Originally Posted by Gynx

Hey all.

I've decided that with the current ongoing divide on whether or not 'nigga' is acceptable that I'd include the game developers in this discussion. I think everybody knows which side of the fence I sit on (having been the guy that drafted the public/private slurs rule) and whilst some people agree with my views enough people don't to the point that this is an ongoing discussion.

I have linked this thread to them with a summary of the discussion ("should 'nigga' be allowed in wibbles talk?/what do you think about the public/private ruling?").

As it stands, I think this is the best option to get a finite, definite ruling on how the staff and community treat that word in particular. If anybody should have a say on how he wishes his game's community to behave, it's the creator. He may want the staff to decide, he may want total written freedom, he may want tight moderation - that's his call to make and one we will have to respect once it's made. Normally we keep community issues like this out of the development sphere but I think there's big implications for our game/community image and target audience - something that he should at least be aware of.

Cheers.

Hi guys - the verdict is in on this one.

There's no desire to change any part of the slurs policy as it currently stands from the developer's perspective. To put this bluntly, there will be no racial slurs in public space and this is not open for discussion. With wibbles being a public board on the face of the community homepage it's hard to make an argument for it being private and as such the current policy applies. That said, it was mentioned that because of the nature of the wibbles board it would be okay to do something fun like an interesting word-filter.

Sorry if this may upset some of you, I realise freedom of speech is something that's important to you all but at the same time we have to consider the game's image and the message allowing slurs sends to newer users and prospective partners.