Gay Guild Recruitment Disallowed From WoW? 514
Fireball394 wrote with a link to an article on the site 'In Newsweekly'. The article, entitled "Blizzard of GLBT gaming policy questions", discusses the application of a harassment warning on a player who was recruiting for a GLBT guild. From the article: "In her follow-up letter to the company, Andrews explained that there was an obvious misunderstanding and that she was not insulting anyone, but merely recruiting for a 'GLBT friendly' guild. The response from Blizzard was, 'While we appreciate and understand your point of view, we do feel that the advertisement of a GLBT friendly guild is very likely to result in harassment for players that may not have existed otherwise. If you will look at our policy, you will notice the suggested penalty for violating the Sexual Orientation Harassment Policy is to be temporarily suspended from the game. However, as there was clearly no malicious intent on your part, this penalty was reduced to a warning.' Blizzard's stance was clear that recruiting for a guild using 'GLBT' was inappropriate as, the company said, it may 'incite certain responses in other players that will allow for discussion that we feel has no place in our game.'"
Seems Standart (Score:3, Insightful)
Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not like a gay couldn't play WoW, as I'm sure thousands of gay people do play, but rather that recruiting people to a gay guild is adding unnecessary tension. It's like naming a guild "republican lovers" and trying to recruit people in to that kind of guild. I'm sure many people would dislike that too and I'm almost certain Blizzard would act similarly.
Good for Blizzard (Score:3, Insightful)
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
So now you're allowed to go around calling other people and things gay, but refer to yourself that way, and you're in trouble.
Quality ideas here.
Re:Good for Blizzard (Score:5, Insightful)
So why can't this other persona be gay?
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
The ONLY question (Score:3, Insightful)
If so, then this decision is wrong. If not, then this is a nonissue and that's that.
Question (Score:1, Insightful)
Can straight people join it? If no, then it's discriminatory. If yes, then there's no point to it.
I really don't see the point of a guild like this. Sure, clubs like this at Uni are a good idea, but why should your orientation be brought into a game that has nothing to do with sex?
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:4, Insightful)
And what is wrong with either? I understand where they are coming from, but at the same time, if I am playing a game that takes advantage of teamwork, the best bet is to try and get players around you that have similar ideals, passions, ways of thinking, etc. This provides an opportunity for players to form deep-seeded friendships, which online games do for a lot of people. If my passion is being a Republican (or Democrat, or snowboarder, or whatever), then I don't see why I should be disallowed from forming a group of players together that have these similar passions when I am clearly not doing so out of malicious intent.
backwards blame? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
You wouldn't even be allowed to discuss whether Elton John is gay or not -- in fact, I know of a player who was suspended for 3 hours for doing so. Rightly or wrongly they've decided that rather than try to evaluate such discussion on a case by case basis they'd rather simply disallow discussion of the topic. This would include bannig discussion about whether or not Brad Pitt is straight so it's not discrimination.
Thus, it'd be hard to recruit for a GLBT guild without discussiong policy-banned topics. In the end, it's their game, it's their policy, and if someone is playing, they've agreed agreed to it. If someone doesn't like it, they're always free to not pay them to play.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, no. They're saying it isn't a good idea to form such a guild, as it promotes a lot of hate-mongering. Additionally, if you'd read the blurb at all, you'd know that calling people "gay" or any derivative can result in suspension (rather than a warning).
Read & comprehend.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm sure if such a person wanted to create a 'GLBT' guild they could go to one of those forums mentioned in TFA and announce it there, having the effect of reaching a large fraction of the people they wanted to reach while keeping those who have no business with it out. Anything else is just asking for pure grief from the vast majority of the community.
When you consider how many players blizzard may have lost had such a guild come to exist, became publicized, then had all of the members harassed versus the few they will lose over this announcement you should see where I'm coming from.
Re:Question (Score:5, Insightful)
Take a look at the promotional art for any female character in the history of fantasy and tell me that's not true
They allow... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:5, Insightful)
Sara Andrews has stated that she will not be renewing her World of Warcraft account due to Blizzards lack of support for a GLBT friendly environment, "It seems to be OK for general chat to be flooded with, 'That's so gay!' and 'I just got ganked! What a fag!' yet advertising for a GLBT friendly environment where we don't have to deal with such language is deemed inappropriate."
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But I don't see any links about "Damn republicans! Stupid GOPs!" or anything like that. If done right it can be a positive thing, and people see that there are gay gamers [gaymer.org] out there. A thing more rare than women it seems. It doesn't have to be an isuse, it can be a positive thing. Instead of grouping with a bunch of people who just yell anti gay slurs and being a closet-case-ork.
The problem is the society, you can't take the issues of contemporary life out completely, and it never hurts to group up with similar people so you don't have to worry about those issues either.
What blizzard has done has simply left those issues in.
Re:Not about rights... (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess you think they should sit back down and take the abuse silently like good little homosexuals... I can't believe this received a +4 Insightful on Slashdot.
Blizz owns WOW (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:backwards blame? (Score:3, Insightful)
Two questions (Score:2, Insightful)
I have two questions here.
Re:Good for Blizzard (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
I mean, I am about as GLBT friendly as a person gets, but this entire issue just goes too far. In fact, it goes too far on so many levels.
Ok I understand the family friendly stuff... thats why I don't play WoW. I am offended by the familyy friendly nazis everywhere that I run into them. I avoid them. I don't like their viepoint. I don't agree with their implicit assumption that language or exposure to sexuality, or whatever is in some way damaging to children. Frankly, I consider their viewpoint stupid.... but I still respect it. I leave them the fuck alone and expect the same respect in return.
as H L Menken said "We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.". Words to live by in any area of life.
But anyway... GLBT? Good for you. Why is it so important to tell everyone and organize around it. Have your clubs, have PACs, get together and rant and rave and do whatever. Why must you (and I realise this is only a subset of GLBT people that I am addressing here), shove it in everyones face?
In fact, its a game designed to have people team up and work together and be social based on the game dynamics. Why bring in outside dynamics? Why form a guild of GLBTs when GLBT has no meaning inside the game at all? Your character doesn't even have sexual organs for gods sake! Do you really care that much if the people you play with are GLBT? Wats wrong with us straight people?
How would you feel if you saw a "Straight as an Arrow" guild? Wouldn't it seem silly? WoW isn't a dating site, goto match.com or some such and announce your sexuality there, if you really want to converse with more GLBTs... or go to a sci fi con or something.
This is silly. WoW was right. They did the right thing. If you don't like it, then play a better game. WoW kinda sucks anyway... City Of Villians now... there is a game.
-Steve
Re:Okey dokey (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What I am curious about is (Score:5, Insightful)
No. Would some of you dense people read the fucking article? The guild was formed because WoW is rife with homophobic abuse. Yes, Blizzard has a policy against it but it is not enforced. And the guild is "GLBT Friendly" not "GLBT ONLY." What does GLBT Friendly mean? It means guild members can rest assured that they will not receive homophobic harassment from other guild members. It does not mean this is some sort of "gay sex club." Get a fucking grip.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't be a Republican in a fantasy age. They don't exist. You can't be a snowboarder -- they don't exist. Your character does not snowboard, and there's no such thing as Republicans, so how can you form a guild based around it? Note that you could create a players association... this is specifically about in-game groups called guilds. There are no players who are members of a guild -- only their characters are.
And a thought just struck me... in the World of Warcraft, I'm fairly certain that Blizzard has not written sex into the actual game, so therefore it doesn't officially exist. You can't have a gay or straight character -- you can't have sex at all.
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Evan
Re:Good for Blizzard (Score:2, Insightful)
A character's sexual orientation has no bearing on gameplay. If you choose to orient your online character as gay, that's fine, even though your character can't really get it on with another character (though, "cybering" might be the exception here). What they wish to prevent, I assure you, is becoming liable for not properly policing hate issues towards the people BEHIND the personas. Which is where a GLBT guild would certainly lead.
I'm sure they'd have no problems with guilds built around in-game character differences. You could have a dwarves guild or a magic-users guild. The moment you start involving anything from the outside world into the game, you're going to have to begin dealing with hate issues. A male-only guild, a gay-friendly guild, a pro-choice guild (hey, you can RP it, right?) has no place in the game.
On the other hand, "gay" and "fag" in public chat conversations should probably be limited. It adds nothing to the ability to communicate, and is breaking the RL/game boundary. And say Blizzard doesn't implement that, if you wanted to enforce that for a guild, you simply set up a policy, whereby players in the guild who do use language you deem inappropriate are warned/removed from the guild.
I'm siding with Blizzard on this one, though their response seems a bit weird.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
Which only serves to further stigmatize homosexuality by reinforcing the notion that "gay" could only be an insult. Good job, Blizzard.
When I write my dark futurepunk MMORPG... (Score:2, Insightful)
I can understand Blizzard's POV - let's not bring these things into the game, it's a game, it's fantasy.
OTOH I can understand that some people might want to be with people who (external to the game) are like them. That's natural. It's like older gamers not wanting to play with punk 14 year olds with attitude problems.
Common Culture (Score:4, Insightful)
There's certainly Chinese guilds, French guilds, mature guilds, and 1337 guilds; why not a GBLT guild? Being GBLT isn't about primarily about sexuality, it's about gender roles and common culture. Just as geeks have sites like slashdot, GBLT persons have common forums, movies, and books with which they identify to create common cultural references.
Defined gender roles and attitudes toward them have an integral role in any cooperative community -- real or virtual -- and I believe that it's perfectly reasonable to use this set of common beliefs to form a guild.
(Note: I am not GBLT, but I am friends with quite a few)
Re:Good for Blizzard (Score:4, Insightful)
By going on assumptions that a guild like that may lead to hate issues, they're not doing anything to remove the true negative elements from the game. Instead, Blizzard chooses to limit positive social interactivity between benevolent like-minded gamers.
And by the way, calling people "gay" or a "fag" online has nothing to do with breaking any kind of RL/game boundary. It's simply ignorance and hatred. (I've been called a "fag" many times online, and I'm not gay in RL.)
Re:Good for Blizzard (Score:3, Insightful)
Guilds are character associations, not player groups. (A player can have multiple characters, say a cleric and a rogue, but if his cleric is accepted in a guild, that doesn't grant his rogue any special status.) Guilds are for gaming concepts -- and there is no gaming concept of sex in WoW. You can start a rogue's guild or an Ironforge guild. You can start a We Farm URBS guild. You could start a racist "elves-only" guild or a "no gnomes allowed" guild if you want. You could even have a "no-girl-characters" guild, and disallow any female characters. But they're all character-based, and based on the in-game reality. In real life, it doesn't matter if it's a male or female player controlling the male or female character.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Okey dokey (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, I know what's prohibited, but that's irrelevant. It happens just the same.
So if roles were reversed, 98% of WoW users were gay, and slurs against straight people were common on WoW, and I actually hoped to meet other people on WoW with whom I might become friends with (and, you know, maybe date), then I can totally imagine joining a guild for straight people. How is this not obvious? You sound like you've intentionally deluded yourself (and you sound a little like all the idiot homophobes up in this discussion).
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
But yeah, they're just common insults, gay, fag, bitch, nigger, and there should be nothing wrong with them. But unfortunately, there are. It's better to be called bitch or fag from someone you know is that way too, instead of someone using it as either a light-but-nothing really insult or a i-hate-dem-homos-gonna-carve-me-up-another insult.
"Don't ask. Don't tell." -- Blizzard (Score:5, Insightful)
"While we appreciate and understand your point of view, we do feel that parking your bright red 2006 Ferrari F430 Spider is very likely to result in the theft or vandalism of a car that may not have occured otherwise. If you look at our local and state laws, you will notice the suggested penalty for parking bright red sports cars in seedy neigborhoods is to temporarily jail you. However, as you are just an arrogant, rich prick, this penalty has been reduced to parole and 1000 hours of community services."
Seriously though, this situation is ridiculous. Blizzard is punishing the wrong people here. Harassment of any player (gays, lesbians, straights, americans, canadians, jews, muslims, etc) should not be tolerated. Blizzard apparently has a "Don't ask, Don't tell" policy when it comes to diversity.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:5, Insightful)
My understanding is that slaveholding was pretty universally accepted in the antebellum South. Does that mean that everyone should've just gotten over that and waited for the fad to change on its own?
(No, I'm not claiming that calling someone a fag is the same scale of badness as holding them in lifelong servitude. But I'm pointing out that societal acceptance is a crappy sole standard for the condoning of oppressive discrimination.)
Re:Blizzard is right! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Seems Standart (Score:2, Insightful)
I assume that the way they're looking at it goes something like, "If someone started a 'heterosexual-friendly' guild, we wouldn't allow that under our harrassment policy, so how is this different?"
And, of course, you want to say that it's different because the GLBT community (is it really only 4 letters now?) are the ones being persecuted, and Blizzard is, in a way, persecuting them to prevent their future persecution. Which is clearly crazy.
Personally, I look at the whole thing, and I can see why everyone's doing everything they're doing, and I just wish that the world was such that the GLBT people didn't feel like they needed a special guild where they'd feel safe.
Re:Not about rights... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
The point is to organize a guild so you can enjoy the game without having bigots call you a fag all the time. That's exactly the behavior that keeps me away from online gaming.
Re:Not about rights... (Score:4, Insightful)
Blizzard encourages players to report harrasment of any form. There aren't enough GMs to police every single chat message. They rely on player reporting.
And yes, using that type of language is against their terms of service.
So I don't believe your point is valid. If players aren't receiveing punishment it is not necessarily because Blizzard is actively deciding to let them slip by, it's because they don't have the resources to do it, and the players themselves are apathetic towards it.
This one chat message happened to have been caught. Do you think that this is the first advertisement for a GLBT group? This was a routine wrong place, wrong time, got caught language issue that has been blown out of control because so many people feel so strongly about the subject, one way or the other.
This is less about Blizzard's policy than it is about the media and militant people using this event to control their message and how it's portrayed by the media. How else are they going to get their message onto the front page of Slashdot?
-Adam
The Point (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:gays... (Score:3, Insightful)
If you're going to live a lifestyle that is against nature, sinful and basically sick to the majority of the world then keep it to yourself and you won't have problems. the same books you are refering also tells you that people are not allowed to judge this, it is Gods business. ...and homosexuality is known behaviour among other species on this planet so it is not unnatural. ...and why do you think you are "the majority" ?
I sleep with girls and I'm a guy... If you really need to remind yourself of it, you probably are a gay who do not have the courage to accept it.
--
No, I'm not gay... I would however love to have a pair of good tits.
Re:Two questions (Score:2, Insightful)
Gross generalizations about a particular group are hurtful and can be considered discriminatory.
I think you've just nullified your own statement.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope that's not actually what you would do as principal. And I hope that's not what you'd do as Blizzard's CEO, even though I can understand why you would.
Re:Blizzard is not right (Score:3, Insightful)
You seem to make an assumption that I'm on a given side. I've been beaten while marching for gay rights and have an extensive collection of lingere and corsets in my size. Check out my listed website for a hint of my hobbies. I'm also a large hairy male who is getting married to someone who isn't XX this fall.
I'm all for gays being in game -- I'd love to see a guild of gay Tauren or a guild of Amazon lesbian warriors. And the players would be a mix of men and women who are of all sexual orientation in both sides. Because, in my eyes, they may have made the right decision for the wrong reasons, but it is *still* the right decision: A guild is a group of like minded characters, not a group of like minded players.
Then you would probably get some really good roleplaying going on.
You assume that the gay players are roleplaying gay characters -- how is it good roleplaying if one character is harassing a straight character because his player is gay? Besides, what if a gay player creates a character in the GBLT guild who is intolerant of gays? You're confusing player groups and in-game character groups.
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Evan
Re:Okey dokey (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, pretty much.
I think Blizzard is also taking the "don't make waves" style of law enforcement. That is, a certain amount of antisocial behavior is allowed, as long as it doesn't rock the boat, so to speak. And conversely, your right to say whatever you want is going to be conditional that it doesn't cause a problem in their pretty little world.
WoW is a lot like Disneyland. It's a part of the real world, and yet it's not. It's all quite fake and intended to create the an illusion (in Disneyland, an idyllic place to take the kids; in WoW a world where you can take on an alternate persona and hack at people with swords) which people pay for the priviledge of experiencing. The Disney folks are probably not going to let you burn the American flag in front of EPCOT Center -- even though it may be your right to do somewhere else -- because a whole lot of other people who are paying to be there don't want to see it. Likewise, Blizzard isn't going to let you set up a GLBT guild, because a lot of other customers would dislike it. (And I suspect they have a fear of being portrayed as a place for perverts in the Conservative media, which could cost them a lot of customers; there are still a lot of people for whom "gay" is synomous with "pervert" or "pedophile," especially in regards to interaction with their children.)
I admit, it's not very fair. However, WoW is essentially a private playground, and they can do what they like in there. Anyone who doesn't like the rules can take their membership fee and go home.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, and it makes people who are gay really uncomfortable to have those words thrown around as insults. It's hard enough to come out in the first place; I can't imagine what it would be like to come out if everyone I knew was clearly hostile to my sexuality because they used those words as insults all the time.
What's your ethnicity, what's your kink? Search and replace "gay" and 'fag" and so on with "wop" or "kike" or "Jap" or "nigger" or whatever term is instant fighting words, when applied to you. Looks like a pretty hostile environment, doesn't it?
I've actually gotten younger people I know to stop saying "That's so gay" when they mean "that's stupid" by pointing out that, hey, I'm gay, and it hurts every time they do that.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
You can report people who are saying offensive things and Blizzard will look into it. In many cases they'll give a warning, and in some cases they'll ban someone.
I've had very positive results from reporting people who had offensive names or who said things highly offensive (in my view). So if gays get offended by hearing the word "gay" used as a negative term, then they should report the offenders.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
Can I just ask why the heck it matters whether there are or are not gay gamers out there? What does sexual orientation have to do with any of it, why should any one care? I am asking this in all seriousness, this is just silly (to me).
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:3, Insightful)
But confronting everyone who thoughtlessly uses a word that you find offensive isn't the answer. The people who didn't mean anything by it will feel like shitheads, and people generally don't like feeling like shitheads, which beeeds resentment. And the ones who did mean something by it will laugh and get up in your face, and you won't have solved anything. There are better fights to fight than just making sure everyone uses nice words all the time.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
If a straight person is in a 'regular' guild and says "Oh, I have to go - my boyfriend and I are going out tonight, I have to get ready" such a statement is met without comment.
If a gay person were to say "Oh, I have to go - my girlfriend and I are going out tonight, I have to get ready" such a statement usually gets met with "Uh... I thought you were a girl? How can you have a girlfriend?" at best, and "OMGZZ! UR A DYKE!!!" with a swift kick from the guild at worst.
One should be perfectly free to not have to worry that if they say the pronoun of the person they're involved with that they'll get grief for it. That's the point of a GLBT friendly guild - one can be oneself without getting harassed by small-minded idiots over something that really is irrelevant.
What is a gay character??? (Score:1, Insightful)
That being said... sex (as an act) has no place in the game. Primary sexual traits (ie. male and female) are unavoidable, so it seems natural to have male and female characters. But you can be male or female without considering sexual orientation or sexual acts. You can't be a member of the GLBT without that. Otherwise, what does it mean to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender?
So, as I say, sex (as an act) has no place in the game. Therefore, anything relating to sex (as an act) should be excluded. That's not just GLBT, but ANY kind of sex-act-related topic. It would be just as inappropriate to discuss being straight or any kind of straight-sex related topics. There is no discrimination here.
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)
Why are there African American college clubs, night clubs, or an african american caucus in the U.S. Congress? Why are there minority scholarship funds, minority political action committees, or other minority groups built around a sport? Why is there a hispanic rugby team in my city? Do you think they're shoving their hispanic-ness in your face when they advertise on a board at Wal-mart or in your local newspaper?
The reason why these kinds of organizations exist and why minorities and homosexual people want to gather together is because you're less likely to experience comments like "thats so gay" on the guild channel, you're more likely to be able to talk about things in real life that might hint at your sexuality, and you're more likely to be able to say things like "Oh honey, I just went to an Elton John concert and it was so fabulous." There are also many common things among many of the self-identified and out homosexual people and maybe they want to be closer to those kinds of people.
I ran a GLBT-friendly end-game guild on WoW where I would guess 20% of our members did not identify themselves as heterosexuals. We did not advertise ourselves as GLBT friendly except in one way, you were introduced to our charter before you were given an invite, and it clearly expressed that we would not tolerate discrimination against ethnic groups or homosexual people and that we were friendly to all types of people of all backgrounds, ie we were GLBT friendly. The guild leader in the article takes pains to say that it is not GLBT only. I have known heterosexual people who were attracted to GLBT friendly guilds because they shared a lot of common values that are held by a majority of out GLBT people.
But lets be absolutely clear. She wasn't flaunting a sexual preference or in anyway saying that there is a superior sexual preference. She wasn't shoving her preferences in your face, unlike that stupid Chuck Norris trend, she was advertising a specific thing, a cultural thing. I fear for your ability to reason and be critical when you think that a guild that advertises a specific cultural style is offensive and in your face when they aren't speaking to you directly but on a public channel created for that kind of thing.
No guild I've ever been in or run myself, and I've been gaming for over 11 years, has ever failed to bring in outside dynamics. People talk about getting married, having kids, meeting someone new, dealing with their studies, and how sick they are. When people are social they share parts of themselves that are not totally encapsulated into the game world and it is ridiculous, thoroughly ridiculous, to expect otherwise of the vast majority of guilds.
This cultural aspect of social dynamics means that it is legitimate to want a guild where people will not say "thats so gay" and where you can say, "yeah my sex class is turning out to be quite compelling" when you want a guild that is more accepting of that kind of thing.
Yes and no. It would seem silly, in a way, because it seems thats what most guilds are. You don't have to be really picky to find a guild like that. Finding a straight guild that is not GLBT friendly is like trying to find a white person in a country club, you can close your eyes and still run into one. Also, it wouldn't seem quite inappropriate because a lot of people really, really want to avoid GLBT people and they might go to such lengths just to do so. I think it is the height of ignorance, but I would still support their right to do so.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
I strongly disagree. This is just like the military's don't ask, don't tell policy, and it stinks. Why is it not okay to be yourself on WoW? I was just reading an article about this, it's called "covering". You can come out of the closet maybe, but then you have to "cover" up your real self. One of the examples was, your family will invite your (the theoretical third-party homosexual is "you" in this case) lifemate to christmas, but don't kiss under the mistletoe like a "normal" couple. You can play WoW, but you'd better not let anyone know you're gay. What's the difference? Nothing. It's still sexual discrimination and it's utterly inappropriate.
Now, maybe they have the right to discriminate against homosexuals on a MMOG, I'm not sure how the law would be applied if it would be at all, but it's still discrimination, and it makes me ill. I'm not playing WoW just because I don't want to, but if I had wanted to, I'd certainly skip it now.
Re:Boo-Ya!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
LOL. Okay, I'll formally state now that I won't accept "make-believe" evidence from a parody site. :-P
Yeah I agree..... NOT (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh and gays, no walking hand in hand, that might upset people. White and blacks kissing in public, no sorry, could lead to scenes.
What you suggest is a very slippery slope. You are giving in to the haters. How far are you prepared to give in? What race/religion/orientation can be told to keep quit before you will say enough? Or will you only cry out when it is you who is being told to behave.
No this stuff makes me sick. People like you in my eyes are worse then the open haters, I rather deal with ten neo-nazi's then with one person who says to not upset them.
Re:Not Wise to an Audience of Homophobes (Score:3, Insightful)
Everyone who has been part of an openly gay-friendly guild is very aware of how bigoted and homophobic some other players are. They don't need Blizzard's patronizing "concern" to warn them off; they know what they're getting into.
In fact, the awfulness of many other players is very likely exactly why these people have chosen to form or join a gay-friendly guild. They want a place where they can say things like "Sorry, can't play tomorrow, it's my boyfriend's birthday" in guild chat without getting that harrassment from their guildmates as well.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:2, Insightful)
Bad move by blizzard (Score:3, Insightful)
The very fact that people feel a need for a Gay Lesbian Bisexual Trans(gender/sexual) friendly guild in World of Warcraft (just so the people confused with acronyms know what this is all about) says enough about blizzard.
It is not a very "mature" place resulting in a very intollerant atmosphere. Not just of GLBT people either. WoW is more or less anonymous and this allows people to behave in ways that in real life would earn them a few broken teeth. Rather then do something about this Blizzard instead asks there the victims of the online bullies to keep quiet and not attract attention.
Nice move. Good to see the last 100 years of liberation of the individual was all for nothing. It is still only acceptable to be a while male protestant and everyone else should just be quiet.
What next Blizzard? Women who play your game and are harrased should not tell people they are really female?
People who claim that Blizzard owns WoW and can therefore do what it wants are living in a fantasy world. A MMO is closer to a social club and the law requires clubs to be open to anyone regardless of sex/religion/race/color/sexual orientation. A club that rejects women because they claim that they want to protect the women from being harrassed by their male members would find very little sympathy from the law.
This woman (presumable lesbian) wanted to create a guild that was friendly to people of a different sexuality then heterosexual. From other comments here it is pretty clear that WoW as a whole is not very friendly to that group. She did NOT want to make a guild for GLBT people only! She did not exclude hetero's.
It is sad that this is still needed in 2006. Very sad in fact that even in a place like Amsterdam wich used to be a really open place it is again becoming necessary to make sure GLBT people can feel safe.
Rather then dealing with the haters among its subscribers Blizzard seems to prefer the "don't rock the boat" attitude that made Amsterdam into the city it is today. And paris france. Don't speak out, keep quiet and hopefully the haters will go away. They never do.
I hope canadian lawmakers are watching this and taking the legal steps to get Blizzard in court and punished to hell and back.
Just what is canadian law on this subject? I would imagine that the sport of hockey has a large proportion of homophobic fans, how is this dealt with? Can a gay player be part of a team or is he hooted of the ice?
Ofcourse the slashdot audience consisting mostly of white hetero male christians is not exactly best fit to understand why there would be a need for a special guild for people who do not fit the so-called norm.
Re:The ONLY question (Score:3, Insightful)
good for them (Score:3, Insightful)
So long as they apply it to everyone.
I'm quite gay-friendly.
Gay people have a tendency to bring their persecution down upon themselves.
"LOOK AT ME!!!!! I'M GAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Then they wonder why people think they are assholes.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:3, Insightful)
My solution to this was simple. I only play games with a few people I know IRL or people I know I get along with from online. I create private games in Diablo 2 and I password protect them. Believe me, this makes Diablo 2 a hell of a shitload better.
In WoW, my guild is restricted to people I know IRL, and a few we have encountered online we care to play with. Fnord the rest of them. It's rare we invite someone into the guild, because it's rare we find someone we don't think is an idiotic brat.
Re:Blizzard is right (Score:2, Insightful)
For a few years I ran game servers on a university campus network. As an extention of the SU we had to uphold their anti-homophobia policy and in-game chat was treated like any other SU venue; if we didn't we'd be shut down. This ment logging it all and punishing the offenders. It seemed totally OTT to me, while I didn't use homophobic language myself as it seemed childish, it was just the parlance for insulting people in Internet gaming culture and it never really struck me as wrong.
It made many of the users very angry, and when I started banning persistant offenders they tried to appeal to the SU, to whom I sent the logs and they just threatened the student with a university disciplinary hearing for their conduct; promptly silencing them.
It took about six months for people to really understand and change the way they talked. Initially I wanted to fight it myself as I'm very anti-censorship & pro free speach. However the SU isn't about that, it's a socialist construct and as such one of its roles is to provide a slightly nicer version of the world where young adults can find themselves.
I think everyone benefited. I realised that as harmless as it may seem, using "gay" as a pejorative hurts people. Having to explain to people why they couldn't use it really made me think about it. The offender would always try and explain it away, "it wasn't homophobic", and I knew it wasn't, but it implys being gay is bad and whatever your personal beliefs policy says you can't do that. The gamers hopfully thought about how they used homophobic language and at the very least learned how not to use it if they had to. Plus I'm sure the couple of gamers we had that I knew were gay felt less insulted.
It reminded me that governments often want to restrict freedom of speach for the same reason its freedom needs to be protected. It can be very powerful; which is also the reason we ought to be careful how we use it.
Re:Yeah I agree..... NOT (Score:3, Insightful)
People are prejudice and insecure, that's just a fact of life, it's wrong but it's still there. There are constructive ways of dealing with it, but none of them are fast and usually require generations to work out. You aren't going to fix it with an online community built around WoW, you are simply creating a free target that the haters feel they can strike at with reasonable security. If we're lucky maybe our great-great grand children will get past these stupid biases, but I'm sure they'll have plenty more of their own. Human vs AI vs Clones vs Cyborgs... I think as long as we have a dynamic society that is changing there will be prejudice simply because a lot of people are afraid of change.
Re:Okey dokey (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, I don't like it and wish it didn't have to happen, it's just that I believe people should use accurate arguments to defend their beliefs.