Blizzard won’t reverse Hearthstone pro’s Hong Kong protest suspension

Enlarge / Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung declares his support for Hong Kong while two announcers duck behind their desks. (credit: Blizzard)

Blizzard president J. Allen Brack said in an interview with PC Gamer this weekend that the company will not be reversing a six-month suspension for Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung and two Hearthstone casters that were involved in Hong Kong-related protests on a live esports stream last month.

In explaining that decision, Brand reiterated the message that Blizzard supports free speech and encourages employees and players to say what they want in "all kinds of ways and all kinds of places." The one exception to that, he said, is "official broadcasts," including Blizzard-sponsored esports events, which the company wants to be "focused on the games."

"Again, it's not about the content of Blitzchung's message," Brand said, echoing previous comments from Blizzard. "It's about the fact that it was not around the games. If we hadn't taken action, if we hadn't done something, you can imagine the trail that would be in our future around doing interviews. They would become times for people to make a statement about whatever they wanted to, on whatever issue. That's just a path that we don't want to go down. We really want the content of those official broadcasts to be focused on the games, and keep that focus."

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from Gaming & Culture – Ars Technica https://ift.tt/2JOJsJf