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by toast0 2171 days ago
Ban the car --- either don't let them use it online, or don't show it to others.

If an account gets a threshold number of cars banned, don't let them use customized cars online.

If they're spouting hate on chat, ban them from chat too.

2 comments

That's just a more detailed explanation of the process of banning someone for using swastikas in a game.
What?

"Don't let them use customized cars" is extremely different from "ban them".

The comment provided a list removing more and more capabilities from the game. That's exactly what a gradual process of banning someone would be. Sure, you can give them time to correct their behavior, but eventually you might have to ban them.
The other capabilities would only be removed if they broke other rules. That's not a gradual process toward banning. That's a completely unrelated disciplinary measure.
So basically, if someone murders another person we should ban them from murdering people but not put them in jail. They should only go to jail if they commit multiple unrelated crimes.
>if someone murders another person we should ban them from murdering people but not put them in jail.

If conflating the act of violently taking someone's life away irreversibly to displaying an offensive custom skin in a videogame sounds like a reasonable and genuine argument to you, I don't think there is anything anyone can say to convince you otherwise.

I agree with the parent comment that restricting customization for the offending users in the game is a reasonable punishment. They can still play the game AND have zero actual possibility of committing the same offense. The desired outcome of the user not using offensive imagery in custom skins is achieved.

Are you serious.

Also this was just an explanation of how it's an option, to the person that didn't understand how. You might want to do a full ban, you might not.

That seems like a lot of effort to address the symptoms, not the disease. The root issue is the user. Get rid of the user and you don't have to worry about all these half-measures.
What was the problem needing solving?
Depends who you ask. Some might say toxic expressions. Others might say people who declaim toxic expressions. Clearly MS has the latter goal in mind.

I can imagine a very reasonable argument for this. Someone who puts a Confederate flag on their car seems highly likely to engage in other toxic behaviors. Just like someone who calls someone a nigger once is likely to do it again. So we use the behaviors as a signal of underlying tendency. We don't want people who have this tendency on the platform because they will tend to make life worse for other users, and the loss of their business hurts us less than we gain from other people feeling more comfortable. Therefore we ban them.

This explanation really creeps me out, if major corps can just do about anything, based on any arbitrary rule ie. RND() or even own biases and legal discrimination.

On the other hand, too many on gaming platforms are engaging in clearly racist behaviour, ie. choosing offensive nicks, spamming chat, and need correction.

I'm sorry it creeps you out, but as a general rule company managers are free to do what they please with their company, as long as it is not illegal. Banning racists isn't illegal so ...
Some may say it’s not a significant problem and it’s cheaper for MS to make a PR statement about doing something than spending effort in moderation software changes.
> Some may say it’s not a significant problem

But not the people who have the authority to make the call, plainly.