The Importance Of Establishing Context With Multi-Term Words Before Banning Players

Shuyin178··1 votes·546 views

It's very simple, there are many multi-term words out there and are becoming more commonly used now a days across more than their place of origin.

Homophobic terms tends to be a banning point for players, but what happens when the "homophobic term" used in a totally different context causing it to hold a completely different meaning than the instantly thought of homophobic version?

A great example of this is the word "%%%". Lets say this occurs in the NA server. A buddy of yours comes over from Ireland and is a smoker. The Irishman transfers their account to NA and they say something involving the word "%%%". Someone sees the word and reports them for "homophobia" because they used that word. For those who don't know, a "%%%" in Ireland is a cigarette, but it can also be used as a homophobic term by most other places. The censor spots that word in the Irishman's chatlog and they get banned (assuming their account has reached past chat restriction) because it's assigned as a bad word. The Irishman never actually did anything wrong, they were just talking how they do in their homeland and how they were raised as such. The game however doesn't care because it only looks for specific words instead of both the word and context used.

A lock-out system should be put in place on accounts under the ability to be banned when multi-term words are used, and have an actual person contact the player themselves to establish context of the multi-term term word BEFORE issuing bans if the multi-term word is used. Everyone talks in their own way, some people use multi-term words more often than others with 0 intention of the word be used in the most commonly known version.

Riot has always wanted players to have fun and be themselves when they play, allow multi-term words to be used AS LONG AS THEY REMAIN WITHIN THE BOUNDARIES OF SPORTSMANSHIP. Part of what makes a person them self is the words they use and how they use them, limiting that limits the person and how they can enjoy the game.

I don't expect many to agree with what I've said here, but context is important at every moment of someone's life. For some players League is a big part of their life so context should be important here too.

Thank you for your time.

13 Comments

Killer30001891 votes

so then anyone could say im from (insert where ever) thus im allowed to use this word

Shuyin1781 votes

Riot gains logs of everything that happens in League, if the Irishman tells them their account comes from whatever server they're from along with their homeland they can have the transfer back-traced and establish plausible truth to the person's origins based on the amount of time it was active in that region.

If you just make an account in a different region then transfer it just to use that "I'm from X" as a defense even though you've used that account on the NA server for years lets say as opposed to the day 1 transfer when you made it, then that can be looked at as false truth and give just punishment as a result.

Leaving final judgement of a ban up to a machine (when it comes to multi-term words only, threats and what not are fine) is something that needs to be reconsidered because machines can't understand more than what they are told to, thus they are not flexible in understanding the individual player when deciding if punishment is just like a peer to peer talk would do.

Killer30001892 votes

If someone says "I'm going to go have a %%% right quick" then i could see that, but i've never seen or heard of that happening. It's always just straight up "%%%" or "you fucking %%%". There are also other words you can use other than %%% and if you transfer to a new server that doesn't have that slang then you should be aware of it. Like moving to a new country you can't just say "but this is legal in my country so i can do it here too" it just doesn't work out like that.

Shuyin1781 votes

In the words of Charlie Calvin in the 1994 movie 'The Santa Clause', "Just because you've never seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist." That includes the first example you gave. There have been many times "I'm going to have a %%% right quick" has been used across history, a few of my overseas friends included in that number from skype calls I've had with them. Directly calling someone that is far different from that example. If someone moves to a new country, they should follow the laws used by that country. Terminology however has words and terms mixed and distorted across various countries, which is again stresses the importance of establishing context when judgement occurs.

Killer30001891 votes

i was talking about how it never happens in league, yes throughout history it has but it's most commonly used as a homophobic slur.if someone sends in a report ticket with their logs showing the context ex. "im going to go have a %%%" then that's different but in this game and it's community %%% is used all on its own as an insult.

EvilDustMan1 votes

Yes. And if you said 'I stepped out to have a %%%' maybe it could be argued.

But 99% of the time, it is not going to be that.

Shuyin1781 votes

That 1% is exactly why a person needs to give final judgement instead of a machine because the machine only looks at the word and instantly goes with the other 99% before looking at how the word was even used to begin with.

ModThe Djinn1 votes

That word is widely known as an offensive term in the UK and Ireland. Some people in the US call cigarettes that as well, and that doesn't mean the term isn't offensive. It's not an excuse. The word "cigarette" exists, and can be used easily to mean the same thing.

Chermorg1 votes

I know multiple Irish people who do not use and do not see used that term for a cigarette anymore.

ModThe Djinn1 votes

{quoted}

I know multiple Irish people who do not use and do not see used that term for a cigarette anymore.

Kind of my point. :)

Shuyin1781 votes

Which is why context needs established by a person and not a machine. Machines can only understand what they are told through limited information, while a person can understand more because they are not limited by such restrictions.

It's impossible for everyone to agree on every point of terminology. Just because a word is more commonly used in one context should never deny the plausibility of the word in another. "%%%" is used more commonly as a homophobic term, but it is also used in more ways than just that version. Looking at only 1 version of a word's usage should never occur within a gaming environment when toying with the life or death of an account which is the entire point of this discussion.

As the example I gave above, the term was used for cigarette. The word cigarette exists and is commonly used, but is not used by every person and more than likely never will. That is why it is important to find the context for a multi-term word because of how delicate the way words are represented by current day standards.

I'm not saying go around and call people homophobic words by any means, that's wrong. However, if another usage of a word is possible within a situation then it should be established by an actual person to the merits of the way the word was used in that situation because it's just as wrong to punish someone for something when the reason behind why they are punished is false.

Fair judgement needs to occur within a ruling before punishment is established if the situation has the ability of flexibility through context (threats, as an example, not needing such fair judgement because there is no flexibility when threatening another person). That's all I'm getting at with all of this.

Modi1 votes

Context needs to be established within your entire team (or, in the case of all-chat, all players in the game) before it can be used. If all parties agree that the contextual use is acceptable, then they will not report it. If it is not reported, it is not scanned for unacceptable chat.

Space Jhin1 votes

I get what you mean, though the cases you've mentioned are a bit too rare to be considered. We in Europe however, Balkan to be more accurate, have a very common word in Serbo-Croatian languages that is censored as it's an insult in Spanish... And that's "puta", meaning "time(s)".

For example: "i got ganked..." [6 puta = 6 times].

Im not sure if I can get banned for using it as a part of my own language, but it sure is annoying. I knew 2 more common words that seem to be insults in other languages but I can't remember them now, they'll pop up as censored again at some point while using Lobby chat.

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