Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

toucharcade.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 226 posts

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#31

Post by Someone1234 »

jameskilton wrote: post #15
rrss1122 wrote: post #13

Why is everyone trying to erase history all of a sudden? Because somebody felt bad?

Please don't hyperbolize. Removing the Confederate flags from public places like government buildings and refusing to sell merchandise with the flag is not erasing history. And I'd call the regular terrorizing and murder of black people under this flag far more than "someone felt bad". Apple simply took a way-to-heavy-handed approach here.

I'm not from the US and thus have no skin in this game, but even I can see that while this movement (to remove the Confederate flag) started out with good motivations (e.g. removing them from public buildings) now it has been taken too far (stopped sales, harassing the manufacturers, banned from places, removed from app store, etc). It really does seem like people are trying to erase it from existence (alright, a little hyperbolic, but still).

I totally understand the negative connotation and why that exists. And the fact that public institutions still fly it is "disturbing." But people against it should stop while they're ahead, they'll only see a massive backlash if this keeps up.

PS - I wonder how hard it will be for educators, civil war re-creationists, and similar to get a Confederate flag?

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#32

Post by Zigurd »

crxgames wrote: post #20

This is ridiculous. I bet they leave Nazi WWII games.

This is, quite possibly, reasonable.

As you point out, they probably approve WWII historical games with Nazi symbols in them. But they probably don't approve content that glorifies Naziism.

So if you have content that wasn't similarly vetted regarding the CORRECTION: Army of Northern Virginia battle flag (not "stars and bars"), what can you do but de-authorize all of it and start over?

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#33

Post by sp332 »

TillE wrote: post #23
Mithaldu wrote: post #3

Germany has a law about this, with some exceptions that would specifically apply to cases like this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_§_86a When a movie like Iron Sky has no problem being shown in German cinemas with the swastika left untouched, because it's clearly art, then it should be fairly obvious to Apple that banning historically accurate representations in historically accurate interactive a…

Apple is quite explicitly uninterested in artistic expression on the app store. From the second paragraph in their guidelines: "We view Apps different than books or songs, which we do not curate. If you want to criticize a religion, write a book. If you want to describe sex, write a book or a song, or create a medical App." Their stance makes very little sense (arbitrarily dividing games away from books or films), bu…

Not just games, but any app.

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#34

Post by Someone1234 »

TillE wrote: post #23
Mithaldu wrote: post #3

Germany has a law about this, with some exceptions that would specifically apply to cases like this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_§_86a When a movie like Iron Sky has no problem being shown in German cinemas with the swastika left untouched, because it's clearly art, then it should be fairly obvious to Apple that banning historically accurate representations in historically accurate interactive a…

Apple is quite explicitly uninterested in artistic expression on the app store. From the second paragraph in their guidelines: "We view Apps different than books or songs, which we do not curate. If you want to criticize a religion, write a book. If you want to describe sex, write a book or a song, or create a medical App." Their stance makes very little sense (arbitrarily dividing games away from books or films), bu…

I strongly suspect they wrote that expressively in case a court ever looks at Apple's policies, and needs to decide if Apple is silencing art/freedom of speech.

Essentially they want to separate themselves from most existing legal precedent.

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#35

Post by melling »

xbryanx wrote: post #19
rrss1122 wrote: post #13

Why is everyone trying to erase history all of a sudden? Because somebody felt bad?

Regardless of what you think about the current reactions, they are not solely the result of someone feeling bad. They are the reactions to the murder of 9 innocent people by a white supremacist professing a genocidal desire. Now, whether this justifies this action or not is a different matter.

Yes, and he killed them with a gun, not a flag. Perhaps we should ban apps with guns?

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#36

Post by Someone1234 »

kirkbackus wrote: post #18

It's quite ironic that Apple is setting a precedent for the intolerance of any symbol of slavery while they are knowingly supporting manufacturing which utilizes child labor, which is often forced labor. The epitome of hypocrisy which hopefully leads Apple to change.

I would absolutely agree that Apple's workers in China and elsewhere work under harsh conditions that would simply would not accept in the West.

But do you know for a fact that Apple utilises child labour or is that more speculation? I know it is common in clothing manufacturing (and other cloth-like accessories e.g. shoes, bags, etc) but didn't know it was common in electronics and or in China.

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#38

Post by BinaryIdiot »

jameskilton wrote: post #15
rrss1122 wrote: post #13

Why is everyone trying to erase history all of a sudden? Because somebody felt bad?

Please don't hyperbolize. Removing the Confederate flags from public places like government buildings and refusing to sell merchandise with the flag is not erasing history. And I'd call the regular terrorizing and murder of black people under this flag far more than "someone felt bad". Apple simply took a way-to-heavy-handed approach here.

> Removing the Confederate flags from public places like government buildings and refusing to sell merchandise with the flag is not erasing history.

Maybe I'm wrong but I kinda got the impression rrss1122 was referring to Apple wanting games removed which were based on historical events where the confederate flag was used. Perhaps OP also meant it for the current events for removing it from government buildings, etc but I assumed not.

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#39

Post by Moshe_Silnorin »

jameskilton wrote: post #15
rrss1122 wrote: post #13

Why is everyone trying to erase history all of a sudden? Because somebody felt bad?

Please don't hyperbolize. Removing the Confederate flags from public places like government buildings and refusing to sell merchandise with the flag is not erasing history. And I'd call the regular terrorizing and murder of black people under this flag far more than "someone felt bad". Apple simply took a way-to-heavy-handed approach here.

>Removing the Confederate flags from public places like government buildings and refusing to sell merchandise with the flag is not erasing history.

It is however a token effort that effectively signals "I care" while actually achieving nothing but the censorship of historically accurate games. Banning violence in comics didn't reduce crime. Banning symbols in art isn't going to reduce this wildly rare form of shooting.

Re: Apple Removes American Civil War Games from the App Store

#40

Post by sneak »

Mithaldu wrote: post #3

Germany has a law about this, with some exceptions that would specifically apply to cases like this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafgesetzbuch_§_86a When a movie like Iron Sky has no problem being shown in German cinemas with the swastika left untouched, because it's clearly art, then it should be fairly obvious to Apple that banning historically accurate representations in historically accurate interactive a…

The App Store is about volume and profit and PR, not about providing a forum for art or expression.

An app with pictures of classic paintings that happen to include nipples will not be approved for sale.

After all, if you really want that kind of stuff, you can always install a different package manager and use someone else's selection of apps.

Oh, wait.

Post reply on HN