I’ve never trusted their reporting system, though you seem to have had some confidence in it before this incident. The first time I reported something (it was very, very long ago and I havent the slightest what it was) and I got the response of “we’re handling it” I was severely disappointed. I didn’t see justice happen. I saw a company placate me, and I thought it was highly likely they did the same for the accused. I always say, when money’s involved the benefactor’s sole interest is the money. In this case, I suspect most reporting goes unanswered, ignored, or unprosecuted.

I think Stubborn has some good points, though. The kind of community the game has been breeding in recent years is a direct product of company policy and game design. Which is to say, I feel sure these kinds of things aren’t considered a serious problem. Theres a kind of apathy about the entire system. Just look at the flippant and “you’re stupid, but …” responses the many CMs and designers give to players on the forums — despite some probable good intent. They have the community they deserve and it’s really chased off those who would have continued to bring positivity to it.

Which brings me to my final comment on this: community policing. The problem with WoW and all other MMOs in this regard is that policing is, as a company policy, up to the support. That is, support doesn’t want players solving problems, they prefer players just report it. This contributes to apathy. If the company is telling the player they have no responsibility in governing their community, thus calling for an investment in it’s quality, it breeds apathy. The player isn’t encouraged to do anything *but* report. This also has the unfortunate effect of bad behavior getting an exclusive spotlight, because there are no community mechanisms to highlight good behavior. And this is due in large part to the players being asked to participate only as reporters as their communities quality gets decided by a team of CS reps.

Still, that was way too long.

Glad you like the art! The work was done by Baenhoof (aka Karnokoto on DeviantArt), and features my warrior, Lelissa, in all her badassery. ^_^

Baen *did* do bust art of my Death Knight, Malyss – if you’re interested in seeing that sometime, let me know.

@Velidra – I will agree that an educative approach would be a better line to take. I also agree that there is a measure of racism in forcing a name change when the name involves a word from a foreign language, but in the sense of greater community impact, there has to be some kind of line drawn as to what can and can’t be allowed to occur. I would certainly sympathize with the Persian player who wants to use their language in a character name, but would suggest instead that they use something that isn’t going to spark an issue like this.

In a less-severe example, let’s say that I’m playing in a German MMO, and I happen to be playing a race that is something akin to a golem. I’m an American, and a bit of a rock nut, and I opt to name my character Schist. To me, it’s an innocuous name. To the German, it’s pretty close to a swear word. While not worthy of a ban (and if Ibitanegar’s name is derived from Persian as you suggest, neither is theirs), it still warrants an encounter with a GM who can ask for the origins of the name, and then instruct them that it could be deemed offensive, and warrants a name change.

I won’t go into my views on your final example re: african americans here, since it’s not really related to the post, but would like to get your opinion on my views with such things. I believe we’re connected on Twitter – I’ll follow up with you there.

Thanks for the comments, you two.

Sadly no one has yet invented a method to detect intent through the internet (or the account owners race etc) there is no reasonable way to determine if they mean “I bit a sweetheart” or “I bit a niger”.

To be clear, I despise racism. Because you know, it looks like I’m defending it here a bit. Which I’m not. This likely case is that it is racist, but can we jump to that conclusion?

What if the person behind the screen is a Persian? 9 times out of 10 when you find a name like this it won’t be, but that 1 time out of 10 you’ve just told someone that they can’t use a Persian word, which could be considered racist in itself?

(This doesn’t even get onto the modern day use of the word “niger” by african americans, and the social and political ramifications of that, is it a word they use to demean themselves? Is it a word they have taken, owned, and reworked (thus not racist) or what? Intent is a tricky thing) (not to mention, should we really be using fear of bans to “control” racists? I’d much rather prefer to take a educative approach, but this is side tracing into the philosophical side of this)

Anyway, this comment is getting away from me, so I’ll end it now. What I wanted to get accross can probably be summed up in one sentence.

This could be innocent, so can blizzards GMs act on a “It probably is racism”?

The community has been long-suffering, to be honest, and I think probably this “every-man-for-himself” /ignore culture is a result of it. When you never see any good done by the authority, you eventually either become apathetic towards the way things are or become a part of the problem so as to fit in. Consider what you see in every post-apocalyptic or dystopian story. You have a single unlikely hero struggling against the unfair autocracy, bandits of some kind, and the apathy of others. It’s a pretty close comparison, actually, now that I put it like that.

Anyway, keep fighting the good fight. I’m sure we’re probably just bashing our heads against the wall, but at least I can sleep at night.

Sincerely,
Stubborn