Sex talk and other offensive comments

I honestly thought that GW would be one of the few games that would keep a tight reign on sex talk in the chat channels. It's becoming very difficult to even hook up for a quest let alone attempt to buy items for sale without having the foulest most profane dirt out there for all to see. The "usual suspects" comments to turn off the open channel doesn't wash. I shouldn't have to do that under any circumstances. And the interesting ways the great unwashed get around the filters makes me wonder why there are filters at all.

This game doesn't need dirt flung out for all to see, especially those of us who think that this game is for playing, not for adolescent fantasy to be played out when their parents can't see what they are doing. And those adults who participate should be ashamed. And don't tell me to "file a complaint". It doesn't work. I didn't pay my money for this crap, and I certainly don't think AN or NCS want it to continue at the expense of losing players.

I agree, Phineas. When they're talking on the "public" channel there's no getting around it if you're trying to hook up with a PUG or converse with others about things. It's a problem that ANet is going to have to look into, IMHO. If people want to "cyber", it would be nice if they'd take it to whispers or, better, to IMs.

The problem is that a lot of the ones perpetrating this are "virtual exhibitionists". They aren't going to stop regardless of what measures ANet implements, unless it's banning accounts for x-rated chat.

This is all just one more reason I use henchmen and guildmates exclusively.

I agree with you as well. I think some of the worst places this happens, and I tend to see it all the time, is Competitions Arenas. Not inside the actual arenas, but just the lobby area on the map. It always seems to be filled with W/Mo's, asking every female character to take off their armor.

When the game first launched, conversing in local chat was actually enjoyable, since it gave people a chance to learn more about the game, or find a group to play with. Sadly, now, it's just filled with junk: trading, slander, and stupidity.

Some people are getting extremely annoying in public chat. Majority of the time I have public chat off, so I don't have to hear them.

I agree, and I even empathize.

I now have my chat filter set to guild and team. No one in my guild behaves that way as far as I know, so when I am not in a team, I hear NOTHING. I occasionally see white text above heads of people, for example last night, some cluster of obvious redneck-people were abusing another player, using the N-word against there heritage.

I immediately took screenshots of all the text above all the players heads, after mouse-over on each, and sent them to Arena Net. They emailed me back that action would be taken, but that I would not be notified. I helped someone out, and that person whispered me saying "thank you", only because I felt the need to put them in their places, and said in general chat "thanks fellas, your racism and hatred have been screen-capped for all the world to scorn".

I said all that because I feel that as players, we have the ultimate responsibility to do something. ArenaNet has the intention, but they rarely CAN act on such a voluminous amount of reports that come in. I say, screenshot the little bastards, and rain on their parade.

You send anet a screencap, that person has no escape.

I am sorry that you had to deal with this crap, but I have to be honest, I simply stay out of town as much as possible. lol, but thats only me.

I hope you can overcome the miasma of crap

The almost funny part in all this is that the chars don't actually "get naked" at all and the only people who might be slightly titillated would be pre-pubescent boys who are only dreaming of what it might be like IRL. After all, the person behind the character is probably some sort of greasy semi-bald headed man sitting in front of his computer in his dirty undershirt and tighty whities with a stack of pizza boxes and empty beer cans filling up the room. Oooh yeah, baby...take it off.

HEY!

I never understood this 'cyber' thing. They do what? Stroke the buttons?
Scroll the mouse?
kiss the monitor?
scan their genitals and send that over email?
or is this the drawing of genitals on the minimap i see often, and i'm being cybered while I wasn't aware this was cyberring?

Totally confusing.

makkert, i think its a lot of x rated words that they use to each other....

i must admit, i have never seen the point of this stuff myself, mainly cause some people cant seperate the romantic In Charecter stuff you do such as *kiss* and *hug* in these games and end up thinking you are thier GF in real life...then hoping you will give em one

i also think most of this is on the US side, since i have not realy had to deal with it at all so far, cept for this one ranger boy back in pre sear who kept telling my char she was HOT!..i laughed and said, course she is, all women here are, theres no chocy bars to get fat on^^

first time i ever heard about thes stuff, i was on a old game called Myth of Soma, and some guy i never met PMd me (like whisper, only it poped up in a little box with their name on the top)
he wanted to know if i would cyber him for a Power Axe....
i had to PM a friend, who was at the time 12 years old, and ask him, what was a cyber, and what was a power axe, and was it worth it....

when he told me the answeres, i sent the guy a PM back saying, no, i dont want a power axe, and im not realy a girl, so you wouldnt like it if i did do it...
why should i tell HIM i was realy a girl lol

Rayea, thank you for the explanation. So it is role-playing for the retarded. And with bad actors. I get it. It is like Jerry Springer, translated by a mute.

Ad for the chocy bars: I agree! We want our chocy bars! We want the right to get fat!
Fat persons have -2 charisma, but absorption +2!

I agree there's too much junk in the public channels. I wish we could have our own censorship list - or two censorship lists - so that we could really choose what to see. The first list would be as it is now, just stick ----- in place of the word or phrase you don't want to see, so as to even cut out the stupid people who try to get around the filter. The second list would be for words of phrases you don't want to see at all, and if someone said anything on this list, the game just wouldn't send you the message at all, cutting out completely the people spamming WTS WTB in the public channel.

Phineas, you've got to tune it out. It's a practiced skill like any other. No one is going to do anything about it unless it gets so bad that - well, let's not go there. I will tell you to file a complaint, because business is business and if you don't make your displeasure noticed no one will do a damn thing. So complain to ANet, please. But in the meantime, condition yourself. The world is full of things you won't agree with. So if this isn't just a rant as therapy, my suggestion is meditate.

Think about it like a screaming infant in a resturant (or a 6 hr. airplane flight) There's nothing you can do about it, fantasing about beating the parent or strangling the child or taking your UBER parenting skillz over and quieting the child just make it worse. Just block it out. It's not a threat, it can't hurt you. It's just a thing. Let it go. Concentrate on what you are doing. That's right. There you go. What baby? What crying? What immature sex chat?

You can't help reading it, but you can control reacting to it.

I know, and I'm sorry, but it's the best answer I have.

When I see vulgar trash talk in the chats I simple say this:

"(Character's Name Here) CLEAN IT UP...NOW....WE ARE SCREEN CAPPING YOUR COMMENTS AND RECORDING THEM. STOP IT OR BE BANNED FOR LIFE"

I am surprised at how fast "most" people stop. I just go into PARENT MODE. Maybe they think I am a DEV. I really don't care. But I seem to get them to stop PDQ. Then I will get a thank you in a whisper.

Just thought this was a relavent post.
Submit support tickets!

Not everything can be censored, unless everything was screened BEFORE saying it, and that's just impossible to achieve, beyond a basic filter.
So, if it matters to you, the only thing you can do that'll actually DO anything is to submit support tickets, unless you'd rather suffer in silence and or gripe about it while doing nothing.

After getting over 200 screenshots at 1+ MB a piece, including ones taken for remembrance of noteworthy personal things, odd game occurrences, and then also people with no restraint, I gave up on the last bit and cut down my screenshots to 125, compressed the rest to JPEG, and stored them in an archive, and chose instead to keep my talk+trade+emotes channels off, and totally ignore anyone except teammates, guildmates, and friends, except rare instances where I turn talk back on.

If you find sex offensive you have issues :/

And should I also not find murder for personal gain offensive?
Or defecation of holy/religiously affiliated sites offensive?
Or rape?
Or slavery?
Or polygamy?
Or gay sex?

Different cultures place different meaning on things. In some circles, sex is a dirty act to be done for the sole purpose of having children, and otherwise ignored.
Yet in some of the same ones, it might be perfectly acceptable to kill someone because they stared at your wife the wrong way, or stepped 1/2 inch on your soil. (You can be locked up in jail for committing gay sex acts in some countries still)

Polygamy, which could also apply to a woman marrying multiple men (regardless of how unlikely it may be, as with a woman raping a man), has very few inherent problems in it. Everything sited tends to be record-related, tax-related, or personal issue-related. In the end, the only real thing preventing the first 2 from being adjusted to accomodate change are personal sensitivites.

Yet, in America, the supposed land of the free, it's against the law. Go figure. (And yes, I'm aware of the limited Mormon-sects that still practice it in secret, and the tendency of those said people to be abusive to their wives. Polygamy =/= abuse, though.)

No need to argue over any of this, as it's likely to go downhill into a flame-fest fast. The entire point of this post is that regardless of the culture you live in, you most likely have sensitivities; Actions and things not appropriate for public discussion or viewing.

Saying that because people have hangups about sex means they have issues is rediculous; As is said, those in glass houses should not throw stones. When you lack such hangups about anything entirely (And I'm sure I could name quite a few), you may scold others for theirs.

[And yes, I'm aware there's a huge difference between sex and murder. However, when you argue for sex, it's most likely bashing other people's ethical upbringings, who were taught it's wrong, and using logic and natural laws. So riddle me this; For personal gain, without ethics, what's to stop murder and rape if you know you won't get caught?]

Once again, the entire point of this post is to shock people into awareness that their own moral upbringing isn't the only one in the world. My own personal viewpoint on some of the above issues varies greatly from that which I've used.

Edit- And when I say hangups about anything, I mean unrational reasoning, like baseless accusations, blatantly false assumptions, and what-not. Like saying you hate broccoli because it kills people O_o;

Actually the reason it should stay out of conversations is exactly the reason as posted above--the reactions to it vary from culture to culture, and can cause friction among people (no pun intended). Therefore, it's best to stay away from the uncomfortable subject altogether.

Wow, this is one of the most ignorant posts I've seen in a long, long time. Honestly this better be a joke, and if it's not just er...keep it shut for the rest of us.

It's not that we find sex in itself "offensive" it's just that some decent people don't want to hear about sex 24/7 wherever they go, it annoys the HELL out of me when I'm just wandering around town talking to a few people and some people start with this shit. Honestly I don't need to hear about what exactly people'd like to do to the female elementalists. I'm all for swear words in a normal sense, but even those should be kept out of normal conversations out of sheer respect for the community, but as Mercury Angel pointed out, certain sexual natures can be VERY offensive and I don't need to read that crap when I'm trying to find a group.

Another thing that I'm not sure was discussed yet is that people actually use sex as a vulgarity, purposefully depicting the scenarios to offend or disgust. I'm sure nobody would be offended if I started a real conversation about the sexual life cycles of the Kodiak Bear and its impacts on society (perhaps a bit weirded out, but not offended )

Ah yes, thank you, I'd forgotten about context.

Such as the difference between saying "<Expletive invoking fecal matter>!", and "You're a piece of <Expletive invoking fecal matter>!".

[Curse words are always more fun like that anyway, not that I even use those o_O]

i find people that tend to use simple 4 letter words in games like this are ether desperate to go join the world of the Big People (meaning they want to grow up and get laid)
or have little or no way of expressing themselves other than those 4 letter words.

although, admitedly, most of us will use <urinating dog> now and again, i like to see peoples reactions to other words....
like Frell....frell is a great word, it can replace any and all F words and lots of 4 letter ones creatively, and it also shows you have an interest in a specific Sci-Fi show...^^
(namely, Farscape heheh)

or, do the Terry Pratchet, and use <urinating dog> and other strange stuff....see how they react if instead of calling them a <expletive deleated>, try a Foul Mannered, Milk weaned Sop, or...Your Father was a Hamster, and your Mother smelled of Elderberies ^^

the wierder and more roleplay the better i find sometimes....

works in real life sometimes, too....my mother once called a girl a 'femail Bovine'...and the girl flounced off saying, 'Yeah! and Im proud of it!'....was too dumb to know she had just been called a cow....

You know, I never see any of this stuff. Most of the complaints on this forum are things I never run into. That makes me super-duper lucky! Come PUG with me, we'll have a grand ol' time!

I don't run into them either, I just like to comment on things like this. Then again I guess it'd increase my chances of running into it more if I actually played GW anymore...

I've seen my fair share of people cyber'ing in local chats - I take SS & report them and leave it to anet to do anything about it. I've also seen some really disturbing things in local chats.. all about rape and such, again reported them...

but what really gets me annoyed and gets people slapped on my ignore list for a while is when people pm me asking me to cyber them. Some offer gold, some offer items, some just want to cyber, some even offer me RL money... umm no thanx. If I wanted to cyber I'd log onto any number of sex/cyber/etc irc chat channels or such.. (don't know of any, but I'm sure they exit.. heh). I don't play GW to be spammed with ppl requesting that I cyber with them... blech. I report them as well.

but yeah, the GW community in game definately leaves off some "desirable" points and bring's in the trash. But then again, thats sort of to be expected and you'll probably find similar problems in other online games.. maybe just not at the extent that it is in GW.. don't know as I only play GW & 1 other game online (and no problems of tis sort in the other game..). *shrugs* I just live with it.. ignore all the garbage I see.. if it gets bad I report it.

hehehe, yeah - farscape was great

anyways - i really don't feel offended at all by "sex talk" in main-chat

Oh man.

In any large congregation, there is guaranteed to be a handful of idiots saying stupid things. The Internet has many more than actual life does because small minded preteens will go overboard when they have anonymity and no one nearby to beat them to paste. Does it really matter? No. They're little ignorant pricks whose parents haven't beaten them enough. Does it affect anyone with the proper number of chromosomes? No. Turn off Local Chat or ignore it.

I don't know how any of you manage to put the mouse down and go out into the real world. It's an offensive place. Learning how to shut out things that bother you is a necessary skill, and you can't rely on some super-powerful figure (God, the Police, or ArenaNet) to protect you from idiots. Reporting them isn't the answer because there's plenty of insects under the stone.

That brings up a related topic: What is it with America being afraid of sex but in love with violence? The "Hot Coffee" outcry in GTA: San Andreas is just stupid. So, it's okay to shoot the police and steal cars and run people over but it's not okay to make love? What the hell? What is so horrible about the female breast that makes it more worthy of censorship than a guy getting disemboweled? Get your priorities straight, please.

i live in america and i dont understand that

If someone is using sexual offensive language take a screenshot and send it to ANet. Does Anet care? IMO YES, very much so.

The rating by ESRB is determined by the content that is in game and also public. ANet must regulate it so as they do not loose their rating. If they loose the teen rating they would be forced to recall all packages on the shelf so you can bet they are going to take action. Could it happen? YES There are several games that have been rerated due to complaints.

ESRB ratings:

EARLY CHILDHOOD
Titles rated EC - (Early Childhood) have content that may be suitable for ages 3 and older. Contains no material that parents would find inappropriate. EVERYONE
Titles rated E (Everyone) have content that may be suitable for ages 6 and older. Titles in this category may contain minimal cartoon, fantasy or mild violence and/or infrequent use of mild language.

EVERYONE 10+
Titles rated E10+ (Everyone 10 and older) have content that may be suitable for ages 10 and older. Titles in this category may contain more cartoon, fantasy or mild violence, mild language, and/or minimal suggestive themes.

TEEN
Titles rated T (Teen) have content that may be suitable for ages 13 and older. Titles in this category may contain violence, suggestive themes, crude humor, minimal blood and/or infrequent use of strong language
ADULTS ONLY

MATURE
Titles rated M (Mature) have content that may be suitable for persons ages 17 and older. Titles in this category may contain intense violence, blood and gore, sexual content, and/or strong language.


ADULTS ONLY
Titles rated AO (Adults Only) have content that should only be played by persons 18 years and older. Titles in this category may include prolonged scenes of intense violence and/or graphic sexual content and nudity.

If you feel they are not responding then go here and file a complaint.

http://www.esrb.org/consumer_online_hotline.asp

I choose to play my on line games without sex talk, and you if don't understand that, I'm sure you can find a pay site with a phone number you can call and talk dirty for as long as you like. That shit doesn't belong in this game, period.

Exactly, Phineas. Especially not in all-chat for everyone to see.

This thread is getting way out of hand. If you can't stick to the topic without insults, then the only problem ANYONE'S going to have is the problem of how to continue posting in a closed thread.

People, despite what others think, are entitled to opinions without being chastised for having them irrespective of which side of the issue they are on. I'm disgusted by the personal flaming I've seen here. Take it to PMs.

A few of you in this thread don't understand why I won't ignore it. First, if we do, the dirt bags win, and the game is no longer public. Second, since one of the things I do is answer questions and help lower levels quest, turning off the chat denies me that portion of the game to which I am entitled to play.

Again, if you think that ignoring this is the answer, the future of this game is bleak, and you all, in the end, lose the most.

And one more question; why is it MY responsibility to notify AN of this kind of conduct? Why doesn't AN have in-game moderators to protect their investment? I shouldn't have to spend MY time policing the game.

It isn't hypocritical to feel that a public channel isn't the right place for sex talk. It's simply common decency. This is a game. It is not as if people can't go to a whisper channel with one another to do the dirty monkey dance, geez. I could care less if people want to "cyber". I just would like them to do it in the whisper channel. That's not such a tough thing to do, is it?

I just look at it this way: I'm assaulted with profanity, innuendo and vulgarity regularly just watching my local news channel or reading my town's newspaper. I play games to GET AWAY from all that, not find even more crass examples of the downfall of society.

And, speaking from a legal standpoint, I hope that everyone has checked the ages of those with whom they are dallying. Adults have been arrested for sex chat with minors. Just because it's under cover of a game doesn't assure anyone that the other person is "of age".

Actually, Blackace, talking dirty via the internet IS illegal if one of the people doing it is underage. I can't tell you how many people have been arrested and prosecuted for sex talk with minors. It happens every day. And, you're right, to one thing: It is a public channel. But if the devs censor the "f" word and others that I'm sure most of us are familiar with, do you REALLY think they're going to condone blatant sexual blather? I doubt it.

As I said earlier, I don't give a horse's rear end if people want to get their rocks off via cyber sex. But why NOT take it to a more private place? The street in front of my house is public but if two people are going at it there, they're arrested and tossed into the clink for indecent exposure. LOL!

Then truly the only ones being 'penalized' are those who might actually have other things to do or say in the public channel other than "Take off your clothes you big hunka stud, you". Gee that's fair.

And, for the record: I never use the public channel anymore for exactly the reasons stated above.

if you are cybering in guild wars of all places i can't even fathom what's in your head

there are so many better/more appropriate places to do so

In responce to the ESRB ratings; there is a disclamer on online games that says content is subject to change during online play. The game is only tested for solo play, the makers cannot be held responsible for what others do in their game.

every game is going to have its morons, especially this game, because there's no monthly fee...but i really havent found sex talk or other offensive comments to be very prevalent at all, maybe i'm just getting lucky

Ok, now that one is a bit demanding.

It's a free, non-subscription fee game. They're paying for new content developement, server fees, etc. without charging you. If you wanted moderators in every district of every city of every region, well, you could imagine the extra expenses that would add up.

And even so, punishing them doesn't unsay what they've already said. No matter how hard you try, you can NOT stop people from breaking the rules, or there wouldn't be a need for them. You can only try and deter them.

Filters, for example, are attempts at prevention, and you know how successful they are; They have to be balanced to filter out things without getting rediculous (Beat me [As in, such and such beat me up], is 'cursing' in Maple Story. There're tons of phrases that get auto-censored in Maple Story that are 100% harmless. I have to pick apart them when they tell me I can't say it for cursing to figure out what I said wrong, only to find out it's hardly inappropriate), and then, they can almost always censor bypass.
Such as rearranging 2 letters, or using spaces/dashes/symbols. GR|S, ala gamefaqs, is a simple censor bypass that most filters wouldn't catch. Just replace that with your favourite obscenity, and voila.

That being said, does it really bother you that they choose to have the people offended by things submit reports, who can be in numerous places, report a wide variety of things from different cultural standpoints, and do it for free, instead of in-game moderators who would, what, wait in towns all day reading the chat?
How would they also moderate all of the arena matches filled with VERY offensive things (said generally by losers, but also by poor sportsman winners), the tombs, and guild versus guild?
How would they moderate things said in languages they don't speak?

Leaving it to the players covers far more ground and saves them money. That they even do anything at all is a blessing to count. Many MMORPG's, especially free ones, start out with policies against cursing and what-not, but then they end up being occupied with numerous hacked account cases (more often than not, the victim gave the password to a friend. Because they didn't pay for the game, they get careless, and then because of their screwup, make a big deal out of it, yell at the devs for having poor security on the game, and lie and say they got hacked.) They simply don't have the time and resources to constantly address these things.

I have to agree that you can't stop these things from happening and that you'll just have to learn to ignore it. I'm a female elementist in guild wars, so I've had people ask me to do extremely weird things. Luckily I normally have no idea what they're asking me and my friend is smart enough to know that I don't want to know. I think that people should keep these things either in pm or to themselves. There may be people who are just like me and have no idea what they're talking about and dont' want to know. Though I would complain to AN about aeromancer armour since it is a little suggestive. Can anyone tell me how to file a complaint?