{"id":102069,"date":"2019-10-18T20:31:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-18T20:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/352525"},"modified":"2019-10-18T20:31:00","modified_gmt":"2019-10-18T20:31:00","slug":"legislators-condemn-action-against-hearthstone-pro-in-letter-to-activision-blizzard-ceo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2019\/10\/18\/legislators-condemn-action-against-hearthstone-pro-in-letter-to-activision-blizzard-ceo\/","title":{"rendered":"Legislators condemn action against Hearthstone pro in letter to Activision Blizzard CEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

United States senators and representatives have penned a letter to Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick, condemning Blizzard\u2019s decision to punish a Hearthstone pro<\/a> for voicing support of ongoing protests in Hong Kong during an interview.<\/p>\n

That letter, dated October 18 and readable here<\/a>, is signed by senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) along with representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Mike Gallagher (R-WI), and Tom Malinowski (D-NJ). In it, lawmakers chide Blizzard for its decision to penalize that player, a move they say \u201cis particularly concerning in light of the Chinese government\u2019s growing appetite for pressuring American businesses to help stifle free speech.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cActivision Blizzard benefits from China\u2019s growing market for es-orts, along with an investment from Tencent, one of China\u2019s largest technology firms,\u201d continues the letter. \u201cAs you and your company are no doubt aware, the Chinese government uses the size and strength of its economy to suppress opinions with which it disagrees.\u201d<\/p>\n

For its part, Blizzard has stated previously that its issue with the actions of the Hearthstone Blitzchung, or Ng Wai Chung as referred to in the letter, were unrelated to the specific content of his message. In that statement<\/a>, Blizzard instead said that it would have taken the same action had a streamer voiced an “opposing viewpoint delivered in the same divisive and deliberate way.\u201d The goal, explained Blizzard president J. Allen Brack several days after the incident, is to keep event broadcasts \u201cfocused on the game and [\u2026] not a platform for divisive social or political views.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the intent outlined by Blizzard after the fact and a subsequently reduced punishment for those involved, the controversial action led to protests across Blizzard\u2019s esports circuit and player communities, as mentioned in the lawmakers\u2019 letter. An American college Hearthstone team notably shared a similar \u201cFree Hong Kong\u201d message (with the addition of \u201cBoycott Blizz\u201d) days after Blitzchung\u2019s comment and ban, and were met with their own ban nearly one week later<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Those earlier protests from Blizzard\u2019s community caught the attention of Senators Wyden and Rubio last week. Both shared concerns that Blizzard\u2019s reaction sets a troubling precedent for the game industry, a sentiment echoed in the letter.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs China amplifies its campaign of intimidation, you and your company must decide whether to look beyond the bottom line and promote American values\u2014like freedom of speech and thought\u2014or to give in to Bejing\u2019s demands in order to preserve market access,\u201d continues the letter. \u201cWe urge you in the strongest terms to reconsider your decision with respect to Mr. Chung. You have the opportunity to reverse course. We urge you to take it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

United States senators and representatives have penned a letter to Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick, condemning Blizzard\u2019s decision to punish a Hearthstone pro for voicing support of ongoing protests in Hong Kong during an interview. That letter, dated October 18 and readable here, is signed by senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) along with representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102070,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-102069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}