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There’s been a lot of talk whirling around today because an account appearing to be Lee "Life" Seung Hyun has resurfaced on the Korean ladder.
Han "aLive" Lee Seok played games against him arousing suspicions and Jang "Creator" Hyun Woo was immediately leaving games if he hit Life on ladder.
This has fired up debate in the community as we question ourselves: should Life be allowed back into competition?
The debate has been highly charged and polarised with most people falling into one of two camps.
The first camp is firm on saying he should never be allowed to return - he should be banned for life.
The second camp argues that he has been sentenced, fined and punished by the South Korean justice system and deserves a second chance. They feel further punishment is unnecessary or vexatious and cruel.
Straight off the bat I’m happy to declare I fall into the first camp.
We have precedent for lifelong bans, which have been handed down for matchfixing in numerous sports and e-sports.
Cricket. Tennis. Counter-Strike. Brood War.
Competition is meaningless if the outcome is pre-ordained. If viewers and fans doubt the authenticity of competition they will leave in droves.
When it comes to fixing a match, the player(s) involved are not only robbing themselves of a victory: they hurt their fans, the sponsors, event organisers and the community.
There is no knife that cuts deeper than that of betrayal. It leaves deep invisible wounds that sometimes never heal.
In competition, match fixing is the ultimate act of betrayal.
As a player, Life burned faster and brighter than any other. His accomplishments started with a fairy-tale win over MVP in GSL 2012 Season 4 and showed no signs of slowing down.
Then on that fateful day in January 2016, KeSPA announced he had been arrested by the prosecutor’s office in Changwon.
The community was shocked. How could the prodigal son be implicated in such a scandal?
Why, when he was seemingly the greatest player of all time and still at his prime, would he resort to such lows?
I have talked to an insider within the South Korean starcraft scene who recounted Life spending his free time during international events at casinos, gambling degenerately. He got wasted and lost more money than most players would dream of winning at the event.
While I can’t independently verify these claims it does paint a picture of an addiction prone vulnerable youth, barely an adult who may seek to turn to easier, albeit shadier, means of getting paid.
But in doing so - he betrayed the community. His team-mates. The sponsors. He betrayed a diehard, loyal, loving fanbase.
He betrayed the game.
The courts in South Korea punished Life with two months in jail while awaiting sentencing and handed down a sentence of 18 months of prison suspended for three years and 70,000,000 KRW in fines (~$60,000 USD).
He was banned permanently by KeSPA from competing in any future StarCraft events.
Justice had been served. There was no coming back. Right?
Wrong.
In the space of less than a year, KeSPA has largely moved on from its involvement in StarCraft II with the disbandment of all but one team while Blizzard has stepped up in a big way with further expansion of WCS globally.
Life has not been expressly banned from competing in WCS or similar large events, but this situation needs to be viewed in the context that he had seemingly slunk from the pro-gaming arena like a cockroach.
Furthermore, if (and this is purely hypothetical) Life was to begin streaming on Twitch, should he be allowed to profit from the fame and prowess bestowed upon him by a game and community he betrayed in the worst possible way?
Let’s look at precedent. During the Brood War example, KeSPA was the sole organiser of meaningful competition and had a hand in organising the livelihoods of all players and professionals within the scene.
With the permanent ban, these 11 players had literally nowhere else to go and were forced from the scene.
Years later, sAviOr began streaming on Afreeca. This raised numerous eyebrows within the community but he was allowed to continue and profit from his stream for a short while.
Afreeca eventually banned him from ever streaming on the platform. We will likely never see sAviOr stream, play or compete in e-sports ever again.
In CS:GO, the infamous iBUYPOWER scandal rocked the e-sports world in a similar way. Valve handed down permanent bans and Twitch banned multiple match-fixers (but not all).
After these players betrayed their respective games, they were permanently gone.
Life’s name is no longer on the WCS trophy he claimed in 2014.
I hope it stays that way.
  
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Spot on deth, couldn't agree more.
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Even prodigies need to face consequences and be made examples of.
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TLADT24920 Posts
I think that for the legitimacy of the SCII scene, he should not be allowed to compete. He can play ladder if he wants but players are not obligated to play him either.
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I strongly disagree with OP.
1.- Life was already sentenced by the Korean criminal courts, for conceding one game of the match, that didn't affect the outcome of the latter. There was no proof that Life threw an entire match, or that any of his trophies were the product of already fixed matches.
2.- So, Korean criminal courts have already passed judgment, but limited to one single fact. In criminal law, there is no such things as betrayal, lack of trust, etc. There are facts, there are offences, and there are trials. Judgments are based on concrete facts, circunscribed to concrete offences, all proven in a single trial. This is because punishments are proportional: not all cases are judged the same.
3.- We all agree that matchfixing is illegal and should be punished. But the question is: should all match fixing cases be punished in the same way? You could say yes, because matchfixes affects the viewers' trust and damages fair competition in sports. This is true to some exent, but the real reason matchfixes are punished in nearly all legislations is another one: gambling and betting.
4.- According to most western nations, gambling is legal but strongly regulated, in a way that every individual who bets on something like, i. e., tennis, must have the certainty that only fair competition would affect the outcome of the match. This is why dopping, match fixing, unfair advantage, and others are punished. But in Korea, gambling is illegal. Thus, everyone who is part of a gambling network should be punished severely, in the same way that drug dealers are punished. This explains why Life's sentence seems so outrageously severe.
5.- But the point is not the criminal judgment: it is the administrative punishment. Kespa threw a life-time ban for Life, which, IMO, is extremely severe, considering Life's judgment, or more properly, the actions for he was condemned.
6.- First of all, a life-time ban is disproportionate with his actions. In other sports, sportsmen are punished in a way which is proportional to his acts. Let's take for example an athlete which used forbidden substances in order to increase her performance. Depending on her acts, she will be probably judged to a 3 or 4 year ban. If she would appeal, her sentence will be probably reduced to a couple of years. This kind of proportionality is by no means arbitrary: it is a sign in order to recognize some kind of collective guilt given the offence.
7.- And this is the point where Kespa's sanction is overproportionated: the administration did not take into account that, if some given player commited matchfixing, it was, among other causes, in Kespa's failure in order to establish and mantain an adequate protection network to his players, especially considering that gambling is an illegal activity in Korea. Kespa's teams, i.e., has no psycologist. The famed Kespa training regime sucks every bit of emotional welfare of his subjects. They threw away his education, his family, and his friens, in order to submit themselves on a high-end training regime. Why there is no concern for mental health among Kespa is beyond me, but surely they can't blame solely the players when there is matchfix under its very noses.
8.- Probably some here in TL are not aware that Life, at the moment of commiting his crime, was just a teenager. I don't know deeply the Korean law, but in almost every western nation, an underage cannot dispose freely of his own patrmonium; his salary, utilities, heritage, etc., are administrated by his tutors, normally his parents. And another part of this, that is always overlooked, is the fact that, if Life is really a gambling addict, that is an actual psychiatric disease and it's called ludopathy.
9.- So my point is: Life is just a scapegoat of a system that had so many flaws that it utterly crushed: SC2 Kespa regime. Is it fair that Life takes the burden of being the allegedly cause of the dawnfall of sc2? Or is it fair that Kespa crushed Life career with a lifetime ban when his concrete actions didn't deserve more than a couple-of-years ban?
10.- Many fans raged at Life because he was the one to blame for the crumbling of Korean scene. Or because he was the "Savior" (the bw player) of SC2. Have you ever wondered why are both cases so similar? Or what do they have in common besides being two zergs?
11.- Savior's and Life's cases both have in common that underwent into Kespa's own noses, and that Kespa did not take the blame for it. It is as scandalous as if in the DEA's offices, employees of his were selling drugs. Twice. Let's remember that gambling is illegal in Korea, just as cocaine, and Kespa is a government agency, just like the DEA. Is it just easier to blame a kid that admitting the failure.
12.- I support Life on this. I hope that maybe in a couple of years he could return to the scene. After all, he's one of the greatest of SC2, if not the greatest.
Keep fighting Life!
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France12749 Posts
I don't know who that tennis player is.
I didn't find any names in the CS:GO link.
I didn't ever watch cricket so I don't know (nor looked sorry :/) if the person involved was a GOAT? If he was then good point.
Among the BW players, afaik the most well known was savior but he was past his prime, right?
So in my mind, if Life is able to compete at the top level again, the question of his return to competitive progaming could be asked.
If he doesn't want or can't become good enough again it won't matter, people won't care about a BbongBBong return because even when he was there people weren't very interested.
But Life was meant to become the GOAT of sc2, and was the GOAT of zergs, so a lot of people want to see him return!
Since he did very bad things, there are equally as much people that don't want him around ever again, as you rightfully said.
However, if he were to compete again, would the competitions lose more viewers than it wins by having Life in it?
The argument that he made sc2 lose sponsors and viewers in the first place isn't sufficient because what is done is done, him playing again wouldn't make sponsors that shy depending on how he handles his hypothetical "return".
Personnaly I would like to see him compete again because I'm convinced he couldn't return to competitive greatness again and I want to see if I'm mistaken or not, which is a bit selfish :o.
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Life <3. GO LIFE
Let him play, as long as he doesn't do shady shit while playing. He has been spanked enough.
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I hope you Life fans are enjoying the lack of proleague/sponsors. He compromised the scene and the livelihoods of all the other players we supported, to make a quick buck. That's his legacy.
On April 05 2017 05:09 Apoteosis wrote:
So my point is: Life is just a scapegoat of a system that had so many flaws that it utterly crushed: SC2 Kespa regime.
Savior's and Life's cases both have in common that underwent into Kespa's own noses, and that Kespa did not take the blame for it. It is as scandalous as if in the DEA's offices, employees of his were selling drugs. Twice. Let's remember that gambling is illegal in Korea, just as cocaine, and Kespa is a government agency, just like the DEA. Is it just easier to blame a kid that admitting the failure.
It's hilarious that you think Kespa's at fault for the match fixing. You want them to have 24 hr surveillance on their own players? The consequences were well known, players attended education seminars and signed contracts. Life threw games for cash anyway. I don't see how you think he deserves any leniency. Corruption/gambling is anathema to Korean sponsors and is a permanent stain on the players involved, and the scene itself. Saying Savior and Life were both under Kespa, thus kespa is the problem, ignores every other progamer who behaved ethically and knew the consequences. Savior and Life's commonality is that they both gave 0 fucks about the scene, fans and sponsors and just wanted easy money. There are rookies who dedicated important years of their lives to these games who had their futures compromised by the selfish greed and thoughtlessness of 2 zerg superstars.
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I don't think eternal bans are a good idea. A 10 year ban from any involvement in esports seems about right to me, maybe a bit longer, probably not any less than that though. If the person is involved with recruiting others then the ban should be longer. If the person was clearly pressured into it by senior players or staff the ban should be shorter.
It's a bit of a moot point though because there is no global governing body that can hand down rulings, just individual tournament organisers. It all relies on community pressure.
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Please don't compare Life to Savior. Yes they both matchfixed, but this is where their similarities end.
Savior not only matchfixed by throwing his own games, he organized other players to matchfix as well. Coercing other players into throwing their games by using his status as an older, more experienced figure(things like respecting and obeying your elders and those with more experience in something is heavily emphasized in Korean/Asian culture).
In one case in particular, it is my understanding he had both players in a game agree to throw the match without the other player knowing the other guy was being paid to lose too. After the game was over, the guy who won the game was guilt-tripped by Savior into throwing another game for him since he wasn't able to throw the first game. Savior supposedly got a cut of the profits from these games he convinced other players to purposely lose.
IDK the full extent of Savior's matchfixing, but according to his liquidpedia he was banned by Kespa in 2010 (around the age of 22).
Life did matchfix, and did throw some games in sets he nevertheless won. At the time of these games being played he was 18 years old, and in South Korea you become an adult at 19.
Personally for Life, I do not agree with a permanent competitive ban. It's my understanding that Life was sentenced to 18 months with a suspended sentence of 3 years, and some fines. I would be okay with Life being allowed to play competitively in WCS or GSL after his suspended sentence expires. If KESPA decided to ban him permanently from competing in their organization, then it's their prerogative, especially considering the matchfixed games were played in the individual proleague league hosted by Kespa.
If Blizzard feels the same way (about a non-permanent ban), I think they should contact Life with an ultimatum: a public and sincere apology with a 3 year competitive ban, possible community service (not including his mandatory military service), additional fines, and maybe something else like twitch streams, coaching, or anything that helps promote the Starcraft 2 community/scene. If he doesn't accept, then he should never be allowed to play competitively again.
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Life is still young, why can't he just do something different with his life other than progaming? I don't get why these "bad seeds" keep hanging around the game instead of moving on. In my opinion, if they were genuinely repentant they would go to college and avoid pro gaming. People act like no longer being allowed to play a video game is this absurdly harsh punishment, worse than prison, which is just bizarre.
Also, part of the system to discourage matchfixing has to be legal threat. It seems silly to me to act like because there are no psychologists on kespa teams and because there is no totalitarian sytem to prevent players from even thinking about throwing games, that they should be exempt from punishment. Punishing players like Life is an effective deterrent and will therefore contribute to discouraging matchfixing. Wavering pros can look back and see that even Savior and Life were not above the law.
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If Kespa banned him, I guess that means Blizzard will allow it. Unless their policy changed since last time I checked, about 5 years ago.
On April 05 2017 04:44 BigFan wrote:
I think that for the legitimacy of the SCII scene, he should not be allowed to compete. He can play ladder if he wants but players are not obligated to play him either.
Considering SC2 has many online-only tournaments and Blizzard's netcode fundamentally allows maphacking, I am not sure how much legitimacy SC2 has.
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I don't get it why so many people feel the need to be this overly dramatic about this topic. Life got actual real life sentence and criminal record for purposefully losing a meaningless match in a computer game. That is way enough punishment already. I don't see any rational reason to think that he is now more likely to matchfix than anyone else, so I don't see any other point to his continued ostracism but pure spite.
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On April 07 2017 04:04 opisska wrote:
I don't get it why so many people feel the need to be this overly dramatic about this topic. Life got actual real life sentence and criminal record for purposefully losing a meaningless match in a computer game. That is way enough punishment already. I don't see any rational reason to think that he is now more likely to matchfix than anyone else, so I don't see any other point to his continued ostracism but pure spite.
One rational reason is that sponsors (especially Korean ones) won't want anything to do with a player convicted of match-fixing. Progaming relies on sponsorships and community support. Not being allowed to return is just a logical consequence of him compromising his reputation as a progamer. Besides, he's free to do anything else, what gives him the right to continue to earn a living from the scene which he fucked over?
It's like a bank employee who stole money, got convicted, and now you want him to come back to work at a bank again. That person can pursue literally any other job, and you're acting like that's some spiteful punishment?
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On April 07 2017 12:01 Scarecrow wrote:Show nested quote +On April 07 2017 04:04 opisska wrote:
I don't get it why so many people feel the need to be this overly dramatic about this topic. Life got actual real life sentence and criminal record for purposefully losing a meaningless match in a computer game. That is way enough punishment already. I don't see any rational reason to think that he is now more likely to matchfix than anyone else, so I don't see any other point to his continued ostracism but pure spite. One rational reason is that sponsors (especially Korean ones) won't want anything to do with a player convicted of match-fixing. Progaming relies on sponsorships and community support. Not being allowed to return is just a logical consequence of him compromising his reputation as a progamer. Besides, he's free to do anything else, what gives him the right to continue to earn a living from the scene which he fucked over? It's like a bank employee who stole money, got convicted, and now you want him to come back to work at a bank again. That person can pursue literally any other job, and you're acting like that's some spiteful punishment?
Again with the sponsors thing.
Did the players get the sponsors? No.
Kespa and the teams get the sponsors.
Ergo, the ones who should care about keeping the sponsors happy are Kespa and the teams. To this day, no one at Kespa or Afreeca Freecs was fired, sued, or anything like that. That kind of reasoning is shocking to me, like blaming the weakest one and the goverment agency taking zero blame for what happened right under his very nose. They are like: "these kid Life is a despicable one, and we will send him to hell". Really? From a state's organization?
Your example of the bank, well, he couldn't stole the money by himself right? The bank's board will surely call his CEO and requesting them to explain why the bank's security protocols failed, After that, the board will surely cut a couple of heads. That is the modus operandii in every serious organizations, because if the organization is unable to avoid these things, it's obvious that they are lacking something.
That's why Life can't and shouldn't take the whole responsibility on the downfall of Korea sc2. He definitely had some responsibility, and that's why he was condemned by the courts. But pretending that he alone was the culprit, it's delusional to any mature individual.
EDIT: And we should remember that prior to Life case, there was the Prime case, where a whole team patroned by Kespa was disbanded because of matchfixing. An entire team under Kespa's authority was involved in a matchfixing case. What did Kespa do, besides swinging the banhammer? That's right, nothing. Kespa has seriously failed at keeping at bay illegal gambling and matchfixing from the e-sports scene. And who's got the blame on that? Our favourite scapegoat, Life.
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
i am required to say that Life isn't anywhere near the GOAT, and anyone that insists as much is delusional
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On April 08 2017 02:12 lichter wrote:
i am required to say that Life isn't anywhere near the GOAT, and anyone that insists as much is delusional
True, he will never be TheBestfOu.
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TLADT24920 Posts
No one compares to bitbybitprime. Now that was a baller player!
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EPT
