I’m 100% certain that they didn’t remove your entire ability to chat, everywhere, with no warnings, no prior account actions, and no information given to you, for no other reason than that. I’m also 100% certain that you know they didn’t too, and are continuing to be dishonest.
But even if I am wrong and they did, I’d still support and agree with it. People who have an insatiable need to tell everyone their political affiliation/opinions that they can’t even set aside when they’re playing a video game are insufferable, and I’m happy to see them treated harshly so they learn to keep that shit where it belongs, a list that does not include chat in video games.
I disagree. This is a video game. There is no legitimate reason to bring up real life politics, and everyone should have the good sense to know that. If you don’t, that’s a you problem, not a moderation problem. Removing your ability to chat does not harm you. There’s no reason you should feel entitled to a warning not to do something you should know better than to be doing.
No, I believe that’s all the person might have put. It was a very mild political conversation on global. I read most of it. There wasn’t too much offensive to any one side besides those who didn’t want to read political comments. That’s what a global chat is partly for, not just political comments but just chatting in general. The idea that you can’t bring up something because it’s a video game is very narrow and yes I do believe people are entitled to an idea of what they did wrong. How can someone improve themselves if they don’t know what they did wrong, what comment was too much and were the line in the sand is. One shouldn’t be punished for crossing a line and then not told where that line was they they crossed.
Also, the idea that because someone said something in global allows for them to lose all other types of communication is crazy. To add to that, have no idea of how long the punishment is and have to wait for another moderator to possibly e-mail them back. Why couldn’t the first moderator do such a thing to begin with.
That I disagree with. IMO, there should be some places where people can be without politics being dragged into it (from either side) given the rather fractious nature of politics at the moment. I’d also disagree that since the OP was using perjoratives for one side that “there wasn’t too much offensive” going on & given the rather disagreable & tribal nature of politics at the moment then that conversation would likely have gone to hell in a handbasket very rapidly. The OP may have thought that what he said was just being amusing or something, but I’d be surprised if he’d have felt that way if he were on the receiving end of it.
You can literally just block people or turn off chat? It’s a click of a bottom if they don’t want to see my chat. People need a safe space? Then just block my chat. You can still see everyone else. Why is this hard? A paying customer should now have all chat turned off because one person might get offended and can’t make an effort to just block? Come on man… Be honest
Without seeing everything they posted it’s hard to say and just take their word but I read a lot of the comments in Global, it was the tamest talks of politics I had seen. Since this cycles launch it has been the most active global has ever been, partly why I paid attention. At most global is just people asking for TP’s to places they could easily get to themselves. That aside this type of moderation is just as toxic as what they try to moderate and that’s my issue on this. going full ban hammer with zero warning, zero information on where they went too far, and zero information on the length of the punishment is an insane style of moderation. While you might dislike the type of communication going on in global that is fine. What happens when a mod gets a little too overzealous and there is zero structure to bans put in place?
There needs to be a set procedure for bans with warnings and information put in place for the person being banned. Something that gets followed uniformly. It’s never right to just have this ban and forget about its policy. Also the idea that you lose all communication in an MMO is insane when the infraction happened in global and wasn’t something incredibly offensive or violence-invoking.
Yes, I’m just going based on what the OP has said. It may well have been the tamest talk about politics, but it’s also EHG’s “house” so if they don’t want any particular things being said, they can do whatever they want.
Yeah, I get that & I’m with you on the “zero warning, zero info” bit.
That’s why there’s a process to appeal/complain about a ban.
I would post a screen shot if I could. I literally cannot type in the chat window. I cannot see the chat. If I go to message someone I cannot type anything in the box to them. I am literally banned from using all chat and even seeing it. I am been playing this game for almost 1000 hours now and have never been banned for anything and the only reason politics were brought up is because Biden just dropped out of the race. Thats a huge deal in America. I got no warning. No timeframe. Nothing. Just shadow banned. I might as well be banned from the game. I didn’t buy it for single player.
Look I will admit the chat got out of hand. It wasn’t anything crazy though but definitely some name calling. No cursing or death threats or any of that non-sense. It was your standard trumpers vs libs arguments because Biden just dropped out. You could say it was trolling sure. Many were doing it. I understand a ban is fair. How it was done is BS.
Which is a terrible and archaic system, I’ve dealt with bad, overzealous, in a terrible place-of-mind moderators on a smaller scale where you got banned for just about anything that rubbed them the wrong way. A system where the person has to e-mail them to get the proof of why they were banned is crazy. If this was a mute for a day or ban for a day I’d say suck it up, is global chat you miss for a bit, oh well. This is a full communication ban and they need to ask for whatever information the moderation team is willing to give them.
Just a horrible system, that can be resolved with a simple message from the moderator doing another step. Either by e-mail linked to steam account or chat window. “Due to violations of our terms of service you have been dealt a Insert punishment for the following comment insert offense if you wish you appeal this punishment please contact customer services.” Literally a copy and paste statement with a few things pasted in.
Something the person banned will have that shows why they were issued the ban. Having to rely on a company, any company, to give you information. Especially if it was due to poor moderation that might make them look back and might not want to release is crazy.
I don’t think that you can claim to be neutral while at the same time banning people from chatting. One might say that global chat is the only way most will interact with other people playing the game, so banning people from using it is telling them they can’t play with others.
Also, a more neutral approach would be to provide people the ability to mute/ block persons they don’t want to hear from (which is already in the game), so policing them isn’t necessary.
Don’t complain about moderation problems when players aren’t willing to use the tools in place if they feel offended. Stay out of it unless you’re legally required to act.
I believe it’s because it contains the word “rump” which the chat filter automatically catches as inappropriate language. This is not a statement in defence of that policy FYI.
People sometimes play games to escape their real life situation. Having to first read a political message and then have to decide to block someone is not in line with that.
The fact that exactly today this 4 month old thread is being revived says enough about the topic people want to introduce again into General Chat.
Your entire argument of “free speech should be unlimited” already gives me a good idea about what type of chat messages you’ld be sending.
This isn’t a government platform protected by the 1st Amendment. If you want to shout political things, I believe one of the other fanboys bought Xitter just for that, go do it there.
Leave politics out of the game, Eterra has no presidential elections, and if we had, Grael would win anyway
If someone insults you or your mother you can block them, sure. But you’re already insulted. Even if you aren’t, free reign will simply turn chat into 4chan a toxic environment, as can be seen in many games.
EHG want people to have a good time in a friendly environment. And since politics (and religion and a few others) discussions always escalate and turn ugly, they decided that in their own game, part of the ToS is that you’re not allowed to discuss these issues.
They would rather you play the game and have a good time than either having to constantly block people or turn off chat altogether (which is what happens most of the time).
Your argument makes it seem like a defense of “let us insult people freely and if they don’t like it they can take actions” rather than “let’s not insult anyone ever”.
First of all, you are ignoring the difference between prevention (chat filter) and reactive resolution (blocking people who already did the damage with “hurty words”) Your argument is as logical as saying “we have hospitals, so why need seatbelts?”
Plus, the current moderation is also neutral, every political stance gets treated equally! In a hands-off environment, the loudest side would actually be favoured and be less neutral.
And lastly, if you’ld repeat some of the political stances certain US candidates said in the last few months in chat, I’ld be in my rights to sue EHG for the distribution of said speech. Because unlike the US, most countries actually adopt an approach of “your freedom ends where your neighbor’s begins” and ban hate speech. Not moderating would create a legal issue in the vast majority of their market and not even Tencent would invest in a game that ends up being US-only.
But of course you’re gonna gloss over this all and just repeat “it’s not neutral because I can’t say whatever I want!”, which will prove my point.
You may think you’d be in your rights to sue for “hate speech”… but unless the company is based in your country, the laws your country has on speech have no validity. Hate speech doesn’t exist. It’s a government fabrication.
And again, I don’t know what you’re reading, but it’s not what I’m typing.
That’s not how the law works. Go ask Facebook or Google about their EU fines if you need an example.
Wow, that ain’t Kool-Aid you’ve been drinking, is it?
I’m literally reading what you’re typing. That’s how this whole forum thing works.
I’ld explain what that statement says about your mental capacity, but “hurty words” aren’t allowed. Besides, I have neither the time nor crayons for it, nor do I believe you’re willing to listen anyway.
