Blizzard Suspends Hearthstone Player For Hong Kong Support, Pulls Prize Money

[Visions of Khas]

People are apparently being banned for mentioning Hong Kong in a twitch stream during a Hearthstone Masters Tour.

I never hated Blizzard. Hell, I was fine with the crappy story we got out of SC2, knowing that we had outgrown their target demographic. (Well, "fine" might be an overstatement, but you get my drift.) I am just really sensitive to matters like this, and their attempts at silencing people who speak out about tyranny utterly pisses me off.

[The_Blade]

I just had a conversation with a friend on this topic a few days ago. The situation is so complex that boycotting China is not possible as a regular person. However, you have every right to voice your opinion vs tyranny and cruelty. What really hurts about all these companies and celebrities bowing down to China is that they don't even need the money at some point. Moreover, they do have the possibility to make a statement and have impact.

Take Lebron. If he stands his ground and makes a statement, he would just lose the Nike money and probably get a tiny slap on the hand by the NBA. He would still stand as the player with the highest revenue overall. I don't hate the man, but I am heavily disappointed.

What truly makes me hate Blizzard is that they have been virtue signaling everything and claiming the moral high ground for the past 5 years. Now, that they face the real crossroads of "doing what's right or grabbing the money" they fucked up their whole identity and their fans.

[Turalyon]

What truly makes me hate Blizzard is that they have been virtue signaling everything and claiming the moral high ground for the past 5 years. Now, that they face the real crossroads of "doing what's right or grabbing the money" they fucked up their whole identity and their fans.

It's probably my cynicism/skepticism that's causing me some hindsight bias here, but I always consider companies who "virtue signal" and market themselves/ create PR around claiming the moral high ground, genuine though they may be from the outset, as a red flag. It's always about the moolah in the end.

[sandwich_bird]

People are apparently being banned for mentioning Hong Kong in a twitch stream during a Hearthstone Masters Tour.

I never hated Blizzard. Hell, I was fine with the crappy story we got out of SC2, knowing that we had outgrown their target demographic. (Well, "fine" might be an overstatement, but you get my drift.) I am just really sensitive to matters like this, and their attempts at silencing people who speak out about tyranny utterly pisses me off.

According to some dude on reddit, Blizzard has also been banning pro-China comments on that stream. But, the statement on the subject is:

We are not banning people from Twitch chat for specifically using pro Hong Kong speech or any other political statements. Bans are being levied by an automated moderating system that’s triggered by viewers spamming any phrase repeatedly. We expect to have the issue corrected in the next few hours.

https://www.polygon.com/2019/10/18/2...witch-chat-ban

So take that as you will.

Man, I'm getting excited for blizzcon this year but not for the games. The drama is going to be intense! Imagine if on top of all this political stuff, they don't announce Diablo 3 or D2 remaster. Ouch

[KaiserStratosTygo]

^ Haha, I remember the days when it was only a minority that hated on Blizz, now everyone's jumping on the bandwagon. How the times have changed.

Ah, it feels good, doesn't it? the vindication, puts a devilish smile on my face >

[ragnarok]

Ah, it feels good, doesn't it? the vindication, puts a devilish smile on my face >

It just shows how much things have changed. Not that I really felt any good things for Blizz back during the WoL days, I was merely neutral. Of course, to see them show their nature like this, well I can't say I was surprised.

[Nissa]

I really, really don't want to hate Blizzard. They seem like every effort must go into making sure nobody sympathizes with them at all.

At the same time, I'm not really in the camp of people who want to go, "hey, let's spam Blizzard with Hong Kong stuff!", because I generally feel that some things in life should serve to give us a break from the garbage in the world. As much as one would support Hong Kong, it would be fairly easy for the crowd to want to use Blizz for other platforms as well. I support Hong Kong, but not people acting like idiots, ie spamming twitch.

[The_Blade]

I really, really don't want to hate Blizzard. They seem like every effort must go into making sure nobody sympathizes with them at all.

At the same time, I'm not really in the camp of people who want to go, "hey, let's spam Blizzard with Hong Kong stuff!", because I generally feel that some things in life should serve to give us a break from the garbage in the world. As much as one would support Hong Kong, it would be fairly easy for the crowd to want to use Blizz for other platforms as well. I support Hong Kong, but not people acting like idiots, ie spamming twitch.

I agree with you, but many can't see the spectrum. This is why I don't like the "Reddit crowd" or anyone who acts with the same absolutist way of thinking.

Just as with Hong Kong, they act all crazy about other main stream issues like Climate Change and anti-liberal bigotry. However, there's heavy conflict in Yemen, Kashmir, Chile, Brazil, Congo, South Africa, Kurdistan, Lybia, Malaysia, Indonecia, Australia, and well put Mexico there too. On top of that there is a general lack of mental health in developed nations like USA, Japan, and the UK. Trying to bring awareness through the Hong Kong popularity is often heavily criticized, as right now it's "Hong Kong's time". This attitude will result in a lot of people just disliking the mainstream public "support" on sight for being fanatic and annoying.

[Visions of Khas]

However, there's heavy conflict in Yemen, Kashmir, Chile, Brazil, Congo, South Africa, Kurdistan, Lybia, Malaysia, Indonecia, Australia, and well put Mexico there too.

I'm familiar with several of those, but Australia? What's going on there?

[sandwich_bird]

Trying to bring awareness through the Hong Kong popularity is often heavily criticized, as right now it's "Hong Kong's time".

It's technically the same argument/logic that blizzard claim to use: "The main subject should be isolated to preserve focus and going outside of it results in consequences". I don't really see a problem with preventing topic hijacking unless you meant something else? For example, most would agree that it'd be in bad taste if PETA joined a gay pride parade with anti-animal abuse signs.

Considering the average attention span and such, it's a fair policy. It's how they usually define the bounds or the topic that I disagree with as is the case with Blizzard.

because I generally feel that some things in life should serve to give us a break from the garbage in the world.

And I can agree with that too. I don't want political ads inside my game if it's not smoothly made to be part of the universe nor do I want to deal with spammers. But, on the other hand, interviews are intrinsically about the real world.