Smile and Nod: RealID and Why Hate Speech is the Least of Our Worries

[Tele-screen]

I found this article actually rather endearingly heartfelt. It even made me re-evaluate my opinion on the sad souls who place so much value on their virtual lives. This is the kind of thing that makes me read the Escapist.

 

[Erick.S]

I will never participate in a game that places my RealID on anything. There are very real reasons for that. I was stalked at one time of my life, and though i have asked for restraining orders and have moved since, its still a very up front thing in my mind. I will not risk that chance to be followed again, or for someone to harm me, for no reason. If it starts being something required for all sites, that is when I will have to find some other way to socially connect with distant friends and talk to people without the stress of some bigoted a**hole will hunt me down.

*This* is the main reason why exposing your identity to complete strangers, all over the globe, in a digital age, is a very bad idea.
As someone who has been harassed online as well by unstable, violent people, who threatened me in all kinds of manners (from taking me to court over using a word they believe they copyrighted, to outright murder for [their] racist reasons), I felt lucky that for the very least, they couldn't reach me outside the boundaries of the net.
Since this article assumes only children and celebrities can be at risk from other humans, it is missing a major point in the argument, and is reminiscent of the thought patterns of people who lived a secure life to a degree that violent crimes are just something they see on TV series.

In short, all of you who believe playing an online game is worth the risk of being stabbed to death (and I can provide links to actual cases of that), please raise your hand in favor of real ID.

 

[gamer_parent]

I'd say that when Russ Pitt said his viewpoint was biased since he had nothing to lose, he made a MASSIVE understatement.

 

[Russ Pitts]

Yet I would give it away in a heartbeat if it would relegate the assholes who plague its every crevice back to the tick-ridden, backwoods, flyover, bypassed-by-the advance-of-civilization shitpits from which they emerged, birthed by their daddy's sisters.

Hold on, you'd give up the internet JUST because people say nasty things to you?

Not specifically because of the nasty things said to me or about me, but yeah, I would give up the internet in a nanosecond if it would guarantee I would no longer be subjected to the ignorant bleatings of some of the most reprehensible of its denizens. I'm not a fool. I know that negativity and negative people exist and will always exist, whether I can observe them or not, but I don't have to give them access to my brain.

 

[RMcD94]

Yet I would give it away in a heartbeat if it would relegate the assholes who plague its every crevice back to the tick-ridden, backwoods, flyover, bypassed-by-the advance-of-civilization shitpits from which they emerged, birthed by their daddy's sisters.

Hold on, you'd give up the internet JUST because people say nasty things to you?

Not specifically because of the nasty things said to me or about me, but yeah, I would give up the internet in a nanosecond if it would guarantee I would no longer be subjected to the ignorant bleatings of some of the most reprehensible of its denizens. I'm not a fool. I know that negativity and negative people exist and will always exist, whether I can observe them or not, but I don't have to give them access to my brain.

Uh, that's why you ignore them, there will be always be ignorance, but you should never give in to it. That's like saying a silly advert on TV is accessing your brain so you have to give up the TV (no more silly ignorant adverts).

Do you understand why it sounds so absurd to me?

 

[Russ Pitts]

Yet I would give it away in a heartbeat if it would relegate the assholes who plague its every crevice back to the tick-ridden, backwoods, flyover, bypassed-by-the advance-of-civilization shitpits from which they emerged, birthed by their daddy's sisters.

Hold on, you'd give up the internet JUST because people say nasty things to you?

Not specifically because of the nasty things said to me or about me, but yeah, I would give up the internet in a nanosecond if it would guarantee I would no longer be subjected to the ignorant bleatings of some of the most reprehensible of its denizens. I'm not a fool. I know that negativity and negative people exist and will always exist, whether I can observe them or not, but I don't have to give them access to my brain.

Uh, that's why you ignore them, there will be always be ignorance, but you should never give in to it. That's like saying a silly advert on TV is accessing your brain so you have to give up the TV (no more silly ignorant adverts).

Do you understand why it sounds so absurd to me?

I can understand why my suggestion seems absurd to you, but to address your analogy, I also lived for many years without TV. Or at least without cable, which where I lived was essentially the same thing.

I made the choice to not pay for TV service because the adverts were rotting my brain. Perhaps that's a choice you're not willing to make. That's fine. To each his own, but to me, internal serenity is worth more than ready access to cable TV or the internet.

 

[Devil's Due]

Like Russ, I don't have a vested interest in RealID, but I do have an opinion on it.

I think it was a great idea. I personally want to remove some of the cover that assholes use to hide themselves from the idiotic and hate-filled messages they spew. Remove the anonymity from the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory. Kids don't have to worry since it would be posting the name off of the credit card attached to the subscription, so it'd be their parent's name. As well, it's rather easy to not have your full real name posted if you think about it.

What's the big problem? It engenders a much more polite society since you can be held accountable for your behavior. Why is that a bad thing? I get the idea that most of the people who are objecting to RealID are people who are acting questionably and are simply trying to preserve themselves.

I agree with you JaredXE, when I first heard about it I was optimistic at first, but wished later they did install it. I personally have no problem letting someone know my name, in fact my name is very basic, James Jones. There are thousands and thousands of James Jones' in the world that the odds of finding me by name is moot. Unless you acted out and said more, such as where you live, state, address, and other such things.

Plus, I am rather proud of my name. I do not degenerate into hateful speeches and trolling, instead I consider it who I am. I could care less if a friend sees my name on some game. That means he/she is on the game as well, and like earlier, there are thousands of people with the same name. Heck, in most games when I meet someone, I just smile and say "Name's James, pleasure to make your acquittance." regardless if they person wishes to express the same pleasantries.

Now, onto the matter of children in the game and their names, the parents should be the ones who monitor what their children say and post. I'm sure if the parents feel the game is unacceptable for using their children's name, then they simply do not need to play or use it. Same as if a parent feels their children should not play a game because of it's graphic detail of violence.

Lastly, I get the whole idea of being a fantasy and letting you create whichever you'd like, but if this becomes too deeply into fantasy, we might find ourselfs turning into a future where we'd be like the movie Surrogates [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/escape-to-the-movies/954-Surrogates] where we cannot tell the difference between reality and fantasy. And to be honest, that frightens me as a gamer.

PS: I hope I did not offend anyone or such. I am simply stating what I believe and my opinion on the matter at hand.

 

[RMcD94]

Yet I would give it away in a heartbeat if it would relegate the assholes who plague its every crevice back to the tick-ridden, backwoods, flyover, bypassed-by-the advance-of-civilization shitpits from which they emerged, birthed by their daddy's sisters.

Hold on, you'd give up the internet JUST because people say nasty things to you?

Not specifically because of the nasty things said to me or about me, but yeah, I would give up the internet in a nanosecond if it would guarantee I would no longer be subjected to the ignorant bleatings of some of the most reprehensible of its denizens. I'm not a fool. I know that negativity and negative people exist and will always exist, whether I can observe them or not, but I don't have to give them access to my brain.

Uh, that's why you ignore them, there will be always be ignorance, but you should never give in to it. That's like saying a silly advert on TV is accessing your brain so you have to give up the TV (no more silly ignorant adverts).

Do you understand why it sounds so absurd to me?

I can understand why my suggestion seems absurd to you, but to address your analogy, I also lived for many years without TV. Or at least without cable, which where I lived was essentially the same thing.

I made the choice to not pay for TV service because the adverts were rotting my brain. Perhaps that's a choice you're not willing to make. That's fine. To each his own, but to me, internal serenity is worth more than ready access to cable TV or the internet.

But surely, as with the internet, you can just, you know, flick the channel. Don't like what you are watching/reading, go look at something else. Don't like anything at the moment, come back later. Missing out on huge amounts of programs (I assume that it's large amounts, cable is like Sky isn't it?) just because of avoidable ads just seems silly.

 

[Russ Pitts]

But surely, as with the internet, you can just, you know, flick the channel. Don't like what you are watching/reading, go look at something else. Don't like anything at the moment, come back later. Missing out on huge amounts of programs (I assume that it's large amounts, cable is like Sky isn't it?) just because of avoidable ads just seems silly.

I don't see it as missing out. I have plenty of pleasurable and/or productive ways to spend my time rather than wait around for something I'll enjoy to pop on the tube between advertisements.

 

[Russ Pitts]

Two things I wanted to chime in here on, in response to some of the responses I've gotten to this article:

1. To those who are offended by my use of the term "tranny," I sincerely apologize. My goal was not to disparage those who, for whatever reason, have reassigned their sexual orientation or wish that they could. I have no beef with transsexuals.

The point I was attempting to illustrate was that a great many men pretend that they are women in online settings, for various reasons, some respectable some not, and that these were among the folk vehemently opposed to RealID. I wasn't attempting to make a judgment call regarding those activities, but again, I apologize if my inadvertent use of a slanderous term implied negativity.

2. The second thing I want to address is my use of the phrase "the way fat girls crave cake." For this, I remain unapologetic. Here's why: I love cake. everyone I know loves cake. Fat girls? Chances are, they love cake, too. In fact, I'd be willing to bet they love it A LOT.

(Perhaps it was a mistake to use the term "fat girls" here, because I'm really not attempting to single out girls in any way, not even the fat ones. I think it's fair to say that all or most fat people in general love cake, and so perhaps the term "person" may in fact have been a better choice here.

Fat girls, if you'll accept the apology, I apologize for being sexist in regard to my association of fat people with cake.)

Here's the deal, I was fat once. In fact, I was fat for most of my childhood. You know when I stopped being fat? When I stopped eating cake.

I understand that fatness is a subject about which many people are sensitive, but I can't help that. Ninety-nine percent of the time, a person who is fat has made a choice to be fat, or has refused to make a choice to NOT be fat.

I understand that there are fat people who can't help that they are fat due to uncontrollable hormone issues or as a result of side effects of certain medications, etc. but somebody who is sitting on their couch, watching TV and eating cake has no room to complain about being fat and will get no sympathy from me.

If you don't mind being fat, then by all means, eat as much cake as you want. If, however, you are fat and are self conscious about the fact that you are fat, then cutting out the cake is probably a good first step. It worked for me.

But don't cry to me about the fact that I'm pointing out that cake leads to fatness. That's just a fact of life. An unfortunate fact because, as I said, I do love cake, but a fact nonetheless.

 

[Susan Arendt]

Also, upon reflection, I find the tone of this article surprisingly patronizing and insulting. Of course, Mr. Pitts does actually say 'the way fat girls love cake', and that tells me a whole lot about him right there. Not even fat people, but fat girls, so I assume we've got some pretty good insight into how he thinks about women in general, and overweight ones in particular. This might also explain why in his derisive remarks about 'closet trannies' and children that he doesn't mention that a number of the most outspoken critics were women who didn't want it known to the WoW world at large that they were female. Anyone who has spent any time in the online world and interacts with women at all would know that online harassment is a constant threat.

Though I think that Russ addressed his thoughts on the "cake" issue quite thoroughly in the above post, I wanted to deal with this one myself. Speaking as someone who has worked with Russ first as a freelancer, then as a coworker, I assure you, he has nothing but respect for women, as is pretty clearly evidenced by the number of women who have worked for or with The Escapist over the years.

 

[mattaui]

Also, upon reflection, I find the tone of this article surprisingly patronizing and insulting. Of course, Mr. Pitts does actually say 'the way fat girls love cake', and that tells me a whole lot about him right there. Not even fat people, but fat girls, so I assume we've got some pretty good insight into how he thinks about women in general, and overweight ones in particular. This might also explain why in his derisive remarks about 'closet trannies' and children that he doesn't mention that a number of the most outspoken critics were women who didn't want it known to the WoW world at large that they were female. Anyone who has spent any time in the online world and interacts with women at all would know that online harassment is a constant threat.

Though I think that Russ addressed his thoughts on the "cake" issue quite thoroughly in the above post, I wanted to deal with this one myself. Speaking as someone who has worked with Russ first as a freelancer, then as a coworker, I assure you, he has nothing but respect for women, as is pretty clearly evidenced by the number of women who have worked for or with The Escapist over the years.

Two things I wanted to chime in here on, in response to some of the responses I've gotten to this article:

... I apologize if my inadvertent use of a slanderous term implied negativity.

...Fat girls, if you'll accept the apology, I apologize for being sexist in regard to my association of fat people with cake...

...But don't cry to me about the fact that I'm pointing out that cake leads to fatness. That's just a fact of life. An unfortunate fact because, as I said, I do love cake, but a fact nonetheless.

I appreciate both your responses, thanks. I think there's quite a lot to discuss about the RealID issue, though I imagine the 'Does cake make you fat?' question is pretty well settled. I smell a poll question. Does Cake Make You Fat? Yes, no, RealID is terrible!

 

[JSDodd]

I agree with the author of the article with regards to usernames; my usernames are all variations on JSDodd1991. (My name is Joseph Dodd and i'm 19, figure it out) But they canceled the scheme largely because of potential threats, the whole "killing your online rival IRL" argument.

EDIT: Loving Mr Pitt's responses to all the idiots. You sir, are a massive legend.

 

[SaraPh]

But don't cry to me about the fact that I'm pointing out that cake leads to fatness. That's just a fact of life. An unfortunate fact because, as I said, I do love cake, but a fact nonetheless.

That's not really the point. You aren't pointing out a fact, your just dredging up a stereotype, not that they like cake, that they are DESPERATE for cake. There really is a non-offensive version of that metaphor, "the starving man". It works, it doesn't offend anyone and gets the point across much better.

Addendum: this is kinda like saying "why bother with this police thing? people will still commit crimes, police or not."

Except that isn't at all analogous to the current situation. Blizzard already have this police thing, it's called moderators. Real ID is more like saying "fuck it we don't need to police well, deputize everyone, that'll fix 'em". Which is patently absurd.