James Delingpole points out that social justice warriors and their politically correct gospel have infected, and are well on the way to destroying, yet another major online game hub. It's a long article, filled with detail, so I've tried to distill the essence of it.
Every day, everywhere from college campuses to social media pages, from Hollywood to the comic industry, from science laboratories to the military, a battle is being fought for the soul of Western civilization. On one side are the “progressives” whose risibly inappropriate name includes everyone from Antifa, Occupy, and Social Justice Warriors to the liberal elite types who congregate at Davos every year and who would be running the U.S. now if it hadn’t been for the glorious accident of Donald Trump. On the other are the happy warriors ... who recognise that the Culture Wars are a continuation of the same struggle for freedom and against totalitarianism for which good men have been fighting and dying since at least the Battle of the Salamis.
And caught in the middle of this struggle are all those millions of ordinary people who probably never thought of themselves as political but are beginning to realize, through rude awakenings like the one I’m about to describe, that there is no such thing as neutral status in the culture wars. Either you’re for liberty or you’re against it. It really is that simple. And if you’re for liberty, you can’t just hang around taking it for granted. You have to fight for it, now more than ever, every day of your life.
. . .
If you play Magic: The Gathering — Wizards of the Coast seems sincerely to believe — then the Wizards of the Coast can police, judge and punish you, 24/7. They are so stringent, in fact that, essentially, Wizards of the Coast is reserving the right to own the life of any player who plays its card game — and to banish them permanently at the drop of a hat should he or she (though, face it, 99.99 times out of a 100 it’s going to be a he) fail to meet its exacting standards of personal behavior.
And that judge’s decision is final. You’re not allowed a defense, apparently. You’re not allowed a plea in mitigation. Nor is the judge — Wizards of the Coast, owned by Hasbro — under any obligation to justify his verdict and the consequent penalty. Nor, furthermore, is that judge required to be in any way consistent. As we shall see, if you have the correct SJW politics you can harass, oppress and bully fellow players with virtual impunity; only the politically incorrect are punished.
. . .
Convergence, essentially, is the SJW equivalent of those parasitic wasps which lay their eggs inside other insects. The eggs then hatch and the hapless host body is devoured from within.
Obvious victims of this include organizations like Facebook, Apple, and Google, which increasingly put the values of “social justice” before more conventional free market goals like customer service and the bottom line. And, indeed, before more traditional values like freedom of speech or individual rights.
But almost no institution is immune.
. . .
In other words, what happened at Marvel Comics is happening at Magic: The Gathering too. The kids are being given what’s good for them, rather than what it is they want or like.
. . .
No one asked the 20 million people who enjoy playing Magic: The Gathering where they wanted their hobby to be policed according to politically correct standards where you’re no longer free to bitch and gossip and joke about the game, the other players, and the organizational hierarchy.
A tiny cabal of SJWs made that decision for them. And now, just like happened with Gamergate, they’ve been forced to take sides.
. . .
Either you believe gaming should be about fun, freedom of speech and liberty — or you believe it should be about social justice. It cannot be both. You are the market: you decide!
There's more at the link.
It's a sad thing to see major players in the entertainment industry shooting themselves, not just in the foot, but in multiple portions of anatomy in this way. Sure, it satisfies those currently running things . . . but when they have nothing left to run, because their customers have walked away, where will they be then?
Peter
6 comments:
"...but when they have nothing left to run, because their customers have walked away, where will they be then?"
On top of a smoldering pile of rubble.
It may be nothing but rubble, but they are *on top* of the pile. That's the important part.
Agree with Art. And another reason I don't do online gaming...
I'm not a gamer, I don't have a dog in this fight, but a former gunblogger who now runs a game store has this to say:
http://toolazytofail.com/2017/12/12/snowflake-store-ownership/
Not something I've followed, but it sounds to me like he's doing it right. There are people in a business like this who drive out more other customers than they can make up for.
In a lot of places Magic: The Gathering players are toxic shitlords. I can say this as someone who used to play Magic. All the people who got banned are trash-talking shitlords more known for trash-talk than the decks they build. Seriously, the guy mentioned in the article, I know more about his memes and shit-talking than what cards he runs and his primary color(s). Wizards is trying to clean up their tournament scene before game stores start dropping Friday Night Magic for scaring away the more civil customers.
Seriously, it's bad.
My first and last tournament put me off the competitive scene forever. There wasn't an ounce of civility from any of the players, grown men were cursing out boys half their age and making fun of kids for being brought there by their moms. I got called a pedophile several times for being civil to younger players (shaking hands before a match, saying good game afterwards, basically being polite and not being a raging asshole like most of the more 'serious' players).
I can see why Wizards is being rather draconian since right now, to maintain their more civil clientele, a lot of stores are banning games where the players get too loud, obnoxious and destructive. I've heard stories of Pokemon Professors having to beg store owners to let their events be held after some spectacular blowups. Where I live Press Gangers having stores bring in extra staff to keep Yu-Gi-Oh players away from their tables of WarmaHordes Wednesdays because the Yu-Gi-Oh players are all thieves and will take your miniatures if you don't keep an eye on them. It's a nasty, toxic situation in game stores that has nothing to do with politics and SJWs and everything to do with people having been allowed to be assholes for far too long.
Reading the article and commentary, it seems nobody looks good in this situation.
Hambly comes off as an edgelord asswipe, the kind that gets kicked out of groups for pissing off the GM. And WotC comes off as a pack of humorless socjus enforcers; I really don't like this attitude of 'you will be judged by your conduct even outside of official events'.
If I sign up for the military or police, that's one thing, but freaking MtG? Seriously?
I can guarantee people are going to start carefully separating their political personae from their 'official' ones, pseudonyms and handles ahoy. Sheesh.
For the first few years I was at the school, M:tG was wildly popular, especially with the younger set, boys and girls. And then, about two years ago, it vanished. Poof. Like someone threw a switch. I'm not certain what happened, but it was noticeable.
Now it's tabletop D&D again. Olde School.
LittleRed1
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