Is this really the best move? Blizzard made a smart move; the player was going to piss off a large portion of their user base. Freedom of speech works both ways.
Fun part Blizzard "has" a motto, "Every voice matters".
No. The best form of protest against their actions would be for Blizzards' customers to remove their profit from them.
Question : is 'freedom of speech' an action point objective somewhere? It's rare that I hear it used defensively so often, and the past few days have been non-stop "Oh, you like freedom of speech? then you must like (X bad thing it allows for/causes.).
Is this some kind of coordinated strategy? It feels like one.
The last few years of de-platforming have laid the groundwork for the CCP, that's what happens when you don't have principles.
For example within 10 days of Wikileaks publishing 'cablegate' back in 2010, Bank of America, VISA, MasterCard, PayPal, and Western Union all blocked donations to the site. [1] This effectively destroyed nearly all of their funding. As we've reached an era where a variety of absolutely critical industries are completely or near completely monopolized, it means that things like the first amendment are much less meaningful. If the government wanted to ban some form of speech, all they need to do is to make a call to a handful of companies and, like that, they've banned > 90% of discussion of it. And from the company's perspectives, they can agree to cooperate and expect rich rewards and favorable treatment from the government in the future, or they can refuse to no real gain and end up facing the full fury of an incredibly far-reaching government.
Perhaps one of the many reasons that the founding fathers were so obsessed with keeping governments small and relatively weak. This power of coercion is in some ways even more dangerous than any law that might be passed since it can often effect the exact same end while keeping most of the public generally uninformed.
This creates an interesting little micro-paradox. Customers in the US claiming they will boycott Blizzard over this situation are precisely why Blizzard is motivated to act in this fashion. Because there would be a mirror situation in China with a vastly larger customer base acting in an equal but opposite fashion. Until people (around the world) can accept individuals behaving in a way they find deplorable, we're only going to end up in a world where the biggest wins. And as the geopolitical status quo changes, that's no longer simply synonymous with USA or even the west in general.
This is one of the many reasons I think the trend of 'free speech is only the government' is so incredibly myopic. People don't consider that the views they support will inevitably also come under fire from the powers that be - and they'll rapidly find themselves facing silencing and censorship with no recourse. Free speech is a value, not an amendment. Dismissing this because it's convenient is something that will only come back to haunt people as the tides shift, which they inevitably do. We should base our values on a system of ethos, not whichever chain of often contradictory positions we think will work as a means to achieve whatever ends we think we're going to get.
[1] - https://www.gamespot.com/articles/the-number-of-chinese-game...
[2] - https://newzoo.com/insights/rankings/top-10-countries-by-gam...
http://bmkgaming.com/statement-on-blitzchung/
> I do think that Blizzard was correct in issuing him a penalty for his actions. They do not want to set the precedent for their official broadcasts being used as political tools. The players agreed to particular rules for behavior, and he violated those rules.
[..]
> All that having been said, there are additional factors at play here. The punishment meted out to Blitzchung is incredibly harsh. I could understand a fine, or even a short suspension from competitive play, but removal from Grandmasters, clawing back the prizes he already earned, and banning him for a full year seems completely overboard to an extent that feels completely unwarranted and unfair.
> I won’t pretend to understand either the intricacies of the geopolitical situation in China and Hong Kong or the full extent of Blizzard’s business interests there, but to me this penalty feels like it is deeply rooted in both. The heavy-handedness of it feels like someone insisted that Blizzard make an example of Blitzchung, not only to discourage others from similar acts in the future but also to appease those upset by the outburst itself.
> That kind of appeasement is simply not something I can in good conscience be associated with. When I learned about the ruling, I reached out to Blizzard and informed them that I no longer feel comfortable casting the Grandmasters finals at BlizzCon. I will not be a smiling face on camera that tacitly endorses this decision. Unless something changes, I will have no involvement in Grandmasters moving forward.
What isn't even mentioned there is that the two casters apparently got fired, too. They didn't know he was going to say that, they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe they laughed supportingly, or didn't show enough disapproval, I haven't seen it. But the punishment was extremely heavy-handed and disproportionate at any rate, no matter how you look at it.
This is actually the thing that most frustrates me about these protests and issue in general. Finding complete, in context, recordings of the critical events is so incredibly difficult. This makes no sense since we are now in an era where everything is on camera from 500 different angles. But it is what it is. And of course providing in context video gets downvoted, because it makes the issues look less black and white. But that to me is the clearest example of idiocracy. We should not seek to create Hollywood villains and heroes in how things are presented. People should make judgments based on reality which, almost invariably, is more of a million shades of gray rather than good vs evil, right vs wrong.
> Constructive criticism and self-criticism are extremely important for any revolutionary organization. Without them, people tend to drown in their mistakes, not learn from them.
-- Assata Shakur
> These people don’t see that if you encourage totalitarian methods, the time may come when they will be used against you instead of for you. Make a habit of imprisoning Fascists without trial, and perhaps the process won’t stop at Fascists.
-- George Orwell, http://orwell.ru/library/novels/Animal_Farm/english/efp_go
Yet they also have to expect a backlash if they don't provide it,as freedom of speech is integral part of our culture.
People expect that, and any defence of type 'but by law we aren't required to provide that!' will just piss their western customers off.
EDIT: not to mention that in this case the punishment was severe. They could try to stay apolitical by just giving him a slap on the wrist and a temporary ban on tournaments. It would both send a message and work as a deterrent.
Strangely enough Activision-Blizzard soon after that announced their Call of Duty Mobile - designed by Chinese company team responsible for Diablo Immortal.. which was subsidized by CCP.
It was stone cold calculation of: profit loss from hearthstone backlash vs earnings from Chinese mobile market
No, we most certainly do not.
I expect there is some of both. Fear of government intervention and fear of public backlash in China.
I agree it is very understandable that blizzard would want to be apolitical and discourage divisive speech. The question is what to do once the speech has occured, because now blizzard is in the hot seat where their response can be REALLY divisive.
I personally think the response was overly putative, especially the firing of the hapless hosts. Especially so, given that 90% of their business is outside of asia, and only a fraction of the remainder is in China.
The question remains where customers will accept blizzard drawing the line. They would be equally within their legal rights to restrict streamers, game chat, or out of game speech.