13 ms·

As much as Apple's decision is highly contestable, I don't know if it is worth trying to make a PR coup by implicitly backing a racist flag. I know I personally

• cjslep 11y ago
  Edit: I misunderstood parent comment when crafting the below response. > a racist flag I'm curious, should all WW2 games be removed because of the facist swastika flag? Or games involving the cold war because of the communist flag with the Soviet Union? In both cases, atrocities that were an affront to humanity occurred with millions perishing in various camps. Which brings up another question: Why stop at video games? Board games physically print these symbols that could be taken offensively. I ask because I have Axis & Allies and Twilight Struggle sitting on a shelf right here, but don't consider myself facist, nor communist, nor insensitive. I don't have a civil war board game but I bet they physically print those symbols too.
  • doe88 11y ago
    > should all WW2 games be removed I don't want to remove nothing, apparently you've misunderstood my comment. It wasn't the point I was trying to make at all.
    • Kiro 11y ago
      You should clarify your comment then.
    • cjslep 11y ago
      Sorry for misunderstanding. As someone who grew up in the South, I have grown to hear the phrase "a racist flag" as one of those trigger phrases that is politically loaded. I now realize your point is about being in questionable taste when using it as a PR stunt.
  • simias 11y ago
    I don't disagree with your overall point but I don't remember a lot of WW2 games featuring a swastika (well, besides wolfenstein 3D), they often replace them with other symbols. I'm in europe though, maybe it's different in the US. That being said it's probably not comparable. If some US states still had confederate flags on some of their public buildings in 2015 it's probably not nearly as offensive as a swastika.
    • sehugg 11y ago
      I can't help but notice that Wolf3D is still available on the App Store, swastika intact. Perhaps these small developers are easier targets than Zenimax when deciding which apps to sacrifice for the sake of grandstanding.
    • kuschku 11y ago
      Ah, so you’re German, too? xD Most WWII games still use the real symbols in other places, and, while under German law Art is exempt from the Swastika ban (you have to endorse the swastika and glorify it to be illegal), no publisher actually tried to get their game classified as art yet, so they just remove it, as it's easier and less risky.
• cdash 11y ago
  What is wrong with depicting a confederate flag in a game about the civil war?
  • doe88 11y ago
    Nothing imo, it's historic facts. But what is wrong imo is using the situation for PR purpose.
    • bbwharris 11y ago
      This is the point you were trying to make and I completely agree with you.
    • Kiro 11y ago
      How are they using the situation for PR purpose? All they did was posting that Steam put their game on the front page, which any sane game developer would do.
    • colechristensen 11y ago
      Not at all. Steam is showing off the fact that it isn't led by vapid idiots. It's important for gestures like this to happen to fight against the growing threat of 'social justice' fueled censorship. There's a big difference between not selling to people who want to wave the battle flag to trying to erase every depiction regardless of context. Standing up against such foolishness is important.
      • bbwharris 11y ago
        Is it a good game? That's all that matters. Maybe it's great, I personally don't know. I'll give the benefit of the doubt here that the featured algorithm uses controversy as a metric.
    • KJasper 11y ago
      What would you call the move by Apple?
    • benihana 11y ago
• asddubs 11y ago
  Upvoted. No, the confederate flag probably should not be banned from being used in any context in media, ever. But while apples decision was wrong (IMO), it's also in bad taste for a competitor to promote material containing the flag solely as a PR stunt.
  • jarman 11y ago
    Apple decides to perform PR stunt to benefit from hysteria, while fucking over publishers/developers. Steam perform PR stunt by giving one game promotion. I don't see how it is bad taste, especially compared to Apple actions.
    • bbwharris 11y ago
      Apple probably made a mistake and needs to adjust their policy. Steam deliberately did this because of that mistake. Apple didn't intentionally ban a civil war game for PR, they enacted an oversleeping policy that resulted in controversy for this game. It seems like steam deliberately did this to thumb their nose at the situation.
      • KJasper 11y ago
        Why is this a mistake? And not just policy as well? Or is it because Apple tests boundaries and backpedals when necessary and call it a mistake afterwards?
        • bbwharris 11y ago
          Well, how would you solve the task assigned to you: "remove all the apps in the App Store that contain this flag" Do you look at every single result and scrutinize it? Oh and this needs to be done now, as in yesterday. It's definitely plausible that they did not review each and every decision. Maybe too their policy is against historical images as well. No exceptions. We don't know. People love to hate on the App Store. This displaced game found a home on steam and they even boosted it up. Was this for the right reasons because it's truly a great game or was this a marketing stunt to show off their lack of censorship? It's slightly distasteful regarding this polarizing topic. I applaud their bravery if it is anti censorship, but I sincerely doubt the cause is that noble.
• rakoo 11y ago
  > implicitly backing a racist flag I don't see how Valve backs the racist flag. They back the game, specifically because it has been banned by Apple. But I don't see any sentiment toward specifically agreeing with the flag and all its meaning.
  • yincrash 11y ago
    They aren't. The GP is wrong. That's like saying that a historical museum is implicitly backing a racist flag by having one in their civil war exhibit they are promoting this month. There is nothing racist about promoting a game that uses 'a racist flag' in the correct context. In this case, a historical one.
  • jameshart 11y ago
    Right, but they run the risk that the kind of people who are upset with Apple not because Apple have made a general boneheaded move but who are specifically exercised because Apple has removed their flag, will now see Valve as some kind of hero and start acting like Valve is on their side. While valve may see themselves as supporting free speech advocates, they're also, incidentally and presumably (hopefully) unintentionally, pandering to, and risk validating, racist bigots.
• stevejones 11y ago
  How do you feel about imposing a blanket ban on said flag for PR purposes?
  • sagichmal 11y ago
    A company's prerogative, if they choose to do it.
    • deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
• fiblye 11y ago
  I think if Valve chose to promote this and it wasn't automatically placed on the front page due to a surge in popularity, it's probably because Valve is trying to show itself to be a marketplace where no idea is censored, no matter how unpopular and that their competitors have asinine policies. Look at the whole Hatred debacle. Some people think it's the most offensive game of all time and should be banned, but Gabe himself came out and said that that's no reason to pull the game. Besides, when it comes to censorship in games, it's usually from gross misunderstandings or willful ignorance. Banning all Civil War themed games because they display a flag in a historical context is a good example. The game is in no way promoting the ideology behind the flag.
  • fiveoak 11y ago
    > Look at the whole Hatred debacle. Some people think it's the most offensive game of all time and should be banned, but Gabe himself came out and said that that's no reason to pull the game. Someone at Steam did initially pull it off of greenlight though. Gabe re-added it later.
    • fiblye 11y ago
      That's true, but Gabe came out and made a point stating that Valve as a whole didn't support that decision.
• SloopJon 11y ago
  You're assuming that Valve is trying to make hay somehow by promoting this game, but I wonder if the game's placement is simply a result of a spike in sales by users who can't purchase it on the Mac App Store. I'm guessing it wouldn't take many purchases for the store's logic to pick up a historical strategy game as a trending seller.
• yrochat 11y ago
  Valve's position reminds me of Hatred disappearance/reappearance http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/17/hatred-game-back-on-steam-greenlight http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/dec/17/hatred-gam... In either case, it is in my opinion difficult to determine if this is good or bad PR, and if this is good or bad in terms of morals. However, more tendency towards provocation might bring the answer.
• ubertaco 11y ago
  >a racist flag When I look at the Confederate flag, it represents something completely different to me. It's the flag that my great-great-great-great grandfather fought for, not because he was a racist, but because he was 12 years old (he got discharged honorably for somehow getting enlisted below the minimum age) and wanted to protect his friends and neighbors. The popular misconception was that anyone flying the Confederate flag during the war did so out of seething hatred towards anyone not white. The even more popular misconception is that by extension, anyone flying that same flag today does so out of the same reason. For a lot of folks, it's just representative (if perhaps misguidedly so) of a lot of things that define "typical southern culture": redneck (used down here not always as a pejorative but as a lifestyle shorthand) "simplicity", blunt honesty when needed ("mouth of the south") and hospitality when not, and the sort of "God and country" stuff that you'd expect to find in a Keith Urban track. It's like waving a Texas flag, except nobody's tried to tie the Texan flag to the racism that was prevalent everywhere in the US during the Civil War (let's not forget that Martin Luther King Jr. didn't hang out with Abe Lincoln north of the Mason-Dixon line; he worked with Lyndon Johnson much later from Atlanta and Selma.) So I think it's cultural blindness to simply treat the Confederate flag as nothing but intrinsically racist or even as equivalent with Nazi symbolism (or to treat it as worse; Amazon still sells Nazi paraphernalia, but has discontinued Confederate flags). But I also think it's cultural blindness to treat it as having no negative connotations. However misinformed the reasons, the public views flying a Confederate flag as assenting to what they believe it stood for: racism or hate. So whether or not they're right about what it stood for, it communicates to them that you agree with what they think it stood for. In terms of my own worldview, I find 1 Corinthians 8:4-13 [1] to be pretty applicable here (where the issue at hand was "is it okay to eat food that had been used in pagan worship ceremonies?") The idea being: yes, sure, I know better, so it's okay for me. But if I eat that food (or in this case, wave that flag) in front of someone who thinks it's very wrong, I am in their eyes giving approval to something they see as wrong, causing them an issue of conscience. If they go along with me, they are knowingly doing what they believe is wrong. It is then a conscious offense for them, because they have a different understanding of the issue than I do. And I either force them to compromise their conscience to justify my behavior in their minds, or else I cause them to see me and my moral framework in a much worse light. So then, if I have a Confederate flag in my house, whatever, I understand the significance it has to me. But if I fly it out in my yard, I am in my neighbors' minds backing whatever they think that stands for. So any other cause I support or view I hold is immediately suspect to them now. I do damage to more important issues because of my lack of awareness on a less important one. [1] http://www.esvbible.org/1Corinthians8/ http://www.esvbible.org/1Corinthians8/
• jasonlotito 11y ago
  Can you please provide proof that Valve is using this as an opportunity for PR for the reasons stated? The game was recently released, and because of Apple's attempt at PR by banning the game, would result in people going to Steam to purchase the game. The end result would be more sales, and more likely to get featured. Your suggesting this is not the case. Please back it up.
• sehugg 11y ago
  It is hard to pin down the precise motives of a large organization. But Apple is no stranger to embracing the zeitgeist when the mood suits them, e.g. the fast-tracking of the Fiore and Charlio Hebdo apps: http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark-fiore-cartoons http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark...