Discriminatory behavior regarding nationalities

[foobarz]

The following things are illegal in Trench Wars:

...

4. Discrimination, racism, childporn or anything related to it inside the game. This includes but is not restricted to names, squad names and banners.

5. Excessive and deliberate verbal harassment, spamming or flooding of public or private channels. If it is less serious the victim(s) will be advised to use '?ignore Name', ESC I (for public macros) or change their ?chat.

I'm glad that racism is illegal in TW. It is deplorable to discriminate against people based on attributes they have no control over.

However, I feel that it is an oversight that people are allowed to make bigoted comments against certain groups. If it is racist to make anti-black or anti-Arab statements, is it racist to make anti-African or anti-Middle East statements? If it's racist to make anti-Semetic statements, is it racist to make anti-Israel statements? And where is the line drawn? Should people be allowed to make anti-American statements regarding not its government but its people?

There is a clear line between making statements disagreeing with a country's policy and making bigoted statements against the people of a nation. I am American, but I strongly dislike George Bush because I am angry over the 2000 election, angry about his cronyism, and angry about all of the lies he told us, falsely connecting Saddam to 9/11, saying he had WMDs, and saying he was acquiring uranium from Africa, while Bush failed to adequately pursue al Qaeda. But this does not make me anti-American. I love my country. I love the people in it. Just because I don't like the leader, it doesn't mean I don't like the people.

Yet there exists a strong backlash against Bush's policies that's aimed at the American people and is unfair. I've seen people on TW call the "Yanks" fat, ugly, stupid, arrogant, murderers, and people without souls. I've seen people on TW say that the Americans should be nuked (one fellow even has it in his name). Perhaps our country's leadership leaves much to be desired. But that does not mean a thing about Americans in general.

I hate Osama bin Laden for killing 3,000 innocent people, but I don't hate the Afghans or the Muslims. I think that neither Ariel Sharon nor Yasser Arafat are men of peace, but that does not make me anti-Israeli, anti-Palestinian, anti-Semetic, or anti-Muslim.

All discrimination is equally deplorable; there is no way to say it's not right to insult blacks without also saying it's not right to insult Americans or Muslims or Swedes. You can't say it's wrong to insult Islam without also saying it's wrong to insult Christianity or Judiasm. And you can't say it's wrong to discriminate based on race but that it's alright to say we should nuke the Americans.

I think that this oversight should be corrected, and the TW policy clarified, such that it not only is wrong to discriminate based on race, but also on religion, ethnicity, country, gender, and sexual orientation.

Again, I don't mind legitimate critiques of a country's foreign or domestic policies, but I do not think it is appropriate to generalize all members of a nation. It is very hateful, offensive, and immoral.

And here are a few of the comments that caused me to make this long post, from a character named "Velocity | greener"

Velocity |> if only a nuke could wash away american vermin i will be happy
Velocity |> anyway agood american is a dead american
Velocity |> american fellower they got no soul at all
Velocity |> american dogs
Velocity |> Amercans are a gang of freak
Velocity |> americans are warbringer and must be exterminated propreply
Velocity |> Americans wont move. They are fat AND souless

[Troll King]

You're absolutely right. All it takes is for staffers to be gutsy enough to do this.

[genocidal]

agreed, though i mostly laugh when people are stupid enough to think all americans are fat, lazy, and are behind bush 100%. ignorant fucks.

[Louis XV]

Re: Discriminatory behavior regarding nationalities

Velocity |> if only a nuke could wash away american vermin i will be happy
Velocity |> anyway agood american is a dead american
Velocity |> american fellower they got no soul at all
Velocity |> american dogs
Velocity |> Amercans are a gang of freak
Velocity |> americans are warbringer and must be exterminated propreply
Velocity |> Americans wont move. They are fat AND souless

He sounds like a Nazi.

[froedrick]

He sounds more like a 14 year old or younger who thinks that he's cool by belittling Americans. I'm Canadian and I like Americans, I know quite a few. And yes, George Bush is an idiot.

[Vantage]

No offence, but we dont train Osama bin laden and have that turn out sour. Most countries dont hand jews to hitler (Figure of speach u cunt). Even though not all american ppl are like their government, u take the blame for electing those retards.

And i dont think its racist.. its generalization... like when ppl had the nick SARS=CHINESE, Push said he couldn't ban. Live with it

[foobarz]

Aside from the fact that your post looks like a troll, I would mention a few problems with your argument:

1) a large number of Americans do not believe Bush was legitimately elected
2) most Americans are against funding Osama-type people; this was done by the Reagan administration and the CIA, under the radar; most Americans are aware of this type of action when they occur (i.e. barely anyone realizes we're funding a bad regime in Uzbekistan)
3) while the US is close to a democracy, its government does not reflect the people's opinions very well in certain aspects; due to the two party system, people often vote for what they believe to be the lesser of two evils, and for certain reasons foreign policy does not always come up as the most important decision; also, partisan gerrymandering prevents Congress from being responsible to the people

So, while you certainly can fault the fact that the US under President Reagan funded Osama and Saddam--and I agree, these were bad ideas--most Americans would disagree with these actions but are personally unable to change the specifics of US foreign policy.

And in the defense of the US, its government is more representative than a large number of other governments in the world, and political corruption in it is smaller than in many or possibly most other countries.

[Adeon]

4) Fuck you, Phroz.

[Nasir]

Originally posted by Vantage
And i dont think its racist.. its generalization... like when ppl had the nick SARS=CHINESE, Push said he couldn't ban. Live with it

Racism is allways generalization in a way, hating a whole group of people because of their skin, with arguements that they steal or are responsible for 95% of the crime or stuff like that.

[ZeUs!!]

Staff having the balls to deal with it isn't the problem, its the fallout from making such a decision that would be the real issue.

Although its definately a valid point that you've highlighted, staff would just get blown out of the water by the people who use this game to say what they can't say in everyday life (why do you think everyone swears so much). I'm not promoting these actions at all, nor justifying it I'm just demonstrating the amount of people a decision like this would effect. Just about everyone here has an opinion on the world as it is, whether its a 13 year old Irish kid who overheard his dad talking about the IRA and decided that the best course of action was to nuke London or a 38 year old Political Science lecturer. You just can't restrict what people say to that extent.

The nature of the game also makes people talk like the way they do. This whole game is geared around one group of people fighting the other, mixed in with the fact that you can insult people without really hurting their feelings and all sorts of things get said. If we went around enforcing this then we would have to ban half of our current playerbase.

There's also freedom on speech to consider, plus we also can't lose sight of the fact that this is an internet game not a small european country.

Add all of this to the current 'staff is corrupt' peddlars and we have to question the whole legitimacy of having a staff in the first place. Its a great idea but we aren't living in a utopian world yet

[Tigerex]

Lets all stop being such oversensitive pricks and trying to save the world from people using "bad words". Go apply yourself to something more important.

[Awesome]

Originally posted by ZeUs!!
Staff having the balls to deal with it isn't the problem

Yes it is, the ones who do something about it (*cough*, Me!) are hated for it and eventually get axed because of it.

[Troll King]

Originally posted by Tigerex
Lets all stop being such oversensitive pricks and trying to save the world from people using "bad words". Go apply yourself to something more important.

Yeah, staff should worry only about important matters like teamkilling and spec-hunting.

[T Mac-1]

Arnt their like 100 of these threads? And dont they all say basically the same thing.

[wadi]

Originally posted by T Mac-1
Arnt their like 100 of these threads? And dont they all say basically the same thing.

Winnaaar!!!!