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Gay Guild Recruitment Disallowed From WoW?

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.'"

6 of 514 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Blizzard is right by smbarbour · · Score: 0, Troll

    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.
     
    I don't know... That might actually entice me to start playing, just for the joy of killing their characters whenever possible. I know there are plenty of others who feel the same.
     
    Both parties are a bunch of morons, I would prefer to back neither, but the Democrats are closer to representing citizens (rather than corporations) in my book.

  2. What I am curious about is by Daysaway · · Score: 1, Troll

    Individuals fight for Gay Rights. They fight for equal opportunities. They fight to be recognised as equals. Then they form a guild to spotlight the fact that they are different than the common society.

    If you don't want to stand out in a crowd, don't call attention to yourself. There should never have been a guild in WoW that was allowed to recruit based on sexual preference. It is only a target for harassment.

    Otoh, I can see how Blizzard has an express interest in keeping this sort of thing from happening. After all, the more accounts they have to ban for harassment, the less residual income they make. Although with their current numbers, tossing a few bad apples from the bunch wouldn't even make a dent.

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  3. don't make an issue out of it by __aaitqo8496 · · Score: 0, Troll

    to me it sounds like this person is just trying to cause undue tension. we have a girl claiming to be lesbian, but no one makes a big deal out of it - mostly because she doesn't.

    i'm not saying you need to join the ranks of the immature by yelling "fag" or "gay", but you don't have to wave your flag out in front of everyone.

    i don't yell "bush sucks" even though that's what i think and make it known to those i meet in real life.

  4. Re:Blizzard is right by heinousjay · · Score: 1, Troll

    Seriously, stop being so fucking sensitive then. Your feelings aren't anyone else's responsibility, and the sooner you realize that, the sooner you can get past your hangups about other people and just deal with things normally.

    'Hostile environment' is the biggest load of crap in the English language. No one deserves an easy time of things.

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  5. Reverse It by Bellum+Aeternus · · Score: 0, Troll
    A GBLT organization of any kind automatically discriminates against the majority of players for not being gay/bi- and therefore shouldn't be allowed. There are also a lot of close minded WoW players who will take offense to being recuited by a GBLT guild and could leave WoW over it: hitting Blizzard's bottom line. I'm nnot gay bashing; I've several gay friends and even marched in a pride parade back a couple of years ago. It's just that I can see Blizzard's point of view on this.

    It's sad to say, but I'm pretty sure there's more close minded WoW players than gay/bi- players and it is Blizzard's job to cater to the masses.

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    - I voted for Nintendo and against Bush
  6. Re:They allow... by mvdwege · · Score: 0, Troll
    non-in-your-face Christian names like "Redeemed", "The Forgiven"

    How can you say that these names are not in-your-face? The very names "Redeemed" or "Forgiven" divide the world in those who are redeemed or forgiven, versus those who are unredeemed (aka damned), and unforgiven. There is not even an implication of "the others are bad" in there, the judgment is right out in the open.

    I can only think of one quote when I see names like that: "Judge not, that thou shalt not be judged". Not to mention Jesus' various tirades against the Pharisees to boot.

    Mart
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