E-Racism (Protoss, Terran, Zerg) - Page 3

On September 23 2011 02:11 redemption289 wrote:
Over the past year, SC2 has become a major part of my life. Both the community and the competitive aspects, such as laddering and small tournaments, have made my life more enjoyable. That said, there are aspects of SC2 that I could live without. The most prominent among these being the over-reaction and hypersensitivity that is always present during threads discussing race balance issues. The E-racism that the title alludes to is thankfully not real life racism. It is the belittling and blatant ad hominems that accompany nearly every patch/balance/strategy post. Let me be the first to admit that I have posted my fair share of inflammatory comments. For those, I apologize. This post is as much a reminder for me as for everyone else. That TL and other sites can build a successful community, ripe with jokes, pro-match posts, and memes, is great. It really speaks to the evolution of and market for e-sports. However, race selection is a sensitive issue. It is frustrating to have one's skill as an SC2 player slighted simply because they play Protoss, or Terran, or Zerg. The knee-jerk reaction of self-defense and confrontation is understandable, but we should train ourselves to put aside these biases (as best we can) when discussing balance or strategies. It is doubtful that people pick their races because of the inherent bias. Most often, people choose a race and stick with that race because it is what they've learned. It has nothing to do with wanting to "cheat" by winning all of their games in easy-mode. This is something that all of us need to keep in mind. Congratulations to those of you who have managed to stay civil in your posts. You're a better woman/man than I. Simply put, it is a hard thing to do. However, as a developing community, we should be careful to promote and maintain good sportsmanship. This means stifling ad hominem attacks, carefully phrasing our posts so as to legitimately not offend --it is one thing to say no offense and a completely different thing to mean it--, and most importantly learn to be critical of our own race's strengths and weaknesses. Truth be told, every race has some unit that is overpowered and other units that are underpowered. Countless posts and people have whined about an underpowered unit while simultaneously attacking others who post well-warranted and articulate opinions about the units that are overpowered. Certainly there should be a forum for arguing and discussing balance issues, but it ought to be done in a much more civil manner. Let's not sugar coat things, the people who have posted such malicious posts should be ashamed. Often, good people create these posts in a moment of weakness, but that does not excuse the act of ostracizing another member of the community.

Why is this important? As an E-sports community, we should be quick to welcome and attract new members, not cast-out people with evolving views of balance. We should also take care to represent ourselves as mature human beings rather than petty young adults or children. If we expect E-sports to grow, then we should all be willing to do our part to make it as accessible and professional as possible. Snide comments about an individual or a race that people choose to play ultimately damages the credibility of the community as a whole. Additionally, such insults only breed more animosity. SC2 is unique because it can foster camaraderie between people and nations around the world. There are other video games that have abhorrent communities surrounding them. Let’s make a conscious effort to keep the SC2 community as welcoming and open as possible. After all, none of us want to end up like HoN players