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Blizzard has removed Hong Kong Hearthstone player blitzchung from Hearthstone Grand Masters and rescinded all his prize money
- Thread starter Lump
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Thijs took a stance, except it was the wrong one where anything related to the situation that is said in chat is bannable in his twitch channel.
I was just in TrumpSC's stream maybe 30 minutes ago and he said something to the effect of "If people want to unfollow and unsub from streamers playing blizzard games I completely understand and good for you taking that moral stand. I don't agree with what blizzard did but I'm going to keep playing their games, if you unfollow I understand." Paraphrasing Trump there, its not word for word but that was the basic idea anyway.
I've seen a few smaller streamers (like alliestrasza as example) retweet Kibler's post but not personally comment yet so we'll see what they do next time they stream.
This whole thing is reminding me to unfollow a lot of twitch streamers I didn't really watch anymore anyway to be honest though. Like, I was really into hearthstone streams a few years ago and followed a lot of people at first who I haven't watched in ages. Seeing all these people in my currently broadcasting list streaming heathstone and i'm like "oh yeah, I should have unfollowed them ages ago anyway."
I've seen a few smaller streamers (like alliestrasza as example) retweet Kibler's post but not personally comment yet so we'll see what they do next time they stream.
This whole thing is reminding me to unfollow a lot of twitch streamers I didn't really watch anymore anyway to be honest though. Like, I was really into hearthstone streams a few years ago and followed a lot of people at first who I haven't watched in ages. Seeing all these people in my currently broadcasting list streaming heathstone and i'm like "oh yeah, I should have unfollowed them ages ago anyway."
I'm a little surprised Activision HQ has been silent all day, but then again this has really run away from them. The mobile Diablo controversy looks like a joke compared to provoking a newsworthy incident between two world powers. I wonder if there's any tension between Blizzard China and of the US-based corporate office; the line about upholding the pride of China sounds too provocative to have been properly vetted.
Thanks for keeping the OP updated. I didn't know the details of the incident and Blizzard's handling of it. Their behavior is really poor and this kind of capitulation to China is something that bothers me greatly. I'm definitely going to consider a boycott of their games going forward depending on how they proceed in the coming days and weeks.
We will never forget.
Hey, not op but I would like you to know that your message... Brought tears to my eyes. Really. Heck, the other day I saw someone cosplaying as Doraemon cheering people up and I started crying like a baby. Never knew I was that emotional, huh.
The last 4 months had been rough, and no one knows how things will end. There's been many anger, hopelessness, fear, sadness, and many tiring days and sleepless nights. So messages like this really mean a lot to us.
Again, thank you and everyone who has been supporting the Hong Kong protesters.
Edit : Found the Doraemon I was talking about!
https://m.facebook.com/standnewshk/photos/a.720050934747196/2501842839901321/?
Thank you, and everyone involved, for being so brave and so resolute in the defence of freedom and human rights. You are all inspirational.
Positioning the "West" as the ideological opponent and peacocking about it is just as much a part of the CCP's playbook.
This language of Western values is precisely the kind of strategy used to position liberal democracy as anathema and incompatible with Chinese people. Whether intentional or not, the characterization of Western superiority is just further fuel to the fire of Chinese nationalism.
All Blizzard games are now on my boycott list. Blizzard would have to do a lot for me to change my mind.
Not yet. They supposedly made a statement to Blizzard employees today though.
I am not familiar with the case you mention here. But two wrongs don't make it right. We should fight all instances of it, ESPECIALLY if it comes from our home turf.
There are limits to what I accept though. I don't think threaths or hate towards individuals or groups of individuals are ok. "Free Hong Kong" is not hate speech though.
Oh, I would like it if you explained why EU is the same as China in this regard. EU can be counted as a major power right? We do not censor people for speaking out against government.
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Both for me. Was going to buy the new CoD but fuck them. Not giving them any of my money.
By now it hardly matters what they say. The very fact that they have to think this hard about their statement is damning enough.
Apparently they have disabled all forms of account verification to stop people from deleting their account.
Apparently they have disabled all forms of account verification to stop people from deleting their account.
This is old. It was a temporary bug and the tweeter was able to delete her account shortly after.
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Totally agree, my personal line from the beginning has always been that they need to at least re-hire the casters and give him his money but they can keep the suspension in place. Basically like Kibler said in his post.
The longer it takes for them to make a statement, the more gross it feels to me though. Because it feels to me like they are just testing the waters to see if they can wait it out entirely which is totally unacceptable. And they should know that.
Activision has no part in the game anymore so you aren't really hurting them.
Bungie owns and publishes now.
Yeah unless they are planning to completely reverae course here then what they have to say is meaningless to me.
Anything short of "we are sorry. We are reinstating the player and the caster. And we are returning the prize money." is not enough.
Genuine question: is there a way as westerners to criticize the CCP without them finding a way to spin it as western imperialism? Because it seems like in these threads over and over the sentiment is "don't say XYZ because the CCP use it as fuel to their fire." While we should be careful to not want to promote a sense of western nationalism and superiority, we should also recognize the people of Hong Kong very much value their independence and favor liberal democracy and support that. Whether or not it's because of colonialism, we should understand that these are their demands and as people who live in liberal democracies, be sympathetic to their demands and support them. Supporting democratic ideas and societies is good, west or east. It should be considered a universal human value.
The CCP will do what they can to spin it. We should be focused on supporting Hong Kong first and foremost.
I don't disagree with that, but if you look at the comment I'm replying to, it's literally filled with references to virtuous "Western values." They're not treating liberty as a universal human value, they're characterizing it as distinctly Western, and crafting a narrative that has a pretty explicitly prideful bent.
Framing the conversation as a matter of human ethics is exactly what I'm advocating. They're not doing that.
I agree the post comes off strong. I'm just saying anything westerners say in critique of the CCP will be spun by them as being western imperialism imposing their views anyway. I don't think there is a way to avoid that as westerners. But I'll let the person you quoted speak for themselves, assuming they reply to you.
They have said something. It was just only said to China. Blizzard will protect China's dignity. They don't want to address the West because only backpedaling would suffice, and that would make them look bad in the eyes of China if not get them banned by censors.
Better to let the CCP do the work instead of doing it for them.
Gb, especially west, never presents particularly strong opinions about situations like this. I don't resent them for it, and wouldnt really expect or want it. Alex will delve deeper on the beastcast, I'm sure.
Don t really know what they can say we don't already know.
They don't wanna that people use their post win interviews to make controversial and or political statements...that guy did it fully knowing what was gonna happen and accepted it. Not sure about the casters.
Also,as far as I read here, China alone is 10% of their profits...they are never gonna make an enemy of the Chinese govt.
Also I do wonder if the people clamoring for them to take a stance would be willing to cover blizzard's losses (if they get banned from china) with their own pockets.
It's got to be killer for people who make their own living off these games... I wish players like TrumpSC would outright condemn blizz... But I at least understand they live off these games literally.
I mean, people like that have plenty of money already. Big streamers that is. Smaller/medium ones? eh. But like, Kibler is taking a loss for example, but he will be fine. So would Trump. Once you're well enough off, it's just as immoral to pretend you can't take a stand for the almighty dollar - just like it is for Blizz execs.
The casters were aware that he was going to make a political statement. They asked him to "say the eight words" and then ducked their heads right before he did. That's why they've gotten caught up in this as well.
why should they incur in losses to follow your moral code?
it's easy to tell people to do the right thing when we don't have actually anything at stake and just have to ask other people to take the hit for the greater good.
covering for the losses they could have from making an enemy out of the ban happy chinese govt would be a way to spread the consequences more evenly.
Won't someone please think of the shareholders. We agree though, Blizzard doesn't have a moral code.
Yep, and he addressed that in those tweets too, you skipped over that one though.
I hope you at least are getting nice dividends from your Activision shares if you are going to take this position.
it's less about thinking of the shareholders, and realizing that it's really easy to tell people to do something when we dont actually have to do nothing ourselves or suffer any consequences at all. we just tell people to do stuff and hit the loss for the greater good, sounds kind of convenient
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