DBO Forums - Reverse https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/ Bungie.Org talks Destiny en Reverse (reply) Blizzard partially backpedaled. They shortened the ban to 6 months and reinstated the prize money. But I am cynical. I don't think they did this because it was the right thing. I think they did it because…

The threat of losing money is the only thing that works.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165774 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165774 Sat, 12 Oct 2019 02:25:19 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
This reminded me of the Three Body Problem (reply)

I got the chance to hang out with Dr. Ming Wang a few months ago. He was a victim of the cultural revolution and has a pretty crazy story. He learned to dance and play the erhu (like a chinese violin) to survive as part of the Communist Party propaganda department until Mao died. He managed to make it to the US and eventually became an eye surgeon. I got a kick out of him playing the Tennessee Waltz for me on his erhu. We spent a lot of time talking about what we can do about China, and some of the kinda underground work he has going on there.

His book:
From Darkness to Sight: A Journey from Hardship to Healing https://www.amazon.com/dp/1939447917/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_Q86NDbNH5B1A8

His website:
http://drmingwang.com/chineseheritage.html

Just a solid sci-fi trilogy that kicks off during the Cultural Revolution. Good stuff.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165766 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165766 Fri, 11 Oct 2019 16:56:59 +0000 Criticismkidtsunami
Not surprising... (reply) A company that offered to support the banned player came under cyber attack.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/companies/sydney-startup-under-fire-online-for-supporting-pro-hong-kong-pro...

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165752 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165752 Fri, 11 Oct 2019 03:40:49 +0000 Criticismbluerunner
Here's a good read on the subject. (reply) I got the chance to hang out with Dr. Ming Wang a few months ago. He was a victim of the cultural revolution and has a pretty crazy story. He learned to dance and play the erhu (like a chinese violin) to survive as part of the Communist Party propaganda department until Mao died. He managed to make it to the US and eventually became an eye surgeon. I got a kick out of him playing the Tennessee Waltz for me on his erhu. We spent a lot of time talking about what we can do about China, and some of the kinda underground work he has going on there.

His book:
From Darkness to Sight: A Journey from Hardship to Healing https://www.amazon.com/dp/1939447917/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_Q86NDbNH5B1A8

His website:
http://drmingwang.com/chineseheritage.html

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165746 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165746 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 22:34:21 +0000 Criticismbluerunner
Agreed. (reply) https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165745 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165745 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 22:16:13 +0000 CriticismKermit Great post. A must read. (reply) https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165743 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165743 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 21:56:25 +0000 CriticismRagashingo Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Personally, I think this stuff with China is a much larger and more widespread issue that will continue to get much worse before it gets better. :(

I've been giving this some thought over the last few years. Through work I have traveled to China several times, and I have made some very close friends there. They are great people, and I wish I could spend more time with them there. But I also see that they just don't see the problems with their government that we see. I've seen the censorship and propaganda first hand, but I see it from a perspective of knowing what it is. Some of my friends there have only known that, and anything but that is foreign to them.

Back in January I was traveling around the Shanghai area. I was on a train with a friend and saw a picture of Mao. My friend just started talking about how great he was and how he helped so many people. Of course, I know what she doesn't, but I was at a loss of how to tell that to her without personally offending her. What she was telling me was what she had been taught all her life, and there isn't any good way for her to find out any different.

Another friend of mine has traveled out of China many times and is more aware. We have conversations about higher topics like personal liberty and democracy. We also discuss Chinese history and she is much more aware. I've noticed though that she only talks with me about stuff like that in a whisper, and only in places we aren't over heard. I do enjoy our back alley coffee shop talks though. It shows me that there is hope, and maybe more people than I think there are looking for change. Probably like her they just keep their heads down since the consequences are high.

I visited Hong Kong in January and then Guangzhou. It's such a stark difference between the two. In mean, Guangzhou has nice buildings and looks modern, but culturally the mainlanders and Hong Kongers are different. It's like the people living in the Matrix and the people living outside it. I did notice there at dinner a couple of my hosts cracked jokes about the government. It just didnt seem like something my Shanghai friends would do though.

All that said, people are people. My friends there go about their lives relatively unscathed. They live their lives, enjoy food and movies, and many things we do. Of course, they arent part of the groups getting imprisoned. As long as they're left relatively alone and have a job and a little free time, they're not going to push for anything more. They seem to have a fear of stiring the pot, and they see the folks who do get taken out quickly. So how do you start a change?

A few other observations:
I use a VPN whenever I am there. I had people see me use it (I pulled something up on Google and they asked how I did that), and they told me I could get away with that because I was an American businessman, but they would be jailed for that.

The only outside news I saw there was CNN and BBC. If a story about China came up, the channel would go black during that segment.

They really want to learn English, and asking a good ol' boy from Arkansas (me)for help was not a good idear.

I enjoyed thinking about the virtues of communism while standing next to the factory boss's Rolls Royce Phantom while watching the workers ride bicycles to work. Inside the lobby they had pictures of the top brass of the company hand in hand with top officials of the Party. Oh, and that factory makes a lot of the grills you can buy at Lowe's and Home Depot.

I've been in factories where it was 120-130F and the workers worked 12 hours shifts. Guys were handling glowing hot pieces of metal in shorts and flip flops.

On one trip in July a couple of years ago I lost 7 pounds in a week just touring factories.

In one of those factories I watched a bunch of people crammed into a small room place labels on dog food bowls for hours on end. I wasnt allowed to take pictures. I picked up a bowl and looked at the brand on the bottom. It was an Ellen Degeneres brand dog food bowl.

I walked around Hong Kong on a Sunday. I passed several churches having service. I can count on one hand the number of churches I have seen in mainland China. I know an American pastor who was arrested on an airplane and interrogated because they found out he had started some home churches in China. He did not give up any names of the people he was meeting. He was put back on a departing plane and had his visa revoked.

It's dirty there. Like not just the smog and air pollution. There's just trash everywhere.

Anyway. I can go on, but it's quitting time and I want to go home.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165740 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165740 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 21:28:59 +0000 Criticismbluerunner
PREACH. (reply) https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165738 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165738 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 21:18:56 +0000 CriticismKermit Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Maybe Cody underplays how hard it was to give up Destiny, but I also suspect he's got many varied interests and, as happens to a lot of us when we give up something we enjoy, he realized it was easier than he thought it would be. Good for him.


I'm not unsympathetic to this. Cruel has posted here before about how Destiny was basically his only social outlet for a long time while his daughter was young. Cheaply has said something similar here.

But also realize the games are precisely designed that way in order to hook you in that exact fashion.

What you mean by exact fashion might not be interpreted as underhanded. I mean, if a game is designed to be played with friends, that isn’t a bad thing. The friendships you make or deepen while playing a game aren’t necessarily lesser than friendships fostered through other means. (There is a switch that gets flipped once you meet a person in real life, but that’s another topic for a different thread.)

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165737 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165737 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 21:18:05 +0000 CriticismKermit
Relevant (reply)

Way to go, Apple. SMH.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/apple-pulls-hong-kong-cop-tracking-map-app-after-china-uproar-11570681464

WTF am I supposed to do? Learning Linux is ACTUALLY HARD :-p

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165734 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165734 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:36:34 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

https://kotaku.com/former-naughty-dog-employee-says-he-was-fired-after-fil-1819557683

Thank you. I will certainly think about this, but it kind of seems like one individual issue rather than a company wide toxic culture, and I don't think we know the specifics of the individual case well enough.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165733 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165733 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:31:44 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Maybe Cody underplays how hard it was to give up Destiny, but I also suspect he's got many varied interests and, as happens to a lot of us when we give up something we enjoy, he realized it was easier than he thought it would be. Good for him.

I'm not unsympathetic to this. Cruel has posted here before about how Destiny was basically his only social outlet for a long time while his daughter was young. Cheaply has said something similar here.

But also realize the games are precisely designed that way in order to hook you in that exact fashion.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165729 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165729 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:19:02 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Another thing is the rhetoric gets out of hand, and it's easy to be dismissed as the boy who cried wolf. Amazon is the worst company ever to exist? Really? Worse than Union Carbide? And it's fine not to buy chicken sandwiches because the guy who started the company has beliefs you don't like, but that's not going to persuade anyone who shares his beliefs to change their mind


Honestly, only a very small portion of it is about convincing others. It's almost entirely about me not contributing to a problem.


Which I respect, especially because of your relatively weak efforts to shame those of us who haven't followed you. :)

Oh I will shame about lootboxes. I'll never forgive Speedracer for spending 40 bucks to get that ornament :-p lol jk.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165728 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165728 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:17:23 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Another thing is the rhetoric gets out of hand, and it's easy to be dismissed as the boy who cried wolf. Amazon is the worst company ever to exist? Really? Worse than Union Carbide? And it's fine not to buy chicken sandwiches because the guy who started the company has beliefs you don't like, but that's not going to persuade anyone who shares his beliefs to change their mind


Honestly, only a very small portion of it is about convincing others. It's almost entirely about me not contributing to a problem.

Which I respect, especially because of your relatively weak efforts to shame those of us who haven't followed you. :)

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165727 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165727 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:16:19 +0000 CriticismKermit
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply) first couple of months are hard. then you get so far behind you don't want to go through the effort of catching up.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165726 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165726 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:13:27 +0000 CriticismSchedonnardus
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply) You are correct. The vast majority of these types of things I do I just do, and it only comes up if someone asks or needs to know. It's mostly about not feeling guilty myself. What I post here is relevant because it's about gaming, and this is a gaming forum.

I am also full of shit on a lot of stuff. I eat meat, drive a gas car and burn jet fuel for fun, sometimes see Tom Cruise movies, etc even though I really shouldn't.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165724 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165724 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:05:32 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Another thing is the rhetoric gets out of hand, and it's easy to be dismissed as the boy who cried wolf. Amazon is the worst company ever to exist? Really? Worse than Union Carbide? And it's fine not to buy chicken sandwiches because the guy who started the company has beliefs you don't like, but that's not going to persuade anyone who shares his beliefs to change their mind

Honestly, only a very small portion of it is about convincing others. It's almost entirely about me not contributing to a problem.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165723 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165723 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 19:02:37 +0000 CriticismCody Miller
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

On the other side, I saw this bit of satire related to which businesses we boycott and why and the relative, often incompatible reasoning behind boycotting one business but still enjoying the goods and services of objectively worse businesses.


WORLD—A grim report indicated Wednesday that the count of people murdered by known hate group Chick-fil-A has risen to 0 this year.

While previous years saw counts averaging 0 and sometimes going in the negative as Chick-fil-A employees saved the lives of their customers, this year the count has skyrocketed to 0. Critics are claiming the company's strong and pervasive culture of hate is contributing to the expanding number of deaths.

"Chick-fil-A is poisoning our cities, killing people by the zeros," said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. "We do not welcome hate in our country, and neither should any other countries, eh?"

He then had to go address a 76th blackface photo that had emerged.

Reporters and journalists have demanded an answer from Chick-fil-A, but so far spokespeople have only responded with, "My pleasure."

LOL.

Meanwhile, Apple just pulled multiple apps helping people in Hong Kong maintain their right not to be secretly shipped over to China to be imprisoned or whatever.

It’s a complicated world... one where boycotting every single injustice would leave us without food, power, technology, etc. Personally, I think this stuff with China is a much larger and more widespread issue that will continue to get much worse before it gets better. :(

I agree, sadly.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165721 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165721 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 18:47:05 +0000 CriticismKermit
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply) On the other side, I saw this bit of satire related to which businesses we boycott and why and the relative, often incompatible reasoning behind boycotting one business but still enjoying the goods and services of objectively worse businesses.


WORLD—A grim report indicated Wednesday that the count of people murdered by known hate group Chick-fil-A has risen to 0 this year.

While previous years saw counts averaging 0 and sometimes going in the negative as Chick-fil-A employees saved the lives of their customers, this year the count has skyrocketed to 0. Critics are claiming the company's strong and pervasive culture of hate is contributing to the expanding number of deaths.

"Chick-fil-A is poisoning our cities, killing people by the zeros," said Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. "We do not welcome hate in our country, and neither should any other countries, eh?"

He then had to go address a 76th blackface photo that had emerged.

Reporters and journalists have demanded an answer from Chick-fil-A, but so far spokespeople have only responded with, "My pleasure."

Meanwhile, Apple just pulled multiple apps helping people in Hong Kong maintain their right not to be secretly shipped over to China to be imprisoned or whatever.

It’s a complicated world... one where boycotting every single injustice would leave us without food, power, technology, etc. Personally, I think this stuff with China is a much larger and more widespread issue that will continue to get much worse before it gets better. :(

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165718 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165718 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 17:39:53 +0000 CriticismRagashingo
Ah, capitalism and communism, hand in hand (reply)

Boycotts are too often (mostly painless) gestures done to appear virtuous to those who already agree with you, and these days no one seems as interested in talking to anyone who isn't already on board your train.


Just wanted to throw in a slightly different perspective here: while it's true that this can be what boycotts are about... often, they're just a personal way to 'save your own soul'. (That's in quotes because I'm not assigning any religious significance to it here.)

For example: I boycott Exxon because of the Valdez spill; I have since it happened. I don't tell people I'm doing it, I don't talk about it - so it's not an attempt to 'appear virtuous', it's simply my way of keeping myself from supporting a company that did something unforgivable (in my eyes). (I don't use BP for similar reasons.) I feel better about myself by not giving money to companies that have committed what I believe to be egregious sins.

(To be clear: in both cases, the accident by itself isn't what caused me to stop using the product - it's either HOW it happened (drunk pilot for the Valdez), or how the company responded (unwillingness to admit the problem for far too long for Deepwater). Lots of oil companies have spills; if my rule was 'if you have a spill, I won't buy gas from you', I wouldn't be able to buy gas.)

Anyway, I just wanted to point out that virtue signaling isn't the only reason to boycott a company, and so the fact that convincing those who don't share your views is the 'hard work of change' shouldn't discourage people from withholding money from companies whose moral code clashes too strongly with your own. I know that my choice not to purchase gas from Exxon or BP has ZERO effect on either company's bottom line. I don't really care; I simply know that I sleep a little better knowing my money isn't going to them.

Perfectly valid. For the same reason I've avoided Exxon myself except in emergencies. Maybe it comes down to what we mean by often. Surely, the kind of personal boycott you're talking about happens more often, but I was thinking of the kinds of boycotts that make the news or proliferate on social media--the explicit purpose of those boycotts is to facilitate change. I like to think good arguments win, consensus leads to a more stable peace, and so on. Building consensus is the hard work, listening to differing views, finding common ground, perhaps even compromising a little. I feel like many organized boycotts are simply team-building exercises for people who think alike, which feels good for sure, but maybe isn't that effective for changing minds.

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https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165717 https://destiny.bungie.org/forum/index.php?id=165717 Thu, 10 Oct 2019 17:09:38 +0000 CriticismKermit