Itch.io is shadowbanning or deleting NSFW and LGBTQ content

[Ruin Explorer]

The amount of what are clearly rape and “child porn disguised as anime girls” on Steam is astounding. I’m not sure I want to defend them, or attack policies to deplatform them.

Yeah, and that's how these scumbags get you!

Because you're afraid of looking bad or feeling bad for "defending the indefensible", which absolutely some small minority of stuff on Steam and perhaps (though I am less convinced in this case) Itch.io was.

But the seller platforms and/or relevant governmental jurisdictions should be the ones making that decision, not Visa and Mastercard. This is like the water company turning off your water because you perform in a burlesque show, and a pressure group is trying to equate that with some horrific and extreme sex stuff, and decided to harass the water company about it, and claim the water company was "helping pedos". Literally this is what the pressure group here is doing, and what you're handwringing about.

EDIT - And let's be clear - if the water company was an unregulated, profit-driven, corporate entity, they would 100% turn off your water to avoid bad press. But they're not. They are regulated, and they're not allowed to profit seek to the degree they'd like. They're forced, by regulation, by law to provide you with water (at least in most jurisdictions), and they can't say "You are an unacceptable category of person, morally, gender-wise, racially, caste-wise, or the like, so we will not be providing water to you". But only because laws did that. If they had their druthers, they'd absolutely be cowardly cutting off people because some Bothered About D&D-type group was angry and threatening them. It's worked before! The D&D cartoon was the way it was because of BADD and fear of BADD.

And furthermore, the pressure group knows they're lying, knows they're making false equivalences, and is intentionally pushing it very far and trying to get absolutely mainstream and boring stuff like Detroit: Become Human, Mass Effect and so on pulled because it doesn't fit their extreme narrow moral views. That includes basically all LGBTQ+ stuff, because any sexuality that isn't cis-heterosexuality is "political" and unacceptable to some people.

Also, this isn't a "policy" in any sane way. This is the knee-jerk spasms of payment providers with too much power responding to random tiny pressure groups, so calling it something as formal and considered as a "policy" isn't helpful.

EDIT - Also worth noting, absolutely if this had been viable in the 1980s, D&D and RPGs would 100% have been victims of this particular "do what we want or we'll say you're helping pedos/satanists/murderers to a newspaper"-type evil manipulation.

 

[MGibster]

I don't know how one would identify content as LGBTQ+...or as heteronormative, either...without there being some element of sexuality in it. In other words, if all anybody is doing is fighting monsters and taking their stuff, what would identify it as LGBTQ+? So I wouldn't be surprised if a high percentage of LGBTQ+ content gets flagged as NSFW, compared to a random sampling of content.

At least here in the United States, we have a fairly long history of relegating stories about gay people into the adult category. Years ago, I remember Roger Ebert complaining about a movie he reviewed being rated R. He noted the lack of foul language, nudity, violence, and explicit sex scenes, the hallmarks of an R rated movie, and concluded it received the rating because the story centered around two gay boys. And of course in our current cultural climate we have a lot of people trying to excise books with gay characters from our public and school libraries. It really isn't about sexual content, as even stories with gay characters are challenged.

 

[BrokenTwin]

Is LGBTQ+ material being blocked because it's LGBTQ+, or is just that some of it is also being considered NSFW?

I don't know how one would identify content as LGBTQ+...or as heteronormative, either...without there being some element of sexuality in it. In other words, if all anybody is doing is fighting monsters and taking their stuff, what would identify it as LGBTQ+? So I wouldn't be surprised if a high percentage of LGBTQ+ content gets flagged as NSFW, compared to a random sampling of content.

However, I also wouldn't be surprised if the sort of people who go out of their way to flag NSFW content have different reactions to the same activity depending upon whether or not it's heteronormative.

Do you consider all instances of sexuality NSFW? Kissing, holding hands, saying "I love you?" Introducing someone as your significant other? Any form of gender expression (via mannerisms, clothes, etc)? Just being in a relationship?
There are so many ways to have LGBT+ content in your game without it being explicitly sexual. Most media with any amount of characterization contains heterosexual content, it's just considered normal, so we don't look at it that way. We don't label het content as het the same way we don't explicitly label cis-gender content as cis. It's the default assumption.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Is LGBTQ+ material being blocked because it's LGBTQ+, or is just that some of it is also being considered NSFW?

I don't know how one would identify content as LGBTQ+...or as heteronormative, either...without there being some element of sexuality in it. In other words, if all anybody is doing is fighting monsters and taking their stuff, what would identify it as LGBTQ+? So I wouldn't be surprised if a high percentage of LGBTQ+ content gets flagged as NSFW, compared to a random sampling of content.

However, I also wouldn't be surprised if the sort of people who go out of their way to flag NSFW content have different reactions to the same activity depending upon whether or not it's heteronormative.

There are Lgbtq+ creators reporting their sfw works are being delisted solely for being labeled lgbtq+

 

[Divine2021]

Yea I don’t know. I don’t want child rape games on platforms my children can easily access. I don’t feel bad saying that, and if cutting out payment services is the only real way to force companies whose primary purpose is the ever increasing accumulation of money, then so be it. No real amount of hectoring is going to change that. Even if legislators did make a move, the reaction would be nearly the same, and then you would have real conflict with government forcing speech codes. It reminds me of when the US government banned what ultimately was Backdoor sex trafficking ads.

Probably people should wait until more details come out, tho.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Ugh.

Every year here, I've posted a Pride thread in June. This was the one in 2024:

Thread '🏳️‍🌈Pride Month- Celebrating Representation in TTRPGs (2024)'

Jun 3, 2024

This is an update and edit from a prior post. Please note there will be references to mature subject matter in games in this post. While it is not explicit, it is present.

June is LGBTQI+ month* in the United States (aka Pride Month), and I wanted to make a post celebrating that Pride in the TTRPG sphere by posting a little bit of history related to representation in TTRPGs and some general thoughts about that representation and why it matters. In addition, I hoped that people could use the comments to discuss some of the amazing contributors to the hobby we have had over the years...

• Snarf Zagyg
• Replies: 44
• Forum: *TTRPGs General

• 
• 

This year ... I just couldn't. Not just because each year I link to the official proclamation (and this year? mmmmm). But because, with everything going on, I just ... hard to celebrate Pride month with all the stuff going on.

I did not know about itch.io .... if you look back at the 2024 post, you will see that I linked to the queer-tagged games on the platform. It was an invaluable resource for indie developers.

 

[Argyle King]

No, companies do not have an absolute right to choose who they do business with.
Thats libertarian extremist fantasy nonsense.

Is it your view that you cannot choose with whom to do business?

I'm asking because I am not sure that I understand how that position exists among the community simultaneously with members of the community stating that a game company should have chosen to not do business with an individual that the community feels has abhorrent views.

How (I feel) that is relevant to this topic is that engaging in public discussion within a community is more productive with a better understanding of the community's generally shared views.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Yea I don’t know. I don’t want child rape games on platforms my children can easily access. I don’t feel bad saying that, and if cutting out payment services is the only real way to force companies whose primary purpose is the ever increasing accumulation of money, then so be it. No real amount of hectoring is going to change that. Even if legislators did make a move, the reaction would be nearly the same, and then you would have real conflict with government forcing speech codes. It reminds me of when the US government banned what ultimately was Backdoor sex trafficking ads.

Probably people should wait until more details come out, tho.

Again, there ALREADY are sfw titles being affected byitchio's actions just for being labeled LGBTQ+. People who want these games banned also want perfetly sfw titles like Detroit Become Human banned. They WANT you to think they just ban porn, but it is run by people for which qeer people existng is inherently pornographic.

 

[Morrus]

Is it your view that you cannot choose with whom to do business?

Obviously it’s jurisdiction dependent, but in most places you cannot choose not to do business with somebody based on their membership of a protected class.

 

[Argyle King]

Obviously it’s jurisdiction dependent, but in most places you cannot choose not to do business with somebody based on their membership of a protected class.

And I agree with that.

However, it was, as I understand in the comment to which I replied, stated/implied that a business owner has no right to decline business.

I'm of the belief that consent should matter.