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MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

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Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#461

Post by baddox »

toast0 wrote: post #370
aka1234 wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "That's an argument for banning swastikas, not banning anyone who displays a swastika." If you don't ban the person displaying the swastika, how can you possibly enforce banning swastikas? There must be a consequence for displaying the offending symbol, otherwise the rule is toothless. You remove the swastika, and the person just replaces it. What then? Just keep removing it and hoping the Nazi/edgelord/'troll' wil…

Ban the car --- either don't let them use it online, or don't show it to others. If an account gets a threshold number of cars banned, don't let them use customized cars online. If they're spouting hate on chat, ban them from chat too.

That's just a more detailed explanation of the process of banning someone for using swastikas in a game.

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#462

Post by [deleted] »

Spivak wrote: post #368
user982 wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pride in what? Heritage of what? The South has hundreds of years of history. Why are the 4 years of the Confederacy so celebrated?

I see lots of people on the internet making the 4 year argument, and I have to admit it's a snappy quip, but I don't think the point is made entirely in good faith. I really do see it being flown as a symbol of rural and/or southern pride that is informed by, but largely disconnected from, the civil war other than as a historical symbol that broadly represents an opposition between rural folk and urbanites. I mean it…

[deleted]

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#463

Post by notahacker »

naasking wrote: post #377
paulchap wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's dangerous when platforms function like a public utility and is yet allowed to do whatever it wants because it's _technically_ private property. It _is_ private property. The companies in question are just exerting their rights. The users agreed to the ToS while signing up, and it's perfectly reasonable for them to cut off your access to their service, as long as it's within the legal bounds of the ToS.…

> It _is_ private property. The companies in question are just exerting their rights. The users agreed to the ToS while signing up, and it's perfectly reasonable for them to cut off your access to their service, as long as it's within the legal bounds of the ToS. So by parity of reasoning, companies that pollute within the bounds of the EPA's restrictions are also perfectly within their legal rights, and so shouldn't…

The implicit argument that an inability to display Confederate flags on others' property generates comparable negative externalities to environmental damage is certainly a bold one, and not, I would argue a better one than the more usual argument that private entities are bound to facilitate freedom of speech by the US constitution. You'd have a tough time persuading me any externalities generated by user generated Confederate flags within computer games were positive at all, still less that they were sufficiently positive to warrant government intrusion in the moderation process to protect them.

(Sure, there are slippery slope arguments about what happens if speech is not permitted on any media or if media companies are permitted monopoly power, but since Forza car designs are pretty far from that scenario, government intervention based on the assumption that computer game-designers do not have rights to curate their world or that displayers of the Confederate flag deserve special protections falls down much slipperier slopes of eroding property rights or enforcing [unpleasant] speech)

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#464

Post by tomp »

heymijo wrote: post #316
soraminazuki wrote: post #221

While it's emotionally pleasing to see racists being kicked out of online platforms, another side of me feels wary of these tactics. For starters, being deplatformed from major online players today would have serious consequences. Although it's true that these platforms are "private property," the entire society has become too reliant on them to be seen that way. I think it's dangerous when platforms function like a…

I am obtusely aware that Germany has banned hate speech and imagery relating to Nazis yet remains a democracy with mostly free speech. Am I wrong? If no, how have they accomplished this?

You’re wrong. Someone was criminally prosecuted because he insulted Erdogan.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-37554167

They eventually dropped he case, probably because of the public uproar, but to even consider such a criminal case definitely isn’t a hallmark of a “freedom of speech” society.

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#465

Post by jacobolus »

TheAdamAndChe wrote: post #310
rsynnott wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume Microsoft never allowed, say, swastikas. There's no reasonable expectation that you are able to spread racist propaganda in a car racing game (or for that matter in an actual car race; I think those tend to have very strict rules around decoration). I can see an _argument_ that Twitter, say, should be forced to pander to racists. I don't buy that argument, mind you, but I can at least see the thought process…

The Nazi flag is inarguably racist propaganda. The Confederate flag, however, has for decades been a symbol of southern pride for many people. I read somewhere recently that over 40% see it as a symbol of heritage more than racism.

“Heritage” in this context is a white supremacist codeword for “the southern states should never have been forced to give up on slavery”. Statues of confederate leaders, incorporation of confederate flags into later state flags, etc. were (and still are) part of a large-scale campaign to promote and defend segregation and racial inequality and injustice, explicitly intended to intimidate and disempower southern blacks.

You can easily find (racist white) people displaying the confederate flag in northern states, but you will be hard pressed to find any black people in the south who feel regional pride toward confederate symbols.

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#466

Post by tomp »

umvi wrote: post #224
i_am_proteus wrote: post #4

Interesting that the Japanese rising sun flag is mentioned alongside the swastika and the stars and bars; the rising sun flag remains in contemporary use by the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force.

At the risk of being controversial... I'm going to go ahead and say that Japan doesn't care about racism like America does. Japanese people are extremely racist, but you just don't know it because Japan is 99+% Japanese with But the ethnic minorities that _do_ live there live in segregated apartment complexes, etc. to prevent "mixing with the natives".

Why does everything have to ba racism? Can’t they just be xenophobic? Or maybe nationalist?

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#467

Post by Noos »

andrewzah wrote: post #208
bjourne wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Palestinian flags have already been nixed: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/12/10/student-order...

That is one particular instance at a university. It does not mean "Palestinian flags have been nixed"... For forza: as a private company they can ban whatever the hell they want. Vote with your wallet.

Voting with your wallet doesn't work, because the amount of online racing games for the xbox specifically and even videogames in general is very small. Sports games increasingly are becoming a near monopoly as licensing becomes very expensive and limited.

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#468

Post by naruvimama »

protomyth wrote: post #440
naruvimama wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Swastika is yet another example of "western universalism", it has a relatively recent negative connotation in Europe & US. Whereas for Asians, native Americans & for much of the ancient world it has entirely different meanings.

Yeah, there are a couple of tipis that go up every year that get comments from the damn ignorant. What can I expect from people looking for outrage?

Meanwhile it is used by radical groups to run smear campaigns elsewhere in the world.

https://swarajyamag.com/news-brief/from-devi-in-hijab-om-as-...

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#469

Post by gamblor956 »

ryandrake wrote: post #337
soraminazuki wrote: post #221

While it's emotionally pleasing to see racists being kicked out of online platforms, another side of me feels wary of these tactics. For starters, being deplatformed from major online players today would have serious consequences. Although it's true that these platforms are "private property," the entire society has become too reliant on them to be seen that way. I think it's dangerous when platforms function like a…

Today it's racists--fine. Hell with em. If you're young, you have many years ahead of you. A lot of time for culture and norms to keep changing and evolving. I guarantee that one day, you're going to wake up as an old person, and something that you like that's innocuous today will have been deemed terrible and hateful by a future generation. Maybe even for good reasons. You'll be kicked off platforms, called ignorant…

The Confederate battle flag has been around for 150+ years. It was, from the very beginning, a symbol of treason, of racism, of owning other people as property, of being allowed to rape and murder other humans without consequence.

Those who want to "celebrate" their Southern "heritage" have plenty of symbols and flags to choose from that don't have inherently racist and treasonous implications.

Re: MS will ban Forza players who add the confederate flag to their digital cars

#470

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

It's truly terrifying to see the number of people calling for limits on speech similar to ones in Germany. [1] The right to freedom of speech was seen as so important, it was put first on the bill of rights.

For anyone who cares about socialism, there was a time where it would have been argued that all talk for socialism should be banned. As for Communism, that undeniably would have been banned in the 50s, if it hadn't been before then (they did try in the 20s, but was eventually overturned). And countless other causes that at one time, over 90% of constituents were against.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23715358

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