Racist Filter!

I don't like the racist comments either. I usually just try to inject some light or positive comments whenever I start seeing racist or nationalistic comments pop up in the chat. Or if the whole party is really bad, I just stop healing in protest lol.

The only racism i have come across is someone drawing what poorly resembled a swastika on the map.... however games such as WoW on some servers have turned into racial wars due to people not speaking the "server language" in general chat.

Racism is bad. People who express racism in game should be banned.

Now that I have stated my position on this, let me say that the original poster is a troll. So far he or she has made the following remarks in this thread:

"We also need to teach these idiot americans ..."

"its only american racism that i've been seeing"

"it still offends me to even consider myself 'american'"

"an american team trying to "work" together, is really just in a sense, trying to screw the other team over"

"it's not just the gaming comunity of americans that are racist"

Clean up your own act first sir. Then you can help clean up the game.

Increase the amount of people you can ignore as well, especially if a majority of the community sees it your way. Most of the people who end up on my ignore list due to aformentioned reasons seem to have the same attitude towards it - not saying you're one of them.

Why some people feel the need to say certain things is beyond me, and as much as I'd like to see them banned - or at least given a stern talking to - I don't see it happening. So for now I've got a nice little ignore list going, and I've left my fair share of districts and groups.

Shadow and Rusty, you are prime examples of this inability to speak amongst a community because there is a reinforced silence unless a person can already defend themselves, but let me propose this question, if you are so obviously strong and resilient to the world and its ways, why not prove it and lend some of that to protection of another's own well being.

Fact is, it has no place in the world for most of us, should not be granted a place of protection here, and if the stage requires us to "tattle" on people, then so be it. Granted a bit of this may just be friendly hostility, let ArenaNET decide that and people should restrain themselves unless it is obvious ethnocentrism as opposed to merely a sore loser

"You can always tell stupidity because they show strength, rather than use it, no one has ever shown true admiration for a tool until it is used, why should attributes be different"

No fees = no credit card. no credit card = 5 year olds running rampant with potty mouths.

Sure, you get this crud in other games too but its more rampant here because there's no way to narrow the age limit. It's a little easier to get mom and dad to buy you a game when they dont have to pay for it every single month.

In my opinion, screenshots and reporting is probably the only answer you need. You can never get rid of all of them, but enough screenshots and reporting and "Maybe" you can lower the population of idiocy.

It's sad, but I dont see any other way of policing such activities. A.net wont put up with it for sure, so we'll just have to see what a couple of bans will do for the comunity.

EDIT:: screenshots can be photoshopped, you may need some other way to prove the racial slurring is taking place since i've seen many a company refuse to use screenshots as proof due to one jerk or another just wanting to cause trouble.

OMG!! Lighten the hell up people....Yes blatant racism is vile and destructive....but when they program a game to say "------ Just won a battle in the HOH, america must win 3 in a row to take from europe." (paraphrasing) Well, it seems to me that the game is TRYING to pit groups agains each other.....its a WAR GAME essentially. The fact that I may want to beat Korea or Europe or Bangla-freakin-desh in a game doesn't make me a racist. Neither does taunting the opposing team. Or saying "i hope we kill the indonesians" within the context of the game.

Now, "I think that _____ need to shower, those people stink."....maybe different story. But the thread starter, in all of his grandios hypocrasy, in defending himself lumped americans together....now HOW THE HELL is that any different than what he is accusing us of. Deal with it....Americans are ****y....dont like it....stick to cricket, or curling, or chasing foxes with horses. I play fair, keep my mouth shut except for the occasional post pvp taunt, but I think the word racism is thrown around a little too easily these days. And please, unless we are practicing revisionist history here, dont act like europeans dont have a history of racism....the english empire was built on the blood of dark skinned people.....ask Ghandi.

first, I AM american. Second, alot of what i've seen goes WAYYYYYYYYY beyond simple competitivness.

Third:

People who get indignant and call responsible people who abide by the rules "tattletales" are often those with something to lose/hide. Just an observation.

For the record, whether or not you think racial slurs and attitudes should be reported, they're clearly against the game's rules of conduct: Guild Wars - Rules of Conduct

I haven't yet witnessed any racial slurs but I will gladly report anyone who thinks it's clever to take their competitiveness a step too far.

And it is a poor one. I never called people who abide by the rules tattletales. I called whining babies who take time out of their day to narc on people who dared offend their fragile sensibilities tattletales. The only channel I ever have open or use is my guild channel, so even if I chose to crack on someones nationality no one would hear it but for a select few people. I don't have anything to lose, and I don't feel the need to hide anything from whiners on the internet.

I never said they aren't free to enforce their own rules, go ahead and let them. I didn't see where the were asking for volunteers for the "Anti-racist police force" though. But hey, go for it do-gooders! It will make absolutly no difference. You have fun wasting your time though.

I must have woken up in Nazi Land recently.

When has it become "tattletaling" to report racial slurs? And what are we? In the third grade to use such a word?

Sitting back and doing nothing is not acceptable. It's condoning and encouraging such actions. And if we can't report such stuff what do you expect people to do instead? Ignore it? Go find the person and beat him up?

I seriously wonder about you people coming in here and telling people that they're too sensitive... kind of ironic since you're coming in here obviously sensitive enough to be bothered by the topic.

As a Jewish person, I find your comparing this to Nazism offensive. Are you a racist or something?

YES. IGNORE IT. This will be as easy as clicking a button if they decide to fix the ignore function.

I find nothing wrong with "kill the koreans!!", or "kill europe!!" on a team... It's competitive fun. Do you say "Boo <insert opposing sports team here>" when you're watching a game on TV? of course!

The problem comes when it gets out of hand. Which it quite often does.

And that was a poor interpretation. I never said "people who abide by the rules". Being responsible goes beyond simply avoiding trouble and sticking your head in the sand when anything untoward or morally wrong happens around you.

Fragile sensibilities? So you mean you find racist slurs acceptable? You think English-speaking Koreans or Americans of Korean descent should endure baseless slurs against their heritage and culture by some foul-mouthed, 14-year-old goit? "Nobody likes a grass" is for people who are either (a) guilty, or (b) condone the guilty party's actions.

Ok, let me clarify exactly what I was implying: those who call responsible people tattletales are often guilty themselves and/or condone those actions. The fact that you don't object to the racism means you either condone it or find it acceptable: I'll let you figure out how that reflects upon you.

Either you've never played a MMO before or you have absolutely no faith in ArenaNet/NCSoft whatsoever. Companies running MMOs regularly follow up on reports of racist, sexist, homophobic and other hostile activity by players, and people are warned/suspended/banned for it. On the other hand, if you think ArenaNet/NCSoft are going to be able to police the entire game of several hundred-thousand players single-handedly, you're very wrong.

It all boils down to whether you think blatant racism is acceptable or not. *shrug*

Wasn't aware that just posting in a topic to raise the awareness of racism within the game actually existing automatically counted as supporting a farfetched idea posted without tact.

You'd be surprised at how many people say there's no racism from the game. Ask a couple of people and quite a few will actually say things like, "Nah, people just wanna beat the other team. It's not like racism, and anybody that says otherwise needs to take their head out of their ---"

Not racism my bottom. The comments get way too personal at times (what does dog-eating have to do with GW? Nothing. Therefore, it was drawn from a bank of IRL sterotypes. Just an example though.), and extend beyond the game for their little jabs.

As for people being too sensitive, or hypocritical, everybody has sexual urges at times, but does it make a person hypocritical not to wish to act on them constantly, regardless of location or company? Eating would likely be more efficient with some foods with your hands, yet at those times, why do you use a fork or spoon (or spork, or whatever )? Aren't you this totally emotionless, rockhard outer shelled, invulnerable epitome of perfection? I'd imagine not.
You obviously accept that there is some validation to social nuances, or you wouldn't engage in them, lest you be a hypocrite.

There's a pretty distinct line between:

"You're whole plan/idea is foolish and bound to failure, and I refuse to take part in it"

and

"You ----ing moron, you're a stupid ---- so I'm out of here. Go to hell."

Also, on a related issue...
The censor is there for a reason people.

Those of us overly sensitive people that use them, use them because we don't want to hear some of the verbal garbage coming out of other's mouths. Those of you that like to use such trash, and listen to it, may turn your censors off. You're not smart or clever using censor bypass, for switching two letters in your word consistently so that the censor won't catch it, for using 'ph' instead of the letter 'f'.
You're not being censored, in actuality: indeed, if you turn off the censor, all of the ----'s no longer stay ----'s, even in the chat history. You can always use the words, and it's an accepted part of the game. However, it's also accepted that not everybody finds them appropriate, and so the personal censor exists for those people, and it only affects their screens.
You can use your words, and anybody who doesn't mind will most likely have turned their censor off by now, and they'll hear it, and you'll hear it, and it should be enough.

As to the screenshots, don't take too much personal significance to them, I'll screenshot just about anything. Last MMORPG I played, I racked up over a gig of screenshots, stored them on CD-R's, then erased them, and took some more. Just something fun to do.
Always nice to be able to say, "Hey, I remember that", and spend a half hour looking through them, and then pull out pictures of relavent information.
I just wish they didn't store as huge bitmaps >.< A little automatic compression would be a welcome thing to me.

Now, back on topic, I'd also prefer if people not use the, "... no worse than _____'s community" excuse for behaviour, or anything in the game. Wasn't Guild Wars supposed to be flaunted as revolutionary, some unique game? Why then is it that every time someone makes a comment about one of the negatives of guild wars, somebody chimes in, "I used to play _____, and trust me, this is nothing. It's much worse in _____, and we're lucky it's like this in Guild Wars." Yes, we're all thankful it's not worse than it could be, but many of us also feel that it isn't a point to stop at just because it's better than almost anyone else. Why shouldn't Guild Wars make it a point to strive to improve not just to meet other MMORPG's in various aspects, but to go above and beyond them? That'd be truly revolutionary then, wouldn't it?

3 semi-rants out of my system in one post >.>

Oh, wait... that's genius!

And, in future, white kids will be allowed to run through school halls screaming racist obscenities at the top of their lungs. Kids of other races will be issued with earplugs.

Racism is against the rules; the individuals who break those rules should be banned, plain and simple, just like anyone who breaks the rules against botting, hacking, cheating or exploiting. Telling the victims to ignore it is saying, "Hey everyone, come play Guild Wars, the game where racism is acceptable!"

As a minority twice over, I take solace in knowing that, as far as we can tell humans started out brown, and will become brown in the end through mixing.

It's funny to see people defend children for being potty mouths and racists. This should be the flag to start a revolution of rationale across this community, and into the real world.

The acceptance contributes to it never being defeated. If someone makes a racial comment around me, I have no qualms putting him or her on the spot. Someone said previously that it's caused by ignorance and stupidity. It's much more than that; it is a systemic problem that will have to be addressed eventually.

50 years ago in the U.S. we needed the civil rights movement to start acting straight. 120 years ago we almost annihilated an entire breed of people in this country. I say breed, because that's what Indians are, black, white, brown, red, yellow, whatever, they are breeds not "races". You can't beat anything if you can't define it correctly.

The original poster is actually correct in stating Americans are idiots. 41% of the U.S. population is either illiterate or functioning illiterate. How can you expect them to understand such a problem if they're unable to read or understand the issue. Being illiterate doesn't make you stupid, but a lack of vocabulary puts one at such a disadvantage they are unable to participate. The entire system is messed up just by the labeling.

Here’s example: “My friend at school, he’s black, was cracking everybody up today.”

Just listen to the people around you in their day-to-day discussions, and you will hear this. As if the fact that his friend is black is a necessary description. Also, every governmental piece of paper we fill out has a label. A label that is decisive and incorrect. Most people that fill out the African-american, native American, Korean American are indeed American. First and foremost almost exclusively american. What comes first though? Even though they maybe 15th generation American, they are still described as something else first.

You can make the argument that it is indeed helpful to minorities as far as specific programs are concerned, but otherwise it’s just a separator. Take it off all forms that do not include the census or any cataloguing endeavor. If you continue to grind the stone on the little things it will shape it into the proper form eventually.

Just thoughts from a concerned human.

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Yes you did. I even quoted you.

Neither actually. I believe strongly in the idea that you can say whatever you want, however you want, to whoever you want. Just keep in mind everyone else can do the same, and they are likely to disagree with you if you are a racist. I understand there are terms that limit speach in the game, and the mods are free to enforce them, as I have already said. I have no worries, as I don't make racist/nationalist comments, despite your feeble effort to paint me as a racist.

No, it really doesn't.

That is exactly what I said! Videogames apply to real life!

Moron.

Ah your true colours come out. There's no reason you'd defend these kiddies using racist language unless you were one of them too. Of course I'm making a big assumption but judging from your posts, I don't think I'm far off.

My true colors were always to call people who make moronic statements morons. You actually think that you can correlate the real world and a videogame. Sorry, that strikes me as moronic.

Wow. You are on a roll now. You don't understand the difference between agreeing with someones right to be heard, and agreeing with their message. That is ok though, we've established you are a moron.


You are. You can't point to one racist thing I've said. It's all "guilt by association", but I'm not even associating with anyone.

Not just disagree with you but be very offended by it. Cover it up however you want, it's still intended to hurt and offend someone and it's still against the rules (and against general morality, for most normal people). Just like anything else in life, there's no reason why someone should be allowed to break the rules and get away with it. You wouldn't get away with break laws against racism in the US, so why should you get away with breaking anti-racism rules in GW?

Unless you hadn't noticed, American and Korea aren't on the in-game map. This is about RL people casting RL aspersions upon each other's RL race and nationality. It doesn't matter that the medium is a videogame, this isn't videogame racism we're dealing with, so my analogy fits. But congratulations on failing to make that connection for yourself.

Yes, just like the police work entirely autonomously without any input or tipoffs from the general public. Because the civilians wouldn't want to "narc" on people and be "tattletales". It's darn lucky the police are able to monitor every single person in the country so they know when bad things are happening!

Ahh, resorting to the lowest common denominator. Never fails to amuse. And makes me wonder why I try to argue with someone who can't rise above it.

Just ignoring it has put us in this predicament in the first place.

It's clear that this argument isn't just about ourselves in a selfish manner. This is about all of us. The ones willing to speak for others. If anyone should stop 3rd grade tactics you should look no further than yourself. You shouldn't come to an argument like this with your wiffle bat when most of us have sledge hammers.


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Heh, didn't spot that quote before. It would almost be clever... if it was used in the right context (jealousy? Yes, that's it: racism offends me because I'm jealous that I can't spout racist insults too!)

That is quite a stretch, but mark it in your "win" column if it makes you feel better.

That is seriously the most East German Stasi crap I've heard in a long time. Do you spy on your neighbors? Do you want the police to have total contol?

Land of the free - as long as no ones feelings get hurt.

Bleh, I'm dropping this like a bag of hammers. I'm not a racist no matter how hard you try to shoehorn that argument. I guarantee you I associate with a more diverse group of people than most will ever meet. I enjoy freedom for everyone, and you seek to limit it. Enjoy the game.

Rusty,

Freedom is a myth in any civilization. Personal liberties on the other hand, which is what you should say, only apply when you don't impose your "speech or freedoms" onto another's personal liberty.

Taking your hammers to go play somewhere else is probably the smartest thing you've said in this thread.

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Ok, had to respond to this. Your "stats" that 41% of Americans are illiterate in one form or another are rediculous. You've yet to effectivly counter anything I've said. All you have contributed is threatening me with a sledgehammer.

I have a different opinion (not even a racist one, or can you show me where I've made racist comments?), so you automatically do your best to paint me as an idiot, and then threaten me. You sound like a real champion of personal liberties.

ok my earlier statement may have sounded like i was defending people being racist on here by saying you should ignore them, i wasnt try to say that it was k that they did that, all i am saying is that there is no way it is going to be stopped, maybe taking screenshots will get rid of some people, maybe it wont, but all they want to do is bother you, there is no way they even really know what your skin color is or anything about you, just dont listen to them, all they want to do is make you mad

41% of Americans are illiterate in some form or another. The widest read newspaper in the country is USA today. USA today is intentionally written at an 8th grade level because unfortunately people have difficulty reading the NY times or the wall street journal. That is just a fact.
I never called you a racist or an idiot. The text doesn’t lie though. I wouldn’t call you an idiot, maybe ignorant, but that isn't my fault if you take it in a negative context to demean you. That’s not my fault, and I don’t begrudge you for it.

Definition of Ignorant: Lacking knowledge, education, or experience; uneducated; inexperience.

To claim that I threatened you is ridiculous. The sledgehammer vs. wiffle bat is an association of difference between your arguments, and we’ll say to simplify, mine.

I am a champion of personal liberties. If you want to argue about illiteracy with me, please spell correctly. Rediculous is not correct, and begins to prove my point. Again, I don’t look down on you for it, that isn’t the point, and not my intention. Until 1930 my entire family was illiterate. I just take it very seriously now that I am carrying the torch for my people.

As far as you opinion is concerned, it doesn't hold any water with me. That's why I say what I am saying to show another view. If you think it's painting you as idiot... well what else do you want me to say. I can't help that.

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Wow, this went from a halfway decent thread with some good ideas to a kiddy bitch fest.

Stand up, stretch yer legs, grab a drink, and play the game.

Cheers.

if WaW involved chosing balthazar or lyssa as your god or something that wasn't related to real life geographic regions then this wouldn't be so bad. People would say Lyssa rules and Balthazar drools or something. There would prolly still be some problems because in tombs the local chat would still show up different writing that would still be something racists could pick on. Anyways I think WaW is not cool and splits people up.

lol, where'd you get that number?

Seems rather hypocritical to discuss ignorance and then not cite sources for evidence presented

Amen to that.

Here's a link with cited places you can find this information on your own.

http://www.efmoody.com/miscellaneous/illiteracy.html

In fact, you can find it all over the place.

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Not meaning to disagree with you or anything, but I don't recall seeing a TOS or Terms of Agreement or anything I had to accept to log on last night...

I agree, and hope you DO start screen shooting. But I don't think that this is a filter is the issue since it would likely filter out things that people legitimately want to say that are not racist. But I agree that the problem is out of hand. I saw someone online the other day with the NAME of "White Power Boy" and my jaw just dropped.

It's a role playing game true, and so if somebody wants to make a chracter that supposedly hates centaurs, or Dwarves (the magical kind, not real people who suffer from dwarfism) or any other fictional creature in the game then fine. But bigoted references that refer to objects outside of the fictional playworld should be dealt with swifly. I wouldn't expell the idiot from the game first time, probably. But after a warning to keep his hate speech to himself, 3 months off the game, and the third time off for good. I know that might seem too tolerant a policy of hate speech, but the problem is that you don't know these people's ages or if multiple people play a character from the same copy of the program.

[As an interesting side note, I was wondering why all the faces in the game fit a generally caucasian mold, and ultra-fit body type (which would seem to be necessary for warriors and rangers, but not casting classes). It would have been nice to be able to create a pudgy monk, or a balding ranger. It would also be nice to be able to change the bust size of women---not to make them larger necessarily, but to allow players to make more realistic people. Especially since there are real women playing this game, even though they probably have a low ratio to men.]

Anyway, start taking those screen shots. I feel guilty because I didn't report "white power boy", I just thought "now there is a name that won't last long", and it was after that that I realized how racist a lot of the chat is.


Poppinjay


Also, I like the idea of different countries playing against each other for the favor of the gods (kind of like a GW olympics), but do we have to be such poor losers when they best us, and even worse in victory?

Well, a true known fact... 95% of all statistics are made up on the spot...


But meh, in other words, i think this post was a mistake, rather then rallying people together... it seems I've caused an uproar between different views. I've been reading alot of it, and i think basicaly all of us are agreeing that it isnt right, so eh... stop with all the arguements like that, just discuss the topic, not eachother.

Basicly, ill be only reporting the people i find that do it alot/say really racist things.
Ummm, when you install the game, you're suppose to read it as you get into it... At the bottom in the smaller letter (which probably werent read either) it states, accept if you have read and *Comply* with the statement. In a sense, i dont have the exact copy.

I would have to say, racism is how one feels personally, you can't force someone to change how they feel/act/think. That's taking away from their given rights as a human being. However, slurs of such nature I believe are not "right" in a sense that, why judge another person based on where they live, their skin, etc? I realize all the factors to that question, I know the answer, but being human I can't help but to keep asking myself that very question. My thoughts on racism in this game are of the following, it should not be accepted or acceptable, a filter is not any good because the message is still going acrost. Banning such people for racial slurs would cause "an uprising" only to create more problems. What can you do? Put those people on ignore and forget about them, if that is how they want to view another race/human, who are you to tell them they can't think how they want? I'm not saying racism is acceptable in any way, I'm just saying you can't change how people think. I know all about racism, when people find out I'm German, they immediately call me a Nazi. I am not all about that at all. I may be German, but that doesn't mean I'm something negative. Stereotypes aren't always right, just use your head. This game is here for your enjoyment, no need to do anything but enjoy. That is all I really have to say.

I never once said these people couldnt "*Think*" how they want... But, if they continue to shout these things out in the "all" read messages, rather then at least keeping it to their team, or better yet, to theirselves.

This is like when the priests said it wasnt so bad to rape the little kids, as they have repented for their sins. It's going against the law!

This game has a "Law", and it's called "The terms of agreement", in which we all agree to before we play this game. So, what im stating, is that this law should be obeyed.

How can ignorance be applied to me when I had the information? You are the one laughing at a claim, and I presented the information without hesitation.

Not citing a source has nothing to do with ignorance by the way. When you debate a subject you dn't show your hand in the beginning. That's amateurish, I'm in to win it.

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