Originally Posted by
Elkfingers
I'll level with you. That's pretty narrow as far as criteria go, so no I have nothing like-for like. Potentially I came on a bit strong on that one particular aspect of the issue.
Still, let's talk about the Collegiate team. If the primary motivator for their decisions was following policy, as they claimed, it should have been just as simple to ban that team straight away. The fact that they didn't, and instead only took action after not doing so completely backfired does seem to suggest that perception played a much bigger role than they're willing to admit publically. They had absolutely no consistency in their procedures whatsoever, and even walked back the punishment they initially handed out after it all kicked off - would they have done that if there had been no outcry? Probably not. It just contextualises their statement in a light where it's shown to be entirely PR bullshit.
If they had said that the action they took was so that they could protect their markets I could probably see my way to being ok with that. Dealing with China is dubious, but it's not like Blizzard has a direct financial stake in how authoritarian the Chinese state decides to be and they're not obligated to endorse or condemn any political action anywhere. My problem is that they tried to paint their reaction as the result of some obviously bullshit commitment to procedure and rigid neutrality, when really all they wanted to do was distance themselves from clear human rights violations because if they didn't they'd be put in a very difficult position. The statement massively fucked me off, basically.