Discussion: What is the true impact of in-game flaming, and is it the biggest point of contention?

Hi, i'm Five. Summoner name five2018. This is my account. It is permanently banned and has been for a good amount of time. I am a big fan of League Of Legends, and i was banned after putting a lot of time into the game for a simple reason: Repeat offence of "flaming". I could go on and on about how i find my last 2 games i was banned for to be unfair and circumstantial, but that isn't what this post is about. I want to speak on my beliefs about flaming, and how Riot Games should go about dealing with it.

Like it or not, League is known to be one of if not THE MOST toxic video game community that exists on the internet (at least, at a large scale.) But, it is also one of the only games that ACTUALLY punishes people for being toxic in-game with one of the best systems to identify "flaming" and BM. If it is so easy to reform, why do people continue to be banned and why is it such a point of contention on the Player Behavior forums? See, personally i believe inting, win trading, and throwing/ afk to be a MUCH worse "rule-break" than flaming/bming is. I think this COMPLETELY ruins the other player's experience without an easy fix. And guess what? in comparison to flaming, if not over 70% of the time, this behavior can and will go unpunished. Why?

Flaming is a behavior of a bad teammate and in general a league player you would not want on your team. But, inting, wintrading, and throwing/afk is a character trait of a player that you wouldn't even want your enemy to have to deal with. Everyone can have a nice laugh over someone being angry at a video game and saying its someone else's fault in chat, but nobody can deal with someone on their team ruining the experience for not only themselves and their team by making the game a huge waste of time, but they also remove the competitiveness and the point of playing from the enemy.

Should flaming be ban-able? And now, im obviously not talking about death threats, off the rift shaming, and other actions that can genuinely effect someones life, im talking about negative talk like: "you are fucking brain-dead, int more dude, wtf " and "you suck Pyke, why are you even trying?". Should that type of behavior be ban-able? I don't think so. And here is why: flaming is the action of negatively speaking to a teammate. Flaming is LINKED with throwing, inting, and other negative behaviors that will cost your team the game and ruin the competitive environment and in general all around point of playing, but flaming itself cannot directly ruin someone else's league experience. Why is this important you may ask? Because the worst thing you can do as a player in league is ruin the experience with league and riot. This directly hurts sales of the video game, and directly makes the player feel bad about ever playing.

You may say, "Hah! only blah-blah % of players are punished in this way! Fuck those players who break the rules. Any real supporter would simply play by the rules and not complain when they are punished rightfully for being a flamer!" However, you may be surprised by the amount of people that find league's ban system negative, and how many people have a negative experience with it. I'm not saying they don't deserve it based on the current rules of League, but they definitely could be positively effected by change.

2 Ways Riot can punish flaming: The first way is obvious and already in the game to an extent. You should have only a few messages, just like a chat restricted account in league. If flaming continues, you should be PERMA banned from chatting in league, and reform processes should be still accessible to the account. Talking with league support and getting your perma ban from chat lifted to only a permanent 5-chats per game rule, can be a stepping stone to having a reputable league account again. This method CAN and will be abused, but its only an idea. Only a step in the right direction.

The second way. This is a more favorable way, and i would do it myself. First, make flaming not punishable unless taken to the next level like i stated earlier in this mini-essay. However, make it so that you have an in-game reputation. after each game, you can either +1 to a player, or -1 to a player. The enemy team can only give +1 and report but cannot do -1. Players with bad reputations will be automatically muted by other players on their team, unless a setting is selected. Players with bad reputations themselves cannot vote on this, and will receive punishments to in-game loot and features. Abusing this feature will be report-able and punishable, and people with good reputation will have in-game bonuses and periodically Riot can do giveaways or sweepstakes for these reputable players. This would encourage reforming, instead of making the path of reform simply grinding a new account and never changing your ways, it would now be open to everyone directly in the client. This would need some changing, due to the fact that if a player were to do bad in your game simply because he/she had an off game, their rep would be negatively effected.

In Conclusion, Everyone makes mistakes, and it is only right to allow players reformation in the client itself, and award players who reform rather than kicking them while they are down. A player may be "way-too" devoted to League and not have something else to turn to in his life, and may be depressed. Reasons for flame can come from anywhere, and are directly linked to being a less happy individual. However, if league accepts these players, sales on skins and etc will not only go up, but the stigma that league is directly linked to toxicity may even go away. And, people's experience of league may be better than ever, and player support of riot may also increase. I would like to thank Riot support about even hearing out my request of lifting my ban, but also i would like to thank whoever is reading this for taking the time out of their day to do so.

PS: I'm close to graduating high school, and i'm definitely not an English major or anything of the sort(i passed most English classes with a medium to high C, lol) , so this is a very informal short "essay" and i was just wanting to state what was on my mind after being banned a while ago. I came back to this account after my school and local college announced League would be supported in an eSport community alongside Rocket League and a few others. (not including CS:GO yet due to violence). This made me interested in this, and if possible i might simply play for the school on the side while i continue my studies and my basketball "career" haha.

EDIT:

TLDR for the vote:

Reputation system: after each game teammates can +1 or -1 your reputation, and enemies can only +1 or do nothing. Bad rep players will be automatically muted by teammates unless a setting is checked. Good rep players will have bonuses and giveaways, and bad rep players will have negative effects on in-game loot.

Chat-bans: basically how chat restrictions currently work, but after a while you can accumulate a permanent ban that eventually may be possible to get reduced to a permanent chat restriction, and eventually normal chatting after a while.