is suffering. It's up to the offended, mocked or bullied one who are the only ones knowing what they feel. Of course, in the public political space, everybody tries to play the victim/innocent game to their advantage.

We can however be convinced, that certain offenses are indeed worthy of recognition. Racial slurs, for example. Sexual or sexist jokes in certain contexts.

Feeling offended because somebody criticized a state is harder to make stick.

Re: Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

#970

Post by bayesian_horse »

gus_massa wrote: post #631
bayesian_horse wrote: post #215

It's really hard to tell the difference between what is genuinely offensive and what is not. No easy answers. In this case, maybe there is a relatively simple rule: Supporting democracy must not in itself be regarded as offensive...

In Venezuela both parts claim to be the democratic elected government. What if the people actually prefer another form of government like monarchy?

Democracy is not the dictatorship of the majority.

The decision to abandon democracy can never be democratic or democratically legitimated.

In the example of Venezuela, both parties agree to the same constitution, though they interpret it differently.

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