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idk man it sounds like discrimination to me.
It's legal to discriminate as long as it's not a protected class.
Source: https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/can-employers-discri...
Great Streisand moves by China though, previously gamers or basketball fans might not really care about what's happening in Hong Kong/China in general, but within 2 days they (China) have raised awareness of what a shitty overlord they are.
That's the lesson Dolores Umbridge inadvertently taught us in Harry Potter # 5.
It is scary to see how much more China and the CCP can get away with, I'm looking forward to seeing where it will all end up. Probably not in a good place. Money talks, morals? Not so much.
It's clear now much of the Chinese leadership were a paper tiger and now that the heat is on, they don't really have a strategy. They just never expect enough people to call them out publicly and embarass them. Maybe they'll keep hold of their own country by suppressing information flow, countrywide surveillance, but whatever power they had over the global economy: severely diminished.
I don't think it should be an international incident. The reality is that corporations shouldn't be espousing political viewpoints, and nobody should care what their opinion is on controversial policies. They make and sell products and that's all they should stick too. Why should Blizzard get in the middle of what's happening between China and Hong Kong? And to be clear, it isn't just Chinese government versus Hong K…
How they've (mis)handled this will be studied by business and PR students for years to come.
Propose that a suspended player is a US citizen. This feels unconstitutional / illegal, as Blizzard has taken away the player's ability to earn a living based in their political views. The guise of suspension under the violation of "disparagement" feels weak. I'd be interested in seeing how a lawsuit plays out.
But it's not a matter of whether or not this was a legal move or not, it's the intent and what it has shed light onto that is the actual real problem.
China is controlling our media and it is becoming harder and harder to ignore. Companies have to watch their step when saying anything because if China, for god knows what reason, decides that something that comes from you does not fall in line with their ideology, be it a line of dialogue in your movie, or a flag in a videogame, or a winning player's speech in this case... Well, good luck without that chinese market.
It could mean death for some companies, so everyone does their best to try to avoid the issue altogether. Now it's fairly easy to do so, but what about the future? Is this not alarming?
Sure, keep politics out of games. Let's keep it out of movies as well. And books. Let's not talk about politics altogheter, not even on social media, or China might decide that the company you're working for does not get to work with them until they fire you.
It might sound exaggerated and reeks of slippery-slope fallacy. Is it? Personally, I think not.
This has to stop.
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There is no law or constitutional provision in the US that says you can’t refuse to work with someone for their political views.
A lawsuit doesn't depend on the law or constitution. As a separate note, the player and hosts would likely be considered to be contractors, not employees.
If you try to sue someone for violating a law that doesn't exist, they will make a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, and the judge will throw out the lawsuit.
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The west employs this tactic too but calls it a sanction or embargo.
China is targeting individual speech, sanctions and embargos target governments and governmental policy. There's a bit of a difference there. That said, I think that China's efforts - by using companies as their proxies - are being much more effective.
Absolutely. They’re beating us at our own game and revealing that American values were never freedom and democracy - those are just ways we think are good to make money. If a better system comes along we’re the first to jump on it.
I don't think it should be an international incident. The reality is that corporations shouldn't be espousing political viewpoints, and nobody should care what their opinion is on controversial policies. They make and sell products and that's all they should stick too. Why should Blizzard get in the middle of what's happening between China and Hong Kong? And to be clear, it isn't just Chinese government versus Hong K…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you give an example of free speech being quieted? We push political issues that way, but I’m not aware of censorship being the trigger.
The most well-known one would be James Damore being fired from Google for criticizing the corporate diversity policies [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google%27s_Ideological_Echo_Ch...
No, actually I don't think that's a comparable situation.