‘Tech Billionaires give all wealth away to end world hunger.’ ‘Tech Billionaires lobby for wealth tax with national governments.’ ‘Tech Billionaires realize they are normal people like anyone else, not super smart world-saving geniuses, and finally shut the fuck up.’
Take the streetlights. Turning them off had saved the city about $1.25 million. What had not made the national news stories was what had happened while those lights were off. Copper thieves, emboldened by the opportunity to work without fear of electrocution, had worked overtime scavenging wire. Some, the City Council learned, had even dressed up as utility workers and pried open the boxes at the base of streetlights in broad daylight. Keeping the lights off might have saved some money in the short term, but the cost to fix what had been stolen ran to some $5 million.
Libertarianism requires its members to engage in due diligence in order to execute their libertarian ideals properly and make the choices that are correct for them.
This, unfortunately, excludes the lower-60% of all Americans, who are so ground down, economically terrorized, and mentally overwhelmed with their daily struggles to survive that they have little to no opportunity to approach any major choice with anything even vaguely in the realm of due diligence. They just don’t have the headspace to do so, and are forced to spend all their available mental efforts on just putting one financial foot in front of the other.
This is why having social support frameworks enforced/provided/funded by the government is so important for so many working-class people - it allows them to put those issues on autopilot, significantly reducing their own cognitive load and allowing them to better process the most important issues in their lives.
Ergo, libertarianism is a wealthy person’s toy. It is something that they can champion, because only they have the economic options and financial freedom to fully and properly engage with it.
Until everyone has vanishingly few catastrophic-level issues on the horizon (like one missed paycheque leading to homelessness, or a sudden illness leading to medical bankruptcy), any attempt to implement libertarianism will only bring mass amounts of misery and destroyed lives to anyone beneath the Parasite Class.
And when you have those kinds of widespread government-provided supports that lift all boats - and not just the megayachts - why bother with libertarianism? We should continue to use what got everyone into that safe state in the first place – socialism.
Remember, the Parasite Class already uses socialism for themselves. It’s called grants and bailouts and subsidies, and allows the Parasite Class to privatize the profits and socialize the losses.
It’s just at a scale that makes it impossible for working-class people to leverage.
This is the far right libertarianism, which has essentially become an extremist, authoritarian form of capitalism. In essence, those with immense power tell us that nobody has any right to oversight and regulation over others. Their power becomes insurmountable, and their control over the economy becomes absolute. We live according to the standards they provide, because we have no alternative.
Every system of government becomes corrupted like this when thieves and liars take control. This is not libertarianism, it is simply the flavor of authoritarianism this go 'round.
Real liberterianism comes in many forms, along the left to right spectrum. On the left, there is a belief in redistribution of natural resources to the community. Personally, I believe we should be embracing local cooperatives for food, energy, medical care, and beyond. On the right, there is more allowance for imbalance by embracing business to drive innovation. Those who innovate succeed, and accrue wealth. But a true libertarian should support a near 100% estate tax, which would limit the imbalance, because you should have what you’ve earned for yourself.
The thing that we lost that leads libertarianism to fail, is our sense of community, a sense of humanity. A responsibility when you see your neighbors suffering, to help them. Once the rich went off to live in their ivory towers, they lost sight of the rest of us.
I don’t see how any system could succeed, considering the circumstances.
[Edit] And honestly, we need to stop vilifying entire philosophies because they were previously corrupted. Just because communism was implemented in a manner that oppressed millions, doesn’t mean there is no good to the philosophies behind it and socialism.
We should be borrowing the good from everything, and remembering the bad. A blanket condemnation of failed experiments makes both impossible. No singular philosophy will be effective in this imperfect world, only in theory is that level of refinement possible.
Then people are wrong, and we should correct them. Left wing libertarians stand in direct opposition to capitalism, and have more in common with true right wing libertarians than the extremist capitalists who are taking over the mind space of the philosophy.
I’m a libertarian in Brazil, so my takes may be different from yours (I’m not even sure if the word means the same thing for me and for native English speakers).
This is the far right libertarianism, which has essentially become an extremist, authoritarian form of capitalism. In essence, those with immense power tell us that nobody has any right to oversight and regulation over others. Their power becomes insurmountable, and their control over the economy becomes absolute. We live according to the standards they provide, because we have no alternative.
Big corporations (which, I agree, are a cancer to society) lobby regulatory powers to weaken local and mid business and to evade taxes in ways small business simply can’t, that’s the source of their power. A lack of government regulation would not be good for them, because it would empower their competition, and that’s the last thing they want.
I don’t see how any system could succeed, considering the circumstances.
To me, the big problem with libertarianism is that it requires a big level of maturity from the population. It requires private regulatory and certification companies, union of workers to seek working rights in a non-violent way, and people to support charity initiatives that help the poor and endangered. All of that is not impossible, but people are very used to that being a government responsibility, it won’t happen over night
A lack of government regulation would not be good for them, because it would empower their competition, and that’s the last thing they want.
This is how they do it when there is some regulation, they abuse the regulation. But without regulation, they would be free to destroy the competition with unlimited anti-competitive practices.
To me, the big problem with libertarianism is that it requires a big level of maturity from the population. It requires private regulatory and certification companies, union of workers to seek working rights in a non-violent way, and people to support charity initiatives that help the poor and endangered. All of that is not impossible, but people are very used to that being a government responsibility, it won’t happen over night
This is the problem with every philosophy, it’s an ideal that someone dreamed up. Over the last 100 years or so, we’ve lost a lot of self-sufficiency as individuals and communities, but also made some progress in other areas like civil rights. It’s a constantly changing landscape, with stronger and weaker among us, and different people trying to help or take advantage. So I agree, nothing can happen overnight, and no single social or political philosophy can be directly implemented, successfully. These philosophies should be seen as altruistic goals, with a series of challenges that society faces along the path.
Those challenges are why I’m concerned with our vilification of past failures. We can learn from those failures, and borrow the good ideas, to address challenges going forward. Knowledge of the past allows us to adapt to the future, and create a system that truly suits what we become.
But if we don’t start caring for our neighbors, as well as those across the globe, we’re lost. My morning cup of coffee, or pack of cheap t-shirts, should not lead to someone living in poverty. Likewise, my purchasing it should not enrich some individual too far above others.
I honestly don’t care what people are into, but this game is a bit intense, sexually. I’m just trying to get my RPG fix, and all the characters constantly wanna bang my ass, when all I want is to be their Homie…
Everything has to be gay, EVERYTHING! Because that reflects reality, where the vast majority of people are gay and ABCDEFG12345QQ++*.,-?XYZ.
In fact being gay is the most noble thing to be, and it has to be the main point of every single conversation forever. Who you like to fuck is THAT important to everyone around you, you’re the main character after all.
I would hope that a similar mod that gives options to disable certain types of romances would have been better suited. So long as it doesn’t single out the types of romances he dislikes.
Nexus consistently refuses to be a platform for bigotry.
That should not be controversial, at all, in any context.
If this asshat wants to publish it elsewhere - he’s free to. Nobody’s stopping him. It’s just a file. He has every moral right to modify software however he sees fit, and he has every practical right to be a homophobe online with fellow homophobes.
But I don’t want anything to do with him. I don’t want to use any website that’s cool with bigots spreading bigotry. If the people who run the website don’t want to deal with that shit either… tough shit, guy. Find another bar. This one’s not for Nazis. Warn all your Nazi friends.
Says jackass pretending everyone’s just calling names, when the modder explicitly stated their bigoted intent. ‘Everyone’s such a meanie and calls names, waaah!’ No: we’re specifically talking about Nazis who proudly say ‘why yes we are Nazis, thank you for asking.’
But your kind doesn’t care what words mean, so you’re just gonna performatively roll your eyes some more.
You’re clueless as fuck dog, the trash admins at nexus are virtue signaling to make themselves look better while also avoiding people looking too heavily into the wide variety of truly horrific mods that are on the site.
None of which I really care whether someone uses or not because I’m not a grade schooler and can make the differentiation between reality and a fucking video game, but pretending they have any moral high ground indicates you have no clue what you’re talking about.
That’s the key part about this and the other times it’s made the news I dislike. They don’t actually care about the content in the mod, which is why 90% of these hateful mods remain up; those mod authors didn’t put the same hate into the description, or the forum, or anywhere other than in the mod which would have to be downloaded and verified by someone to actually know it’s a hateful piece of shit. And then when it makes the news when one jackass decides to spout racist/sexist/homo/transphobic shit in the description and get their mod removed, people point out all the other hateful mods that didn’t get taken down and wonder why this one is being singled out.
“Remove all of them” implies a good question: what is “all” of them? All mods changing the models of characters? Changing the models of characters to make them more conventionally attractive? Less conventionally attractive? Changing the gender of characters? Changing men to women? Changing women to men? All mods that change skin color? Changing white skin to black skin? Changing black skin to white skin? All mods changing sexual orientation? Straight to queer? Queer to straight?
I think you should just allow everything, as long as it isn’t associated with hate speech or discrimination. Which is exactly what’s happening here.
All of them meaning all of the mods that clearly do things out of bigotry like turning black characters white, erasing gay characters, erasing trans issues, etc.
This isn’t a particularly hard moral or ethical question to anyone who isn’t trying to allow hateful content to spread.
Just checking, so if a mod was released that made a straight character gay, that would be fine, but one that made a gay character straight wouldn’t be? Or would both be fine? Assuming no description for either, nothing but content.
The big difference is that when mods remove a single gay character, it’s always the only gay character in the game.
If the mod adding gay characters turns all the straight characters gay, that’s erasure. If the new gay character has dialogue that is hateful toward straight people, it’s still bigotry.
Adding representation to a game that has none is fine. Removing representation entirely isn’t.
So what if there are 3 gay characters, and there are 3 separate mods that each make one of the characters straight. Each single one does not remove representation, but having all 3 installed together would. Do you ban these 3 mods?
I don’t know, I just feel like this is such an arbitrary choice. If you reduce the number to 2 gay characters in a game, with 2 different mods, is that still okay or should both be banned again?
Is it really a difference if you reduce the number of gay characters to 1? What if you split the mod up into two parts, one just removing all sexual remarks (effectively with the intention of making the char asexual), and another simply also adding hetero (so effectively making the char bi) remarks, and you then combine these two mods again to effectively make the 1 character hetero (official gay remarks removed, hetero remarks added)?
Sure, representation is great and I’m all for it, but I’m also for people being able to change whatever they want in their own game. In the end, it’s only affecting them and no one else, which should be the prime directive of tolerance.
To those that are saying they don't see a problem with this mod. Let me put it to you this way. Instead of a mod that turned one gay woman into a straight man what if it turned one black character into a white character?
There literally was a mod like that in Stardew Valley that turned Demetrius into a white character, and it was rightfully deleted from Nexus mods. If someone has that much of a problem with a character being a different race, sex, gender, or sexual identity then they're clearly bigoted no matter what they say to the contrary.
It's gay erasure, and it's bigotry, plain and simple.
I would say so too but my problem was not my best buddies being gay in general or even flirting with me but the awkwardness of having to straight up reject them. It is not bad to have this as a second hand experience in a game but i can see how people do not like it. I suffered through the awkward feeling of telling Gale off but i wish there was a more clear friendship route to begin with. Again, i dont mind flirting or my friend being homosexual and attracted to me. I just wish i could give hints that this is one sided like i would irl. Not sure in what way the mod did it and i see why it might be taken down but also its not like this mod will vanish because of it.
It’s funny how much this comment mirrors the experience of LGBT people left and right. Do you think it’s not awkward for a lesbian to “have to straight up reject” their male “friends” who come on to them? Or gay men and their female “friends”, or asexuals and literally anyone.
I sure cant judge whether rejection by the same sex is worse but that has little to do with that i dont like to have to reject people so why would i lile it when a game i enjoy, with characters that i care about simulate these unpleasent parts of life. Its like saying a game that induces diarreah is just simulating real life (i know this is a very bad comparrison). I dont care about the sex of the person i reject, i simply hate letting people i care about down. And i dont like this part about the game, shame on me.
I certainly don’t mean to shame you for what seems to be a desire to play the game without being propositioned for sex at all. That seems to me to be a completely different thing than wanting to remove a particular sexuality from the game but leaving others intact.
Maybe having to go through that hardship of rejecting someone because you're just not into something fundamental and unchangeable about them such as their gender representation will make you have empathy and understanding for queer people and the struggle they face daily where only about 1 in 10 people they're attracted to will be attracted back.
Exposure to queer media helps build understanding and empathy. Erasing it erodes that understanding and empathy.
If you're looking for games that have nothing that might make you uncomfortable, those games do exist, but Baldur's Gate is not one of them.
For a lot of people, directly tackling elements of life that are uncomfortable or actively unpleasant is what can make a game, movie, or whatever else high quality art. Schindler's List is explicitly about one of the most horrendous chapters in all of human history, and it's also one of the greatest movies ever made. Being uncomfortable isn't necessarily a bad thing.
I don’t see how this is any different than when straight characters in a game hit on you and you have to reject them. Why does the sexuality or gender of the person change anything when it comes to rejection? You’re either into them or you aren’t. Make a mod that eliminates awkward rejection moments across the board.
It’s a matter of targeting. There are ways to address the change you’d like to see that aren’t this focused, give granular control, and permit players to form an experience of their own. It’s not just about the mod they made, it’s about the mod they could have made but didn’t, and that reveals a prejudice.
Because it actually is 100% homophobia, even when it's unintentional. A bit of introspection as to why it bothers people or why they defend it with "I can see why some people..." would do wonders to highlight peoples' subconscious prejudices.
Sure. Somehow i only had to reject one of my female companions and that felt shitty too even though i wasnt that big of a friend. Must be my homophobia kicking in.
The point the others are trying to make is that you (and others) don’t feel the need to have a mod to deactivate females coming on to you. But you (and others) do need one for males coming on to you? This is the entire point. That two equal people doing the same thing but the reactions are so harshly different that people need to change the Game, just because one person is male and the other female.
The other commenter has it 100% right. You had to reject the female companion too, but you only complained about the male one. It wasn't a problem when you had to reject a girl coming after you, but when you had to reject a guy coming after you, you wished for some game mechanism to disable that kind of interaction. So yes, it's a form of subconscious homophobia. Look, I'm not calling you a bigot or anything like that, but I am calling you out on having some subconscious prejudice. We all have it somewhere or another. The key is that when you're called out on it you should recognize it and correct it, rather than get defensive about it.
Ohh yes a mod that eliminates all awkward rejection moments would have been exactly what i want. In the end i want to say that this game has been nothing but awesome even though it forced me to disappoint my companions from time to time.
Having to go through that hardship of rejecting someone because you're just not into something fundamental and unchangeable about them such as their gender representation will make people learn to have empathy and understanding for queer people and the struggle they face daily where only about 1 in 10 people they're attracted to will be attracted back.
Exposure to queer media helps build understanding and empathy. Erasing it erodes that understanding and empathy.
You still have the privilege of hitting on 90% of people you're attracted to IRL or in games reciprocating your advances, so it's not really that big a deal to have 1 interaction end in rejection.
I suffered through the awkward feeling of telling Gale off
This happens in real life too, though.
And the dialog gives you the options to turn him down, just like in real like you'd have a "dialog option" to turn down a gay person who hits on you. And in real life, it's awkward just like it is in game.
All sorts of uncomfortable things happen in the game. Friends die. Children get murdered. Girls get kidnapped and used as baby incubators. Gnomes are forced into slavery. A hobgoblin fucks a ogre in a barn. As much as people don't want to experience those things in real life, you don't see mods deleting them. Yet people can't seem to figure out that making a special case for the gayness is quite actually gay erasure. They're fine with countless uncomfortable things, buy a bisexual character giving them eyes is too icky to handle??
People need to grow up and stop making excuses for homophobia that they wouldn't make for anything else.
…I was legit trying to forget that ever
happened. There are some things I never knew I never wanted to see until I saw it, and that was definitely at the top of that list.
Ok, yes i wrote that not in a good way but it seems you missed my point. My point was that me being friendly was taken as me wanting to bang. That happens irl and it happens in this game. Just because this happens irl does not mean i have to enjoy them ingame. I simply hate awkward situations and while i might be able to dodge them irl i can dodge them in my games which would not make me an anyphobe. There were 4 Characters that hit on me and only one romance i was interested in. Indeed i have felt the same level of awkwardness no matter the sex of the character i rejected.
I dunno Yogi, seems hypocritical to champion inclusively in gaming on one hand and tell folks they are probably playing the wrong game for wanting to avoid a specific feature in it.
I fully agree that mod sites should not tolerate bigoted mods. But saying someone should avoid playing a game they enjoy just because there is a specifically uncomfortable social interaction for them, when it could be modded out had the same energy as the folks saying the Sekiro easy mode mod shouldn’t exist.
Should they remove the “feminist Nerevarine” mod from Morrowind as well because there is sexism in the game, just because some folks still want to play it but not be forced to personally engage in sexist behavior? Should they remove the “Spiders are Wolves” mod in Skyrim? Should people not play games they only enjoy modded? If so, Bethesda is in big trouble…
This issue isn't really about equality, it's about exposure and building empathy. The more people are exposed to the plight that queer people face every day, the more likely they are to build an empathetic connection to them, to care about queer issues, to see it through their eyes, and to understand and support them through it.
I am all for exposure, and building empathy. I do think representation is extremely important. And I greatly appreciate you sharing your point of view with me. I hadn’t considered that to the extent I should have. And I whole heartedly agree that greater exposure to the situations being discussed would lead to a more ideal society.
My only point was that if they want to mod out the awkward conversations where they have to turn down their friends advances, regardless of the characters sex, gender, or orientation, and that is the only road bump preventing them from fully enjoying one of the best RPG’s, then I think it’s okay that they get to enjoy their game. They didn’t strike me as being bigoted, they didn’t ask for LGBTQ+ representation to be removed from the game, they just felt bad about hurting their friends feelings. That to me already shows a fair amount of empathy.
And if such a mod (again, not the bigoted mod the post is about, but the hypothetical mod being discussed in this comment thread that “allows you to have less awkward methods of not engaging in relationships with characters you are not romantically interested in so as to avoid feeling bad about turning down your friends”) is the difference between them playing the game or not, then wouldn’t also be fair to say they are getting more exposure just by being able to play the game?
If you feel that wanting to avoid hurting your friends feelings in a game through mods would cause a significant blow to society developing empathy for and getting exposure to LGBTQ+ issues, while we do have a difference of opinion on that line, I still respect the battle you are choosing to champion and say more power to you. Good luck fighting the good fight.
Eeey Boo Boo, if you complain about sword combat in dark souls, it was-a probably not dark souls’ fault and you should-a probably find a different game
I could mod the combat out of dark souls too. But if youre doing that, you should just go play a game that has the things you want in it and doesnt have the things youre not looking for.
Its a dnd simulation, and dnd is a lot of social roleplay of awkward moments and scenes. I totally get if thats not your bag, but typically when half of a game isnt your bag you just pass on it.
lol. Don’t get me wrong, I see your point (fwiw, I did not mod sword combat out of Dark Souls, or difficult role playing decisions out of my RPG’s). But I just don’t think someone else doing so in a non-bigoted way is that big of a deal. Especially when they made it clear that they just don’t want to hurt their in game friends feelings, regardless of their sex, gender, or orientation. And if that is the only little road bump to them enjoying what is one of the best RPG’s I’ve ever played, then I say I would rather have them not miss the game.
Where did I say it was a big deal? I said they should probs not play a game thats 50% the things they hate
The social decisions is why its the best rpg youve played. The romance and party interactions is all bg3 players talk about. If youre modding that out? You probably are playing it cause its popular, and should just go play something you dont need to cut in half to have fun with.
You didn’t say it was a big deal, I said I didn’t think it was a big deal. Even if someone wanted to remove all of the dialogue from the game because they just loved the combat, classes, skill, etc, I wouldn’t think its a big deal. I love the RPG elements in BG3 (frankly, awkward social interaction simulators are some of my favorite games), but I don’t really mind if someone plays something just because it’s popular and they want to see what the buzz is about. Nor do I mind if they have specific anxieties that they don’t want to be subjected to (no different from turning the giant spiders into bears in Skyrim imho). Nor if they just want to be on a power trip in a world that they like the design and lore of. And if they can have fun doing so, I really don’t see why they should avoid that just because they might have to experience the fun of modding as well.
Maybe I misread your comment, but you saying:
If you cant handle awkward social interactions in the “fantasy social interactions simulator” youre probably playing the wrong game
In response to their comment:
My point was that me being friendly was taken as me wanting to bang. That happens irl and it happens in this game. Just because this happens irl does not mean i have to enjoy them ingame. I simply hate awkward situations and while i might be able to dodge them irl i can dodge them in my games which would not make me an anyphobe. There were 4 Characters that hit on me and only one romance i was interested in. Indeed i have felt the same level of awkwardness no matter the sex of the character i rejected.
Made it seem like you believed @Obonga wanted to remove 50% of the game, as opposed to the single situation they said they wanted to avoid. I can see how you might have assumed their statement that they “hate awkward social interactions” meant all possible interactions that could be construed as awkward. But when I read their comment, it seemed to me like they meant a specific interaction they personally find awkward, and to me that one interaction does not constitute 50% of the game. Rather it is just 1% of that 50%.
Guess I just choose the “people should be allowed to enjoy the games they want the way the want” hill to die on today. Gatekeeping fun has never sat right with me.
They didnt want to avoid a single situation, they said they wanted to avoid all awkward conversations with npcs. Have you played bg3? Thats a very large portion of the non combat. They were fairly clear that it wasnt just the romance turn downs, but the awkwardness of the npcs specifically. Thats a lot of this game.
I dunno how its gatekeeping to tell someone they dont sound like they enjoy the game theyre talking about, and would probably have more fun playing something without it. Seems explicitly the opposite of that, actually. But if you want to make sure you die on this hill you can go right ahead with that take
Could you point out where they were “fairly clear” that they wanted to avoid all awkward social interactions, and could you explain how you are so confident you know what interactions they deem awkward? Because it seems to me like you are making a lot of assumptions.
They were specifically talking about the awkwardness they feel when turning down romantic advances. They did say they “hate awkward social interactions”, but seeing as they also are talking about turning down romantic advances detracting from their enjoyment, it’s fair to assume they found that specific event awkward. They very well could have (and indeed seemed to me to have) meant that they don’t like personally rejecting the advancements of people they are close with. That does not mean that they find the same awkwardness in any of the other role-playing events.
Also, since they were saying removing those specific interactions would enhance their enjoyment, it’s fair to assume they were enjoying the game.
In regards to “how it was gatekeeping”, you might have missed that I indicated I could have misunderstood your intent. But telling someone that they shouldn’t play a game they want to and it sounds like they enjoy, just because it has an aspect they don’t enjoy that could be modded out, is gatekeeping. I get that you believe they hate all of the interactions that could possibly be seen as awkward, and that under that impression you made what I’ll assume to be an honest attempt to steer them away from playing a game they might not enjoy. But frankly, we disagree on how much of the game they found to be awkward, and just as you seem to have missed my point, and I believe you missed their point, I guess it was just very easy to misinterpret your “friendly recommendation” as telling them if they don’t like every aspect of a game you like out of the box, they should stop playing it, when they could very well just mod it to be even more fun for them.
If I took advice like yours, even in it’s best intent, I would have missed out on some of my very favorite games. Daggerfall, couldn’t get into it at all, Daggerfall Unity, amazing. New Vegas at launch on the PS3, frustrated me to no end, modded a decade later, top 5 games of my life. Warcraft 3 (hell any RTS), can’t stand em. DOTA, lost countless hours to (and that one they gutted 90% of the game). Sometimes, being willing to make your game your own is the path to enjoyment.
When did I ask you to nitpick? You said something that didn’t make sense to me, and I asked for clarification. If you didn’t have any reason to believe they were referring to all NPC interactions in the first place, why were you so confident that they weren’t enjoying the game? And how is the point of view we were discussing unrelated? Why when they mentioned a single thing they would like changed did you feel it would be helpful to tell them to stop playing the game entirely?
I get the feeling that you were arguing just for the sake of arguing and at this point have noticed you were kinda just wrong about your assumptions and have decided to abandon ship and pretend this whole thing was beneath you all along…
Honestly, I tried to make your arguments make sense, but they really only do if I assume you ignored most of what was said and cherrypicked the information you wanted to argue against.
Speaking of which, you recommending someone try a different game that they would enjoy more in good faith didn’t upset me. I even acknowledged that I possibly misinterpreted your meaning on that front. I also explained why I interpreted it the way I did. I just think even if your assumptions were correct, it was still bad advice. Not upsetting advice, just bad.
Anyway, I suppose it’s bad form of me to bother someone after they said they don’t feel like engaging anymore. So sorry to take up your time and have a good one. Cheers.
I wont lie dude, if my arguments didnt make sense to you, you should have asked for clarification rather than going by your feelings. Cause your feelings missed the mark by miles.
Buddy, you have literally misrepresented what I have said multiple times, and what @Obonga said, and now you are saying I’m going by my feelings? I did ask for clarification…
Could you point out where they were “fairly clear” that they wanted to avoid all awkward social interactions, and could you explain how you are so confident you know what interactions they deem awkward?
You told me it wasn’t worth your time to “nitpick”.
And I don’t believe I missed the mark at all. You either misunderstood or misrepresented what they wanted, just to tell them that they should go play something else, as opposed to possibly just letting them enjoy the game in their own way. Even though they clearly enjoyed it enough to get through aspects they didn’t like.
When pressed on this, you exaggerated the extent of their issue to fit your original viewpoint. And when asked for clarification, you said I should have asked for clarification… Do you honestly just skim everything you read or?
You ignored my goodbye, you ignored most of what I said frankly, you are under no obligation to read or respond, and I’m under no obligation to not respond. Sorry if my ability to respond is so offensive to you.
Actual thanks btw because yesterday was a pretty shitty day and being labeled as a homophobe really was just the cherry on the shit cake. Seeing that atleast some people understand what i meant puts me at ease.
No, I understood what you said. The point I was making was that while many people are perfectly ok shrugging off women they don't want to partner with, they get all icky and upset when it comes to shrugging off a man they don't want to partner with.
Like in your post you specifically singled out Gale. Yet here you are kind of ret-conning that to "4 characters that hit on you." But when you commented your initial complaint it was just Gale. It was just the gay one.
That's what I'm talking about when I say subconscious prejudice/homophobia. I'm not putting you on the same level as the mod maker or some rabid homophobe who's out there trying to take rights away. But I am asking you to examine your reaction and consider if maybe there was something more to it then just "I don't wanna bang this person." Why specifically the sympathy for people who don't like Gale coming on to them vs people who don't want space-lizard-with-tits or daddy's princess coming on to them? That's all.
There have been multiple times that I've been friendly with women and they'll randomly blurt out "I have a boyfriend/husband/partner". This is a universal feeling, and it makes the game all the more realistic that it includes that. Unfortunately it had to happen with a gay character so people are able to toe the line of homophobia and say that they just didn't like the rejection.
I would be fine with a mod that simply removed the harsh rejection. It's not great for queer exposure and empathy building, but I wouldn't call that outright homophobia. It's lightyears ahead of turning the gay woman into a man.
The creator of the mod actually wanted to do just that. He wanted to turn Wyll white, erase all LGBT references, and make Mizhena a trans person who regretted their decision and detransitioned.
To those that are saying they don’t see a problem with this mod. Let me put it to you this way. Instead of a mod that turned one gay woman into a straight man what if it turned one black character into a white character?
There literally was a mod like that in Stardew Valley that turned Demetrius into a white character, and it was rightfully deleted from Nexus mods. If someone has that much of a problem with a character being a different race, sex, gender, or sexual identity then they’re clearly bigoted no matter what they say to the contrary.
It’s gay erasure, and it’s bigotry, plain and simple.
The best thing about mods is that they only effect the person playing with them. I really don’t get the upset over it. Oh, no, someone else might play a version of this game with less gay (or whatever else offends you). I just can’t bring myself to have the energy to be angry about how other people have modded their game when it only effects them.
No, they effect everyone. By publishing the mod, the creator told the world exactly how they feel about this subject. If it were the case as you put it, then they’d just create the mod and use it solely for themselves and not tell anyone. It’s still despicable, but at least they aren’t going to hurt anyone as no-one can stumble across it. Instead, they made a choice and the backlash they’ve received is a consequence of that choice.
Also it’s very tiring for minorities to constantly exist in a hostile world. Imagine knowing that every place you go to has at least someone outright decrying your existence.
Cis straight people generally can’t fathom how it actually feels to exist in a place where the idea that you shouldn’t exist is a popular one. Some douchebag is gonna act like some psycho on the internet saying “kill all straights” is somehow equivalent to one of the major political parties literally platforming on your nonexistence.
I’m queer and I actually thought lemmy was better than reddit up until now. It’s almost impossible to find a fucking site where I’m not going to have to see assholes who want me shot, silenced or hurt in some other way. It’s exhausting seeing the same shit all the time. It happened when spider man had a mod removed for removing pride flags, it happens when every time a game has a single background gay character, it happened when two women kissed in the last jedi. The same fucking screeching over and over because a minority of the population isn’t straight and exists.
So if it made all the good guys white and all the bad guys black we shouldn’t be concerned? And if it replaced the dialogue to include racial slurs, no big deal? Why should anyone have an issue with hateful content circulating online?
Because rejecting hateful content and making it fringe and inaccessible is for the good of everyone. Exposure to race, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation based issues makes everyone more aware and empathetic of the issues that other people face, and that's a good thing.
And yes, both of those mod ideas you proposed would be just as bad or worse than this one and should also be deleted from Nexus mods.
So if it made all the good guys white and all the bad guys black we shouldn’t be concerned?
…and what if it did the reverse? Or eliminated all members of a given race or sex from the game/changed them to a different sex or race?
I’m just going to stand by my original position - someone creating and using a mod only effects themselves and others choosing to use the mod. The fact that other people are using a mod you don’t approve of has no impact on you, and if this mod existing hadn’t got a Vice article most of the folks in this thread upset about it would simply have never known it existed at all, because they’re unlikely to go looking for such a mod.
No need for what ifs. Stardew Valley has a very popular and well done mod called Diverse Stardew Valley. Changes nearly all (or all maybe, I’m not sure) the population to minorities or otherwise generally marginalized types.
You can still play the mod! It’s not outlawed or anything. It’s just that Nexus didn’t want it on their website. He can easily distribute that Mod elsewhere. It was Nexus’s choise and they choose to get rid of it.
Which is kind of unfair tbh. It’s the same issue with how Facebook and other social media is controlling exposure to influence politics. I pretty well loathe how some platforms are essentially the only avenue for their purpose, like YouTube.
It doesn’t seem like people really consider the fallout of removing the opposition’s voice either. If we can’t hear the stupid people screaming, we’re not gonna know how stupid they are.
Suit yourself. You won’t beat the big money people at their own game with the same tactics and less resources. You’re gonna have to figure out how communications outlets need to be regulated or they’ll be used against all of us to control image.
Forcing people to host speech they don't want to is far more draconian than not doing so.
You'd probably be more than a little annoyed if I put a swastika sign on your front yard and then told you that you were infringing on my right to free speech when you went to go remove it.
I don't think the government views video game mod hosts as so fundamental to a healthy society that they require strong limitations on their own freedom of speech, but you're welcome to call up your representative and start a campaign for the ability to force Nexus to host Nazis if it's truly important to you.
I quit playing League of Legends when they made Groovy Zilean look like a crackhead because the CCP hates drug culture. Every form of media is training your kids.
Your “freeze peach” only has to do with your government. You keep pointing out corporations aren’t people as if that had anything to do with this topic, but until you start paying taxes and owning land through Facebook, it’s a non-sequitur.
I’m not claiming that the law governs this under free speech. I simply think that free speech is worthless if it’s only in places that go ignored.
If a company is thousands of people, what is private about it? A thousand people can’t keep your secrets. FFS, Facebook is overtly selling access to them. The only ownership of Facebook is through stocks which just means the rich get to decide and the poor don’t.
People actually sell houses and shit on Facebook though. Not sure if that can be used as a reason to regulate them or not. For one, it’s a pretty easy way to discriminate against minorities without directly implicating themselves.
I’m not claiming that the law governs this under free speech. I simply think that free speech is worthless if it’s only in places that go ignored.
So why are you forcing Nexus Mods to host this content? What does this have to do with “corporations aren’t people”? Why even bring that comment up?
If a company is thousands of people, what is private about it?
This is just more non-sequiturs. First off, private in this context is privately owned. It doesn’t matter how many people work for them, nor how “secret” a “secret” is if you tell it to everyone (which isn’t a “secret” to begin with). Second off, Nexus Mod’s work force, including community management, is thirteen people.
What you think your free speech should mean, and what you think your country should do with mass media/popular social media has no basis in this conversation.
But Facebook is the one deciding I should see my conservative relatives bitch about being silenced. If I had my way I would never hear my uncle’s take on whether trans women are women, an issue which he apparently holds so close to his heart that he can’t go ten seconds without posting about it
It’s ok if you block them for you. It’s not ok if Facebook blocks them for you without your input. It’s especially not ok when they do that in mass to control the political landscape.
I very strongly believe that filters should not be imposed on people, but rather be privately curated.
It’s also not okay if the president shoots people in broad daylight. Seems weird to complain about how they could potentially that when they ain’t doing that
Nexus mods is doing that. Facebook is doing that. Reddit is doing that. They’re all deciding which arguments you’re allowed to see and which ones are strawman. You’re all tribalistic and only see sides instead of methods.
Nexus mods might be doing that, but I think they’re well within their rights to say “no abject homophobia.” Reddit and Facebook are super not doing that, hence my constant seeing people whine about it even though it isn’t happening
Facebook just paid Harvard 500 million dollars to silence people who were investigating how Facebook is doing harm by controlling the narrative with their analytics.
Google Link because I have no idea which journalists to trust anymore.
I know Reddit is doing it because they did it with me when I moderated a huge sub and tripped their analytics.
Everyone is trying to control everyone else because they think it makes them safer. The means they use cause harm. Censoring like this is wrong, whether it’s their right or not. Don’t use Nazi tactics to get rid of Nazis.
You can, quite easily, unsub from your uncle so he doesn't show up in your feed. He'll still be your Facebook friend and won't even know you aren't seeing his drivel anymore. You can do this. Facebook doesn't need to be the arbiter of morality.
So much ‘both sides’ nonsense disappears, when you figure out reasons come first.
Nexus blocking bigotry is good, because fuck bigotry. Facebook promoting bigotry is bad, because… fuck bigotry. The fact both actions involve the same mechanism does not matter. If you can’t comprehend a judgement of intent and outcomes, and have to grapple with events in terms of blind actions devoid of context, ask one of your fellow space aliens to explain how humans work.
I have no problem with a mod that changes someone’s sexual orientation, someone’s race, someone’s species, or just plain removes or adds new characters. Why would I care how someone else is playing a game?
Right? This is entirely opt-in. Who cares how other people are playing out their fantasies at home? I literally don’t care if someone else is racist or homophobic as long as they’re not pushing that shit on kids, employment prospects, housing decision, or whatever.
My point isn’t about them. My point is about you and media companies deciding who gets a platform and then acting like the people you silence are the ones oppressing and censoring. I’m not a Republican. I’m gay AF. I simply loathe double standards and hate seeing Facebook decide who gets heard.
This is a stupid take. You’re tired of the people who own and use a platform controlling that platform to represent their morals? If you want a platform to host bigotry, you should make one. They often do so well. Just because someone has something to stupid say doesn’t mean others have to tolerate it in their home or place of business.
Nexus mods is doing the bigotry through their removal here. Look in the mirror. Companies are not people.
Have fun with the political landscape being controlled by billionaires. If it’s ok for us, it’s ok for them. Nobody is gonna stop them with hypocrisy and less money.
Nexusmods are doing what they believe is the right thing to attain the highest profit, it’s no more complex than that.
The people in charge voted on where the line in the sand should be (to simplify the corporate process somewhat) and homophobia, they decided, should be on the wrong side. They figure that inclusivity, rather than bigotry, is the way to more customers. (I mean, duh.)
They are entitled to do just that, as the modder is to mod the game how he sees fit.
It is not bigotry to be intolerant of the intolerant, that pathetic argument has been dead since before you were born.
Truth and fairness take a back seat to profits. Got it.
It’s not intolerant to offer an alternative game experience for those who might choose it. You’re so lost in the juice that you’re ok with doing things the wrong way so long as it supports your side.
My problem here is that the same mechanism that entities Nexus mods to do this is the one that lets Facebook give Trump a win. You’re all blind to that though because you think this random guy is hurting gays or whatever with a game option that’s not imposed on anyone.
Modding a game to suit what you wanna play isn’t intolerant. Making your way the only option is. Making it only be their way seems to be what Nexus mods is doing.
There’s nothing stopping the modder hosting it somewhere that is tolerant or even supportive of their ignorant beliefs.
No-one is making any way be the only option.
Nexusmods isn’t the only place it could be, just to state that again, in simple enough terms it might make a dent.
Once more, just to be sure; Nexusmods has no control over other file hosting services, ergo they cannot “make it their way”. They can only choose what to have on their own site, nowhere else.
Did that penetrate your tin foil hat?
Also:
Modding a game to suit what you wanna play isn’t intolerant.
It is when it’s stated aim is to erase the existence of a specific subset of individuals based on a protected characteristic.
It is, in fact, almost the very fucking definition of intolerance.
You’re either completely ignorant and arguing for the sake of it, or you support, and are arguing for, sowing more of this kind of pointless culture wars shite.
(Which was created by the rich, solely to distract us all from the long overdue class war. Kill the fucking rich, not the other poor bastards in the same boat as you. 👍)
It’s fascinating watching how quickly my side has forgotten the state and corporate censorship of the 2000s. I don’t enjoy defending rightoids but I remember being on the losing side and I’d rather be principled now than on the backfoot again when the pendulum swings back.
Major media outlets and companies should not be considered private platforms. Anyone can sign up and post while they use their money and influence to decide who gets heard. This is a problem, and I’m pretty ticked off about how people don’t seem to mind when it’s in their favor. Double standards are bad, no matter which side.
Do you think Facebook should get to control which posts rise up and which fall with their analytics around election time? Me neither. Sometimes you gotta put up with some ugly if you don’t want people silenced for their perspective. I don’t want an echo chamber.
I’m only coming from the standpoint of how dangerous it is for a mass media outlet to control who has a voice. I don’t know how we can articulate this fairly and would like help for that, but I’m not gonna find help in a sea of people who just wanna take sides and ignore the means.
Why should anyone get to own the only effective avenues of communication? Communication is what determines how the world works.
CP is illegal obviously, and jihad doesn’t make sense in the cute cats category the way ‘straight only game mod’ makes sense in the ‘game mod’ category.
Why should anyone get to own the only effective avenues of communication? Communication is what determines how the world works.
Who currently owns the “only effective avenues of communication”?
CP is illegal obviously, and jihad doesn’t make sense in the cute cats category the way ‘straight only game mod’ makes sense in the ‘game mod’ category.
“Sometimes you gotta put up with some ugly if you don’t want people silenced for their perspective.” Seems there’s a limit to the ugly you’re willing to put up with, and you’re quite willing to silence perspectives yourself.
You cleaely still want people to moderate social networks. I assume you’d want these people to outside the company?
Hell, we’re on a site where you can literally filter what content you see. No one is so pro communication that they’ll happily chat away to someone that they don’t want to be around.
Platforms with near-monopoly level control of public discussion should be considered part of the public forum. This weird libertarianism from “lefties” deeply concerns me.
Nobody made you open up a social space to the public, and nobody is making you keep it open. Also I want you to explain how you can reconcile being on the left but also supporting corporate rights over those of individual humans?
You should want to make racists uncomfortable when they do a racism, and bigots uncomfortable when they do a bigotry. It’s part of the hidden contract to living in a nice society. Stand up for others who are affected even if you are not. Shit is not cool, and you should care that your brothers and sisters are being marginalized.
Right? Like who gives a fuck lol it’s their game. If they aren’t comfortable with gay characters because they are still in the closet or some shit they should be able to play a game without it if they want.
I can absolutely understand these people being outraged when someone releases a mod that exists solely to erase them the same way they’d been erased from western media since western media was a thing.
I mean this is nothing new. Racism exists and it’s only natural that it spills over to mods. Just skip it and move on and fuck the haters. My point is that it’s better to just ignore than to give it attention. The attention is what the bigots are really after. Giving it to them is what they want. The mod creator that built this is absolutely loving how things are going here.
Ignoring racism and bigotry has literally never worked, outside of maintaining personal delusions. The more comfortable people are in their hatred, the more bold they become in acting on it. Slavery and genocide happen for a reason, and it’s in part because people don’t take that shit seriously until it’s too late.
I’m tired of being quiet about hateful content. I’ll call it out and hope they get their nexus account banned if they keep it up. I’d rather review bomb it in force to show the public opinion.
You don’t have to care. No one does. No one is blocking this from working.
It’s just not being listed on Nexus.
Moreover this mod wasn’t giving options to players to choose how they wanted to play, it was changing very specific things and advertising it. Nexus doesn’t care to let them use their platform to advertise a mod made for a very specific audience of really shitty people.
This is patently false because if no one cares, it wouldn’t have been removed. It was only removed because enough people cared and spoke up about it. Even just reading this thread makes it clear that plenty of people care about it.
I actually don’t think it is ambiguous. “You don’t have to care” implies that some might, but it doesn’t matter. “No one does” is clearly reinforcing that point, rather than making a new point which contradicts the first part of the first point.
Not if you read cardfully, but it is easy to gloss over. I’d give them a pass, especially since changing your opinion when presented with different information isn’t nearly common enough.
Literally the only care that mattered in this situation is the admin(s) at Nexus mods, and they didn’t have to even care that much. The thing could be removed with about 5 minutes of work, if that. Nexus has shown that they will not platform bigotry, and this is them following through on that once again. Other people’s opinions didn’t even matter.
It’s honestly surprising to me the bigots haven’t set up their own mod hosting site. They’ve done it for everything else when they’ve been told that they’re asshats.
It’s free to host a mod on github. Mods like this and the pride flag remover for Spooderman are just trolls seeking attention and outrage, so they have to make sure to be very visible and find-able. Nexus has no obligation to host those files and if the modders actually wanted to play the game with the changes (and enable others to do so) it’s totally possible to do that without Nexus. They upload to Nexus (which has a clear policy against this) so that they get exposure when “journalism” reports their mod being deleted (since talking about this is free Engagement™)
rugged individualism is not the path to a functioning society. in any society worth living in there are certain views that cannot be tolerated. the kind of bigotry expressed by the mod creator is one of those views that cannot be tolerated.
It really depends, but in general if you feel that lgbt characters or black characters hinder your enjoyment of the game enough to bother modding them away or different then it speaks about who you are in a way that tells me that I dislike you
Nah, because as straight people we’ve never actually faced any hardship because of our orientation. Maybe if the idea that straight people shouldn’t exist, if one of the major political parties in my country wanted to legalize electrocuting us for being straight, if most of the major religions said we should be tortured to death, if there were people seriously debating about whether we should be allowed to marry someone of the opposite sex, I’d say that mod would be bigoted
So intent has nothing to do with it? One is a bigot based solely on the relative hardship two communities have faced. If in gay and want to play a character that reflects my sexuality, I’m not a bigot for making it happen. But if I’m straight and want to play a character that represents my sexuality, and I make that happen, I’m a bigot?
But if I’m straight and want to play a character that represents my sexuality, and I make that happen, I’m a bigot?
Of course not. That’s not what happened here, and is irrelevant. Nobody would care about a mod that makes otherwise unromanceable characters romanceable. This mod changed two NPCs for no reason other than the creator doesn’t like seeing gay people.
You understand there’s a difference between someone making a character gay because they like seeing gay characters, and someone making a character straight because they don’t like seeing gay characters, right?
Irrelevant to what happened, but not irrelevant to what the poster I was responding to was talking about.
You understand there’s a difference between someone making a character gay because they like seeing gay characters, and someone making a character straight because they don’t like seeing gay characters, right?
Absolutely. You are hitting my point here: intent. If someone is gay and changes it because they don’t want to see straight people, that’s bigoted too. If someone makes the character straight because they like seeing straight characters, that’s not bigoted.
I get that the mod maker is actually a bigot, in not challenging that. I’m challenging the claim that by switching from gay to straight makes you a bigot.
‘You mean censoring gay stuff isn’t the same as adding gay stuff?,’ asks deeply confused troll, in increasingly high tones of voice.
This author is explicitly a bigot. They’re not shy. That kind of obvious diet-Nazi bullshit is why Nexus removes garbage like this, and doesn’t lose any sleep over it.
Both cases are effectively identical, so framing one as “censoring” and the other as “adding” strikes me as grossly disingenuous. They are either both adding or both “censoring.”
And this gets to the crux of my point…it they are both effectively identical, labelling one as the action only bigots would do and the other perfectly fine, seemingly almost completely regardless of intent in either case, requires serious levels of mental gymnastics, like framing identical things as completely opposite.
Don’t get me wrong, I understand that the mod maker is openly bigoted and that’s more than enough to justify the removal of this mod. But the idea that someone would want the characters to reflect them in the game doesn’t make one a bigot, which is major reason why I support the push to make game characters more inclusive, so more people do get that.
But labelling some people bigots and others not for the same action, based solely on their sexual orientation, seems like going backwards to me. It should obviously be done on intent.
‘Don’t get me wrong, this guy’s an outright Nazi, but what if people were just calling names for a bunch of reasons I’m about to pull from my ass?’
I have negative respect for that ‘juuust becaaaaaause’ horseshit. It’s bad faith and it’s insulting. Absolutely fucking no-one is being labeled “based solely on their sexual orientation,” and you goddamn well know it. No shit role-playing your real-life choices “doesn’t make one a bigot,” but fortunately, that’s a fantasy, sourced from the vicinity of your pelvis.
You lot always fixate on the mechanism. Like purchase and theft are interchangeable because either way you walk off with a thing you found. As if saying “removing gay stuff is censorship” must be judged in a veil of perfect ignorance, devoid of all history, context, implication, or inference. As if you’re not fully aware there is no shortage of heterosexuality in media, and an order of magnitude less gay. As if you can’t figure out how having slightly less of that overwhelming supermajority is different from seeing that minority erased.
They’re not. Context matters. If i say you can’t back up on a highway, that doesn’t mean you can’t back up into a parking spot. Straight people have never been an oppressed minority, there’s nothing hateful about fantasizing about your favorite white character being black like you or something. There is a hateful history behind wishing all black characters were removed from a game.
If the intent has hate, it’s hateful. If there is no intent to be hateful, it’s not hateful. Hate require intent. You can’t be hateful if you don’t hate anyone, and you can be hateful regardless of whether or not you’re part of a traditionally oppressed group.
What you are arguing is that some actions, based on historical context, are more acceptable than others. Something that I tend to agree with, to a limited extent.
But if two people are doing the same exact thing for the same exact reason, and you are labelling on a bigot and the other perfectly acceptable based on their sexuality, its more likely youre the bigot. Although, really, I think youre just confused about an extremely touchy and complicated subject that doesn’t have easy answers.
But if two people are doing the same exact thing for the same exact reason
Sure, if we’re talking about small children innocently changing characters to be more like them, that’s a totally fair argument. But the context here is a publicly homophobic modder working for weeks to create a full mod to erase gay characters.
I’m talking about intent, and people have pointed out that the intent of the creator was hateful, so the creator is a bigot. But the top level comment that I responded to was a pretty blanket statement that any changing of a character (gay to straight or black to white) was bigoted “plain and simple.”
I’m disagreeing with that premise, not that the modder is a bigot.
There are mods for other games (might be for BG3 but I haven’t had time to dig into modding yet) that replace white characters with those of other races, why aren’t those controversial? Also it’s a single player game. Imagine if you were painting an altered version of a Salvador Dali and someone slaps it off your easel because they find your adding dick tentacles everywhere offensive.
Well there’s never anything wrong with customizing a single player game, I fully support Nexus banning whatever they see fit, especially on these grounds. They have no duty to platform content they rightfully see as reprehensible
so many of the replies read like entries to a libertarian contest. and in traditional fashion it seems they forgot to actually read your comment. it’s nice to see a post that understands why the mod is a problem and explains it well, even if so many in the replies seem unable to grasp it.
Only if you give a fuck, which is far too prevalent in the world. Could be swapping men for women, blacks for whites, whites for blacks and whatever other combination, the real question is, why do you care who thinks what?
I’m truly for all free expression, the world is too concerned with every fucking thing these days, it’s an illness.
Not to shit on you (well maybe as little) but the guy has a point.
You want them to not care. Doesn’t that go both ways? If some edgy straight horny teen wants more straight tiddies and less gay in his game, who the fuck cares?
Cause let’s be honest, that’s what we’re talking about here. Teens and desperate 30 year olds.
And don’t you think what you imply is scary?
And with that I mean : “people’s thoughts influence their actions”
I fucking hope so.
And who are you to tell them what is right and what is wrong?
no. not everything goes both ways. some things are bad, and should not be tolerated.
And don’t you think what you imply is scary?
no i don’t, what about it do you find scary?
And with that I mean : “people’s thoughts influence their actions” I fucking hope so. And who are you to tell them what is right and what is wrong?
just so we’re clear, the context of this statement is me saying “i care about people having racist/homophobic thoughts because people’s thoughts influence their actions”. so, again just to be clear, the “what” that is being discussed is “racism/homophobia”.
in context, your reply reads “i fucking hope so, who are you to tell them racism/homophobia is right or wrong?”.
You know how in the US they aim to remove everything about racism, black history and rewrite native history in many states? This is one front of bigotry. Another one is to remove the visibility in arts and culture. One angle is to remove and supress works created by people from minorities. The other is to remove minority characters from works of fiction.
And at the end of that culture war, when the “ideal” mainstream society is created in the heads it is creates in the real world by persecution of the excluded minorities.
And while the modder has the right to mod how he sees fit, it is perfectly justified for the platform to not help him distribute it. And in such it is different from mods turning mainstream characters into minority characters because it has no negative consequences for peopledown the line.
Well, when the mod author specifically says it’s to reduce diversity as the goal of the mod I think we all have a chance to point out that is insensitive and comes from a place of hatred. Hatred is wrong. Let the people speak against it and let the website host what it wants. I care enough to spend two min to leave a comment here, but I’m not gonna be a reaction youtuber about it.
Hell, I’ve seen accusations that the author of this mod made literally that exact mod for BG3 that “fixed” Wyll and his father by turning them white. Shit’s disgusting.
I don’t have any issues with diversity and inclusivity, and support it however I can.
But I don’t really see the problem with this mod? It’s a honest question, I’ve just read the article, and the Nexus mod answer doesn’t make much sense to me. I mean there are literally mods that change every character in Skyrim to females, how is that different? (I didn’t log in to see the if the mod is active, but I’m sure there’s a lot of “we change this character to female” mods for any game).
And more importantly, why not let anyone do whatever they want with their game, and enjoy it however they want? Or was it similar to the Starfield pronouns mod, where the creator went on a hateful rant in the mod description, and acted like a total dick, spewing their bullshit intorelant propaganda? Then, the removal would be understandable. Otherwise, it’s just counter-productive and only serves to even more divide people and turn them against eachother, and feels like an unnecessary witch-hunt and a PR stunt.
But please correct me if I’m wrong or missing something, there’s probably some context that I don’t have.
Nexus Mods specifically has rules against these kinds of mods. It was removed for violating them. They have the right to make whatever rules they went about the content they host.
But not sex swapping characters, then? Because I’ve seen mods that do that and hang around.
Also, if the next TES game is set in Hammerfell as rumored, I suspect there will be race swapping mods and only some will be considered in violation. Because most of the characters would likely be Redguards (and thus black), and I can see people upset that the PC can be a white guy (which is how one would describe the other races of men) killing lots of black people (Hammerfell is the homeland of the Redguard, the only race of men you’d call black). So I fully expect mods to make random encounter villain groups more racially diverse, since you’d expect them to be Redguards in Hammerfell about as often as they were Nords in Skyrim (aka most of the time) and I can see that being too many black people being killed without comment for some people to be comfortable.
Either that or for Bethesda to do it themselves, and come up with some explanation why mysteriously the natives aren’t mooks very often just to avoid the bad press.
I’m not saying it was against their rules, I’m saying their rules kinda suck if they led them to remove this.
Imo, only mods that spread malware or hate (and maybe some other categories I’m missing) should be removed. This doesn’t do either. I think it’s a stupid mod and I’d never use it, but that doesn’t mean it should be stricken from the platform.
But I agree, at the end of the day, they can remove whatever they want, I just think the rule sucks.
And nothing about this seems negative or hateful. Do you think changing a character to be homosexual is somehow negative or hateful? What about just switching their gender? Race? At what point does it become negative or hateful?
That said, I haven’t used this mod and I’m largely reacting to the headline here, so I could very well be missing something important. But if it’s just changing a character from LGBT to cis or whatever (or vice versa), I see no hate. AFAIK, nothing in it is saying being gay is bad or wrong.
It does spread hate by erasing a queer character from a game. It spreads hate by shielding the exact people who should be exposed to queer people and learn to be empathetic towards their struggles from it.
I think that’s a stretch in this case. The stated goal is to make the game match medieval social norms, and the game is a medieval themed fantasy game. An openly lesbian core character breaks that immersion.
Now, if they removed homosexuality entirely from the game, I could see your point. AFAIK, the player can still have homosexual relationships and RP in any way they want, only one core character switches from a woman to a man.
I wouldn’t install it, nor would I recommend it to anyone, but I honestly don’t see any hate here.
Not sure what you mean? I was simply clarifying the reason for deletion.
Regarding their desires, sure, that’s fine, but it’s the nexus mod’s platform and they have no obligation to host content they disagree with, regardless of validity of reason.
Just like how Facebook has no obligation to display democrat talking points? They can filter and supress how they please. What’s wrong with that, right?
We gotta come to some kind of agreement about mass media and the way they control everyone’s lives. Websites with a certain level of influence gotta be held accountable as avenues of speech.
So where do I get my news? If everyone on every platform just just demonizing and censoring their opposition, what’s fair? Am I supposed to just stoop to that bullshit myself? If that’s the way, we’re never gonna overcome the interests of the rich.
I think we gotta draw a line between private entities. There’s a good difference between a single person or club and huge outlets like Facebook and Nexus mods. How do we articulate the distinction?
The whole point of mods to get the perfect gayness level for the individual player. Some want none of it. Some wants a ton of it. I just want Thomas the Tank Engine replacing all sexy men and women.
Increasing the gayness is one thing, removing all of it is queer erasure which is bigotry. Gay people face rejection from 9 out of 10 potential partners every single day. If even one person changes their mind about gay people because they were forced to be rejected by this gay character and it opened their eyes, then that's a huge win for civilized society and equality.
Nah this mod was making trans people into trans people that regretted it. They planned on removing all the people of colour because of “realism” and do other assorted fuckery. There was a long post about the group that was writing this mod, it wasn’t done in good faith.
In other words, there’s “let people mod whatever they like” and there’s mods that are effectively a statement of an ethos, and not all ethos are worth letting your platform be used to broadcast.
There’s also mods that are tools to give players more freedom, and mods that are fixes to correct what the dev sees as mistakes or shortcomings. The difference between “choose what color you want the flags to be” and “the flags are all blue now”. The latter is a statement of a belief: “I think the game would be better if all the flags were blue”.
The changes in this mod could be framed differently, like “gives player more granular control over NPC gender and sexuality”. It could have been done in a respectful and open-ended fashion that doesn’t play on harmful stereotypes. It could even be used to make the game “more gay” if the player chooses, then if some players choose to make it all “less gay”, so be it. That would be fine.
But that’s not what this mod is, and the intent behind it is fairly obvious. There’s no reason to pussyfoot around this one with arguments about player freedom, that wasn’t why it was made.
Yeah well those types are arguing for the sake of making a show for bystanders and wear down their interlocutor than to have a honest discussion. Just look at their best (shen bapiro) and how the dude is arguing. It’s all in bad faith. They play the card of being innocent and inquisitive, try to uphold the free speech and stuff like that…and it’s all in bad faith.
Or the people arguing here for the “freedom” of installing this mod.
I mean feel free, just not available from nexusmod.
Who cares. Trans people that regret being trans exist. If you don’t like the mod don’t install it lol. It’s not like it is just going to disappear because nexus removed it. It’s still very available.
I care. Pretending intent doesn’t matter just allows the hatred this mod creator has to grow. They didn’t make that change in good faith, it’s a common dog whistle for right wing bigots. Around 1% regret transition, and often because of backlash from those around them, not because they’re not trans.
When someone’s intent is to criticize and invalidate a trans person’s very existence, I care. And obviously plenty of people do since the mod was removed.
Seems like it just gave it even more attention to me. I don’t even play the game as it looks lame as shit and boring to me but now I know about this mod lol. And surely I can still go seek it out and download it easily if I wanted.
The last time something like this happened, it was with a mod that removed the pronouns option in (IIRC) Starfield and the reason it was removed wasn’t for the content of the mod, but for the content the particular mod’s maker put in the description page (bunch of transphobic hate speech). Many news sites reporting on it conveniently left that part of the story out; I imagine this is just another example of that kind of shit reporting and the reason it was removed was because the mod creators were being hateful pricks in the description or forums.
Just because the mod isn’t on Nexus mod it doesn’t mean the creator can’t use it or share it, it just means Nexus mod finds it unacceptable and doesn’t want to host it, so people can do whatever they want with their game and Nexus mod can do whatever they want with their website.
It will still be fringe and more inaccessible, so only people who are deeply ingrained in their bigotry and probably have no chance of opening their eyes and having empathy will seek it out, which is a huge win for everyone else.
This is not the Baldur's Gat devs dashing into the mod maker's house and holding him at gunpoint until he deletes the mod. I'd agree, that would be inappropriate.
What this is instead is the people running Nexus deciding that they don't want to be associated with this kind of content and that they are not willing to host it. If you owned a bar and it started being frequented by neo-Nazis, you'd be perfectly within your rights to kick them out, because you're a private business owner and can conduct it however you like within the bounds of the law.
Your position isn't the "live and let live" idea you think it is, because what you're in effect claiming is that the people behind Nexus should be forced to host content that they find extremely morally objectionable.
I was just surprised why did people find the mod that much offensive. I wasn’t aware that the authors intent wasn’t to just change one character into different gender, but to effectively purge all diversity from the game, including the racial one.
That changes my point of view, because then it makes absolute sense why you wouldn’t allow someone like that on your platform. That was the context I was missing. But if I took the mod at face value, without the rest of the anti-diversity modpack this mod was made for, I still don’t see an issue with wanting to change one characters gender for your own playthough, or a reason why to remove such mod from your platform, especially compared to all other “change this character to female” mods that Nexusmods is full of. But given the context, Nexusmods are in the right here, of not wanting to support someone with so blatant propaganda.
I agree overall, but as hard as it may be to prove, I think it comes down to intent. A mod based on hate has no place on Nexus (even though I’m sure they still exist). Replacing a gay character with another is fine in my opinion generally speaking, but replacing them specifically because you hate gay people and you want to erase them from the game is not. The mod author is a hate filled person who intended to do a lot more based on bigotry, and he was loud and proud of that fact. He could have slipped under the radar easily by having another outlook and not being blatantly hateful.
You are right, I wasn’t aware of the context - the authors goal to just eradicate diversity from the game, and that makes it perfectly ok of not wanting to have someone like that on your platform. But taking the mod at a face value, I didn’t see what’s the fuss about, now I get it.
Yeah, I wasn’t aware of the context of the author working on other mods like that, that are purging every diverse character from the game. I totally agree that then it shouldn’t be there, I was just taking the mod at a face value and comparing it to other gender-changing mods, which still were there. Given the author’s intent and rhetorics, he shouldn’t be given a platform to speak.
Nexus isn’t obliged to host your files. They’re free to have the final say.
I dislike this notion that the characters in the game got to be X. But this is 100% bigotry. That’s what makes it not okay. It’s not the same as someone going in and making everyone a hot naked lesbian with a single click sex mod. This mod exists as a message and to hurt people.
The creator is free to self host it if they wish. But they may not host it using sites like nexus where they disagree with his message.
That’s the facts. My personal opinion is irrelevant. I wish I didn’t have to explain it but it’s not black and white and can’t be taken at face value.
I agree, Nexus isn’t oblidged to host your files. I wasn’t aware of the authors other mods and goal to purge diversity from the game - which makes it absolutely OK to not want him on your platform, and I agree with removing it.
But when I took the mod at a face value, without this context, I really don’t see any problem with it, especially compared to all other gender changing mods on Nexus. Which made their reason not to include it seem like pandering because someone took an issue with it. Now I know that was not the case, and that there was malicious and pretty awfull intent and message behind the mod. But without that, I still think the mod would be OK, and taking it down would be unfair, just because some vocal people took issue with it - which is how the situation looked like from the article. But that’s not the case, and I was mistaken, so it’s solved.
Nexus decides. They have rules, they try to apply them consistently, we see the results. If you disagree strongly enough then either write them to politely state your case or make your own goddamn website.
Scoffing at the fact a human being has to make judgement calls is not a moral victory, despite the smug posturing of a million right-wing trolls who might honestly believe they’re not right-wing trolls. Propose whatever grey-area hypotheticals you want. Hell, put in the work, upload it for real, and see what happens. Make your hypothetical a hypothesis and test that bitch. But don’t mistake the vague possibility of edge cases as proof that “Nazis fuck off” is a bad policy.
Because the general mindset right now is not liberty of having your own opinion but to push in the opposite direction of what was thought years ago. And that’s the problem with extremist thinking it does not care for balance only extreme posture for either one side or the other.
Or was it similar to the Starfield pronouns mod, where the creator went on a hateful rant in the mod description, and acted like a total dick, spewing their bullshit intorelant propaganda?
yes, this is basically what happened with this baldurs gate mod, and this is why it was removed
it uses the same game engine but the combat is a lot less about resource management and more about character builds, the story is good but nowhere near as spectacular as BG3.
It’s still one of my favorite games, I can wholeheartedly recommend it. Just don’t expect it to be BG2.5, it’s a different game
The action system in D2 is soooo good though. Like if I don’t spend every action in bg3 I feel like I wasted a turn. D2 lets you bank a few AP if you aren’t able to be effective that turn, or just position and save up for a wombo combo next turn. The pyramids let your party split up to explore too which is great.
Oh, absolutely. It’s also closer to the PF2e system of handling actions, and since I personally prefer PF2e over DnD5e, it is, if anything, a plus for me
BG3 is my GOTY. Divinity Original Sin 2 is my favorite game of all time. The story/writing isn’t as strong in Divinity but the combat is a work of art. I’ve beaten BG3 twice, I’m in the middle of a multiplayer run, and I’ll run through the game at least once more after the major updates are finished being released. I’ve finished Divinity six or so times and will continue running the game for a long, long time. It’s 110% worth your time and money
Unlike BG3 where the combat is based upon a TTRPG, the combat in Divinity is designed around Turn Based video games.
All of the abilities have a cooldown instead of being limited resources. Which is difficult to do with pen and paper, but works perfectly on a computer.
The way you do builds is also a lot more dynamic, there isn’t really classes as much as there are different fighting styles with abilities which you can mix and match however you want.
The only thing Divinity lacks compared to BG3 is the cutscenes. Which is kind of important in a story based game.
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