gaming Activision/ Blizzard Suspends Tournament Player For Pro-Hong Kong Stance

[Denim&Venöm 16,510]

Kinda surprised this wasn't reported on sooner. 

So yeah, over the past week, Blizzard has faced harsh criticism for suspending one of their pro players, Blitzchung, for a year and stripping him of his earnings, all because he spoke out about supporting the Hong Kong protests. And while any punishment would've been bad, the extensive nature of the punishment was what got people riled up. 

Adding fuel to the fire was when several college players showed their support for the protest, but were not punished in any way, showing blatant hypocrisy on Blizzards part. And speaking of hypocrisy, their US social media posts talk about keeping attention on the game and not political views, but their Chinese social media denounces Blitzchung, talks about what punishments were issued and how they'll defend the pride and honor of the nation. 

The official response from Blizzard has not eased things in any way, most notably for lacking any apologies and still defending their hard line stance and dismissing the notion that China had any input what so ever.  Not only has the official response been rejected by fans and players but also by Blizzard staff, who have taken to walk out protests and covering up artistic plaques at their headquarters, specifically the ones preaching the core values of "Thinking Globally" and "Every Voice Matters."              

It's gonna be interesting to see how Blizzcon goes this year and how the company share holders will react to both the bad press and the spike in players cancelling their accounts. But what are your thoughts on the issue? 

[Jon C 229]

Blizzcon is going to be interesting this year.

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 40,284]

Gonna be the odd one out on this one. I fully support Hong Kong, I definitely do not support the Chinese government, however, what this player did was not in the right place at all. I do think Blizzard was a tad too harsh, but he did break their rules so a punishment of some kind should be expected. Him shouting "Free hong kong!" at a game tournament doesn't do anything for Hong Kong's cause and neither does protesting some video game company. People on the internet, like they do, think that protesting a big video game corporation is helping the protesters when it isn't in the slightest. Besides, if they are going to protest Blizzard, they might want to do so with literally every major corporation on the planet because all major companies do business in China and why wouldn't they? China has the largest market in most industries. The amount of gamers in China far outnumbers the amount in North America, easily.

It is an increasingly complicated situation, but the current internet outrage towards Blizzard is a waste of time and pointless. 

[Anneal 2,194]

1 hour ago, Kyoshi said:

Gonna be the odd one out on this one. I fully support Hong Kong, I definitely do not support the Chinese government, however, what this player did was not in the right place at all. I do think Blizzard was a tad too harsh, but he did break their rules so a punishment of some kind should be expected. Him shouting "Free hong kong!" at a game tournament doesn't do anything for Hong Kong's cause and neither does protesting some video game company. People on the internet, like they do, think that protesting a big video game corporation is helping the protesters when it isn't in the slightest. Besides, if they are going to protest Blizzard, they might want to do so with literally every major corporation on the planet because all major companies do business in China and why wouldn't they? China has the largest market in most industries. The amount of gamers in China far outnumbers the amount in North America, easily.

It is an increasingly complicated situation, but the current internet outrage towards Blizzard is a waste of time and pointless. 

People should be allowed to voice their political opinion on any occasion though. We can easily compare this to Colin Kaepernick's kneeling during the national anthem in protest of Trump. People argued back then how Colin shouldn't have brought politics into the NFL, or how him kneeling wouldn't do anything to reduce police brutality. But these kind of actions force organizations and companies to take action, or at the very least allow viewers to be more politically aware.

Also, I know some people may dislike Bethesda due to their multiple mishaps with Fallout 76, but you don't need the Chinese market to make tons of money, if Fallout 4 and Fallout: New Vegas sales are anything to go by. And other games like Battlefield 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 have still topped video game sales records despite them being banned in China.

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 40,284]

41 minutes ago, Anneal said:

People should be allowed to voice their political opinion on any occasion though. We can easily compare this to Colin Kaepernick's kneeling during the national anthem in protest of Trump. People argued back then how Colin shouldn't have brought politics into the NFL, or how him kneeling wouldn't do anything to reduce police brutality. But these kind of actions force organizations and companies to take action, or at the very least allow viewers to be more politically aware.

Also, I know some people may dislike Bethesda due to their multiple mishaps with Fallout 76, but you don't need the Chinese market to make tons of money, if Fallout 4 and Fallout: New Vegas sales are anything to go by. And other games like Battlefield 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 have still topped video game sales records despite them being banned in China.

Blizzard's tournament rules are pretty clear though. They clearly don't want these things brought up in their events and this is exactly why. Everyone is accussing them of taking the side of the chinese government, but that accusation is solely based on them not taking a side. So by not taking a side (which they shouldn't be expected too because they are a video game company) everyone thinks they are against the protesters. They have their rules set in place for a reason and that is fully on display here.

[ShadOBabe 18,984]

1 hour ago, Kyoshi said:

Blizzard's tournament rules are pretty clear though. 

Have you not yet heard about the American team that did the exact same thing in support of Blitzchung?

That’s them. And not only did they support Hong Kong, they called for a Blizzard boycott.

The team expected the same thing to happen to them as with Blitzchung. Blizzard did not say a word.

The American team forfeited anyway out of principle.

Basically, Blizzard doesn’t have the balls to touch free speech in front of a Western audience. But if China is watching, all bets are off.

[Misty Shadow 7,084]

I get that tournaments have rules, but I am definitely on Blitzchung's side here. Blizzard was obviously just looking for an excuse to kick him so that they wouldn't have to face the wrath of China. It also must be understood how what's going on with China and Hong Kong right now is more personal to people of Asian descent. 

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 40,284]

34 minutes ago, ShadOBabe said:

Have you not yet heard about the American team that did the exact same thing in support of Blitzchung?

That’s them. And not only did they support Hong Kong, they called for a Blizzard boycott.

The team expected the same thing to happen to them as with Blitzchung. Blizzard did not say a word.

The American team forfeited anyway out of principle.

Basically, Blizzard doesn’t have the balls to touch free speech in front of a Western audience. But if China is watching, all bets are off.

Okay, I will admit that is bullshit by Blizzard. If they are going to have rules, they should be consistent with them lest they look like total hypocrites.

[Kyoshi Frost Wolf 40,284]

If I may, I want to further explain why I have such a complicated viewpoint on this matter.

The entire situation is obviously a very tricky one. Companies are now making sure they can tow a certain line with China and its people, but this is pissing off people in the west. What makes it more troubling is...well, there simply isn't much we can do about it. We have these boycotts going on towards Blizzard, but really, what can that do? Raise awareness of the whole thing? Yes. Solve the issue in any way at all? Not even close. China is such a huge place, a huge market, a massive population. Simply boycotting companies will not make an impact, because how things are in the world cannot allow that. Blizzard's stock is 5% owned by Tencent, a chinese company. Angering them could actually affect their bottom line as a company. So their actions are for the sake of their profits and shareholders and so that means the real driving force of their decision is...well, capitalism. Same goes for most other companies. They do what they see as essential to keep their profit margins in line. I am not saying that is okay, in fact I think it is messed up, but it makes it easy to see why these decisions are being made. Most companies will do the same in hopes of keeping their Chinese market intact. It is simply a part of the world in this day and age. Who knows how far this entire thing with China would have to go for the protesters to have their victory. Civil war? Massive unrest in the region? Other nations getting directly involved? Any of those could create even bigger problems for the rest of the world as well. It is not a pretty thing to think about and a gaming company certainly has no input on any of those outcomes.

I guess seeing all of this negativity in gaming is really starting to wear me down. I can be a negative guy for sure, but with gaming being my top passion, I've been trying to have a more positive outlook on it all. Then we have things like this going on and it turns gaming into a political morality battleground and it is so...tiring. There are a lot of Blizzard games that people love and nobody should abandon the games they enjoy over this situation. It simply isn't worth that. Nobody should hurt their own enjoyment for the sake of a political message that simply won't do the job. It seems many are willing to do that now. It is of course their decision, but I wish gaming could be celebrated like it once was.

[Megas 27,064]

One thing is for certain, this move has done the impossible and get gamers from both sides of the political spectrum to agree on something

[Here No Longer 5,270]

I don't really like Hong Kong or China, I think they're both very much in the wrong (China's worse than HK, but they're both villains on this count). But, this to me is not that. It is a freedom of speech issue, and Blizzard is VERY much wrong to "suspend" a tournament player just because of their political viewpoints. This is a fascistic move by a corporation that wants to seem "politically correct" to China because they want to exploit their labor laws. F***ing sick all the way around. I hope Blizzard gets sued for this.

[Pentium100 2,056]

30 minutes ago, Spider Demon said:

It is a freedom of speech issue, and Blizzard is VERY much wrong to "suspend" a tournament player just because of their political viewpoints.

4 hours ago, Anneal said:

People should be allowed to voice their political opinion on any occasion though.

Would it be the same if the player had a political opinion that was not as popular online? What if he said "Go China, get some tanks and finish those protesters already!" or "Trump 2020" something like that?

Anyway, there is time and place for political opinions and if rules of an event state that there should be no politics, then you have to obey those rules. Which means no pro-Trump, anti-Trump, pro-China or any other views. While Americans have their "freedom of speech", AFAIK, the constitution only guarantees protection from the government passing laws, private companies can do whatever they want, including limiting what you can say. One of the reasons to have such rules is to not make the event into a political debate. What if two players have opposing political views? If one is allowed to express his, then the other should also be allowed, which may turn the game into a political debate or a shouting match.

 

Anyway, if you do not like what China is doing, how about not buying anything (that you do not need to survive, medicine would be an exception) made in China? If the money flow dries up, maybe the Chinese government will fail. Writing stuff on the internet is free, that's why a lot of people do it, but when it comes to their own money, well, that's a different story. If you still continue to give money to China, then I do not think that your opinion matters that much to their government, as long as you continue to give money to them. If you buy things made in China because they are cheaper, then you are making the same decision as those companies you dislike - "my pocket is more important than my political views".

[Here No Longer 5,270]

Just now, Pentium100 said:

Would it be the same if the player had a political opinion that was not as popular online? What if he said "Go China, get some tanks and finish those protesters already!" or "Trump 2020" something like that?

Yes it would be, in all honesty. Both are horrible things to say, but they are simply words. They aren't actually doing anything other than that. The latter is quite frankly a really bad example for the point you're trying to make (although I will admit he's been a horrible president) because that's simply a political opinion (even if I would suspect it's based on lies they've just eaten up). The former does sound really bad (even if the protestors aren't in the right here as they've attacked innocent people on multiple occasions), yes, but at the end of the day words are simply words and that's really all that should matter in this sort of discussion in my honest opinion.

It would be different if he were working for a company or something and he were getting fired for this (*cough cough* JonTron getting fired from PlayTonic *cough cough*) because the things he specifically said would almost certainly make at least some of the people working with him on Yooka-Laylee very uncomfortable in their work environment, making it a huge problem because it will hinder their productivity, and harm the brand's public image. It didn't help with exactly what he said.

But in a case like this, there is no such issue, even if it were as volatile as what JonTron said about everybody whose ancestors immigrated to the United States. If Blizzard didn't do this, I don't believe it would affect their public image at all. All it would affect is their working relationship with the Chinese (most other companies are concerned about this as well, with their abuse of Chinese labor). It wouldn't affect their image because the player isn't associated in any way DIRECTLY with Blizzard. Indirectly through the tournaments, he would be, true.

But that wouldn't affect them at all, just him in the eyes of people who have different opinions. But them suspending him like this does have an effect on them. Their image is getting tarnished, and rightfully so, because they are censoring a player's presence because of a political standpoint. Which is very much different than giving the boot to somebody at their company for the sensible reason of PR. It also doesn't help this situation that this is in all actuality done to be on the good side of the Chinese government, and I think most gamers don't have the highest opinion of the Chinese government, and for good reason. They've committed atrocities towards their own people and don't give them basic human rights.

[Pentium100 2,056]

20 minutes ago, Spider Demon said:

The latter is quite frankly a really bad example for the point you're trying to make (although I will admit he's been a horrible president) because that's simply a political opinion (even if I would suspect it's based on lies they've just eaten up).

I specifically chose this example because usually anti-Trump people are vocal about their political views, which means that someone saying "Trump 2020" would have high chances of causing someone else to launch into a tirade on how awful he is. Which may cause the first guy to defend his views turning the event into a political debate or a shouting match.

20 minutes ago, Spider Demon said:

The former does sound really bad (even if the protestors aren't in the right here as they've attacked innocent people on multiple occasions), yes, but at the end of the day words are simply words and that's really all that should matter in this sort of discussion in my honest opinion.

Freedom of speech is an American concept, though as Blizzard is American, I guess it should apply to them. However, AFAIk, it only applies to the government and companies can and do censor a lot of things (though usually they are the ones that a lot of other people do not like, for example alt-right views).

 

20 minutes ago, Spider Demon said:

It also doesn't help this situation that this is in all actuality done to be on the good side of the Chinese government, and I think most gamers don't have the highest opinion of the Chinese government, and for good reason.

Awesome, don't do business with China then. If you do business with China (by buying things made there) and at the same time say that others shouldn't (because of your political views) then you are a hypocrite who wants others incur financial losses, while you do not.

Disclaimer: I buy things made in China and would not boycott a company for wanting to do business in China.

Edited October 14, 2019 by Pentium100

[Megas 27,064]

12 hours ago, Pentium100 said:

Would it be the same if the player had a political opinion that was not as popular online? What if he said "Go China, get some tanks and finish those protesters already!" or "Trump 2020" something like that?

Anyway, there is time and place for political opinions and if rules of an event state that there should be no politics, then you have to obey those rules. Which means no pro-Trump, anti-Trump, pro-China or any other views. While Americans have their "freedom of speech", AFAIK, the constitution only guarantees protection from the government passing laws, private companies can do whatever they want, including limiting what you can say. One of the reasons to have such rules is to not make the event into a political debate. What if two players have opposing political views? If one is allowed to express his, then the other should also be allowed, which may turn the game into a political debate or a shouting match.

 

Anyway, if you do not like what China is doing, how about not buying anything (that you do not need to survive, medicine would be an exception) made in China? If the money flow dries up, maybe the Chinese government will fail. Writing stuff on the internet is free, that's why a lot of people do it, but when it comes to their own money, well, that's a different story. If you still continue to give money to China, then I do not think that your opinion matters that much to their government, as long as you continue to give money to them. If you buy things made in China because they are cheaper, then you are making the same decision as those companies you dislike - "my pocket is more important than my political views".

A lot of this is happening because Blizzard's deep in China's asshole right now, and China doesn't want anyone speaking ill of them. Given the player they suspended was from Hong Kong, that's where this is becoming a big deal. You said

Quote

What if he said "Go China, get some tanks and finish those protesters already!"

As an example, and of course China would be fine with that it's a very pro-china statement. Not to mention, a team in America held up a Pro-Hong Kong sign during a live stream yet Blizzard never banned them because they were from America, yet they were very quick to call Blizzard on their hypocrisy. In the end of the day this has nothing to do with Free Speech and everything to do with Blizzard bending over backwards for a tyrannical government that's gotten way out of control

[Pentium100 2,056]

2 hours ago, Kiryu-Chan said:

In the end of the day this has nothing to do with Free Speech and everything to do with Blizzard bending over backwards for a tyrannical government that's gotten way out of control

Just like a lot of other companies that do business in China. However, for a lot of companies, this is not as easily visible by the public or at least the public does not care. Still, this happens because for most companies money is more important than values. Then again, that is true for most people as well.

Also, companies can be expected to follow the laws of different countries if they do business in those countries. If it is illegal in China to hold up such sign then the player was punished because of it, while Americans can do whatever (including holding up a Swastika, which is illegal in some countries, including mine) and the company can claim free speech since it is legal to do so in the USA.

Of course it all comes down to money. Usually such outrages by the public are short lived, very soon the public finds another thing to be outraged about and forgets the previous thing. Conversely, the Chinese government may have a longer memory.

[Passion 3,478]

1 hour ago, Pentium100 said:

Then again, that is true for most people as well.

That's an interesting so far arbitrary claim to make. Can you provide me with data and sources supporting it?

[Pentium100 2,056]

24 minutes ago, Passion said:

That's an interesting so far arbitrary claim to make. Can you provide me with data and sources supporting it?

Well, the Chinese government was like this for a while now, yet, a lot of people buy stuff made in China. They like it so much that when Trump wants to impose tariffs on China (for different reasons though), a lot of people get upset because, well, it may make their things more expensive.

China is good as a place to have your factory for mainly two reasons - one of them is lower salaries. Another is more lax environmental laws which make your factory cheaper to operate and the raw material (that is mined in China) cheaper. Rare earth elements, for example,  are not that rare, but the problem is that they are not concentrated in lumps like coal or iron ore. Extracting them produces a lot of pollution and the environmental laws of the West they would be very expensive. China has less strict environmental laws and is able to produce those elements much cheaper, so much so, that banning the export or rare earth elements is a credible threat from China. 

And these things do not seem to affect how people make decisions about buying something - price usually wins, this is why a lot of the factories are in China - cheaper to produce means you can sell it cheaper. 

Amazon came into public attention recently about how it abuses the warehouse workers. Well, did anyone stop buying from Amazon? I mean it's just an online shop, you can buy the same item somewhere else (unlike boycotting China which would mean that you may not be able to get some things at all).

Apple builds their devices in China and the working conditions there were bad enough to cause the workers to kill themselves. That did not stop Apple from selling lots of devices. Recently, it came out that Apple managed to allegedly violate the Chinese labor laws. I wonder if people stop buying Apple products now. And Apple devices are expensive enough that building them in the USA or the EU would not require an increase in price, it would just cut down the profits of Apple.

Add to that the fact that most of the public outrages like this are very short term (usually made by a few loud people on the internet) and you should see how I arrived to that conclusion. With Blizzard, maybe their games are not important enough for people to revert on the boycott, but for other things, yea... Apple bad, abusing workers is not OK, I will never buy from Apple*. Oh, look, a new iPhone is announced, now, where is my tent, I need to camp.outside the Apple store.

* I do not have any Apple device but not because of political reasons - I just do not like their devices and the fact that Apple puts the extra effort in making the devices fail sooner and harder to repair. I would buy one if I really needed to run some software and that software was only available on an Apple device.

[PCutter 127]

Now for me, it's almost like we can't trust either the US or China anymore, with Russia being an (dis)honorable mention.

Everyone of them, offering "protection" from the "true evil" of the world, when in the end everyone else is trapped in an inescapable lose-lose situation, a zero sum game.

 

[Pentium100 2,056]

13 minutes ago, PCutter said:

Now for me, it's almost like we can't trust either the US or China anymore, with Russia being an (dis)honorable mention.

IMO the USA and Russia are essentially the same, but with one difference - the USA has more money than Russia, so it can afford to offer some country a bag of money to act in the way they want and if it refuses, then bombs start dropping. Russia does not have the bag of money, so it goes for the bombs as the first (and only) option.

China has a lot of money and, because a lot of companies are short sighted, holds quite a few American companies by the ... factories, so those companies have to obey China.

All of those countries look only for their own interests, and by that I mean the interests of the people who matter - the politicians and their friends. 

[ShadOBabe 18,984]

Uh ohhhh...

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/d3akzz/three-college-hearthstone-protesters-banned-for-six-months

Well, I can’t say they don’t have the balls to mess with free speech in front of a Western audience anymore. So, no longer hypocrites in this instance, buuuut... I don’t think this is going to go over well for them...

@Denim&Venom @Kyoshi @Anneal @Zero @Celli @Kiryu-Chan @CloudMistDragon

[Misty Shadow 7,084]

3 hours ago, ShadOBabe said:

Uh ohhhh...

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/d3akzz/three-college-hearthstone-protesters-banned-for-six-months

Well, I can’t say they don’t have the balls to mess with free speech in front of a Western audience anymore. So, no longer hypocrites in this instance, buuuut... I don’t think this is going to go over well for them...

@Denim&Venom @Kyoshi @Anneal @Zero @Celli @Kiryu-Chan @CloudMistDragon

Yeah, it really isn't saying much for them. It doesn't take a big man to shut people down out of cowardice and greed, knowing that there are enough people out there who don't keep up with this stuff that are still going to buy your products anyways. 

[Megas 27,064]

Apparently Nintendo is avoiding anything to do with Overwatch right now. Cancelled an event at the Nintendo World Store, no promotion on their Twitter(while Fortnite and The Witcher 3 get a lot of promotion), and the biggest kicker, they’re offering refunds for Digital preorders, which they never do for other games. Needless to say, Overwatch on Switch is fucked

[Here No Longer 5,270]

Just another reason to start playing Paladins instead of Overwatch. The Switch release on that came 2 years ago, and it's got quite the community on the Switch and there's no issues like this with Hi-Rez, as they totally cut all ties with Tencent and their games are actually banned in China partially because of it (though not saying they don't have problems, is beyond disingenuous , the last PTS cycle started three days late because of a log-in issue they had two months to fix...).  

Edited October 17, 2019 by Spider Demon

[ShadOBabe 18,984]

Heh, well it's November 1st, and BlizzCon is happening.

I've got my avatar ready. Cannot wait for the news stories and photos that come out this weekend.