Minipost: -isms and -ists in MMOs

There's been some recent discussion about sexism by characters in World of Warcraft that has been sparked by a particular NPC in the beta named Ji Firepaw. On one side you have "This is offensive, please change it" and on the other side you have "It's not offensive" and "That would be censorship" and some other defenses. I'm not here to argue the cases, those link above do a much better job of explaining that than I could. I'm here to talk about what makes such a character different in an MMO versus a book/movie or even another video game.

In a book or a movie, a character such as Ji is targeting their offensive statements at other characters. In a typical video game, they're targeting their offensive statements at a character you're playing. In an MMO, they're often targeting their offensive statements at you.

Some video games let you customize your character so maybe you might argue that the character is you. However, even in Mass Effect it's not you, it's Shepard. Some video games do have the quality of MMOs where the character is close to you because they lack a firm identity but I'd argue that the character is more 'you' in MMOs because it's how you interact with other players. The other players affirm that the character is you, in a way.

Furthermore, video games are about the freedom to do what you want. You have agency in this world, but that agency is incomplete. When NPCs do things such as that, you often have absolutely no means by which to correct them. You just have to sit there and let it happen, powerless to change the attitudes of the NPCs around you, which is incredibly disheartening.

And that's why these things matter more in an MMO.

20 Days of WoW Blogging: Day 14 – This upsets me

"You know what you did. Now get in the corner!"

I use that picture often, but it's only because I love it so much. The video below is actually relevant today.


Rude People
In Zul'Aman on Sunday, we had a hunter in the group who was a 'go guy'. It seems now that he was urging us to get a speed run for the bears completed, but there was no way that was going to happen, especially since it's the first time that I've run the dungeon since...probably May or so. "Puuuuuuuuulllllll", "GOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGO", and other such things were all that he said. I once noticed that he had abandoned our current target to run forward just to wait at the next boss.

Why would you do this? Why would you be like this? We hadn't discussed going for a bear run, and we certainly weren't close to being able to do it. When we wiped on the third boss, he insulted the Death Knight in the group's gear and rage quit. This Death Knight actually had excellent gear. Maybe he was doing poor DPS, but I wouldn't know. As is customary, I called him an asshole after he had left the group.

People who just aren't even trying
I was in a Grim Batol NORMAL on my priest a while back and the group wiped several times on the first boss because they were just plain ignoring the fight mechanics. They would let the special trogg die right next to Umbriss, making him enrage and then the group would wipe. We wiped three or more times to this. I was very nearly ready to quit the group.

Offensive People
It should go without saying that I have no tolerance for those who use racist, sexist, homophobic, or other such offensive language. I will not pay fifteen dollars a month to put up with you and will call you out on it and attempt to have you kicked from the group, and failing such, will voluntarily leave that group.

I also don't care for vulgarity. I don't know you. You don't know me. Why would you say these things? Manners, people.

Trade Chat
One of the first things I tend to do is type '/leave Trade' so that I don't have to put up with that. It not only has to do with the stupid and awful stuff people will say there, but also because I just don't like to have all that text filling up my boxes. I'll selectively join Trade if I have a particular need to use it.