Petition against payment processors who forced Steam games ban roars past 140,000 signatures

[miked9746]

  So, much like the debate around abortion, a handful of people have decided to legislate/implement rules onto the rest of us based solely on their own ridiculous Victorian sense of morality!
 The argument for both positions is the same:    If you don't want one, then don't get one...   but don't you dare think you also get to decide if I get one!!!!

[Eddieoctane]

They don't give a crap about what a bunch of gooners think. This slop should have never been let on the platform to begin with.

How do you define "slip" though? I remember the religious right (the same kind of people who are behind the Steam hijinks) freaked out over interspecies romances in Mass Effect.

How long before games that allow a human to love an elf or Klingon are banned under this same scheme? How long until you can't have an LGBT character at all? Where does it stop? Do developers have to start worrying that the current administration will pressure processors to kill others types of games? What about other media? With this BS, you could have AMC being cut off from credit cards because they did a limited showing off Broke Back Mountain.

You don't have to be a "gooner" to see the problem. At best, there's a chilling effect on all media. At worst, the CC companies are creating a mechanism for the government to enforce censorship without running afoul of the Constitution. If the current regime doesn't like your content, all they've got to do is threaten an "investigation" into Visa or MasterCard or AmEx. Presto, the payment processors tell the vendor to block sales for that content or be cut off altogether. Yes, it's extortion. And yes, it's completely legal under the current laws.

[Marshall]

Mastercard and Visa have no right whatsoever to tell me what I can and cannot buy. They are a financial institution. Their morals and opinions are worthless and have no right to dictate who and what I do with my money. They only need to sit down, shut-up and process my transaction. That is all. That is their entire purpose. If we allow this to continue it might start with porn, but it will not end with porn. They already tried doing this with guns. What would be next? Violence in games? Censoring art? Censoring music? Do we really want a bank telling us what choices we can make?
Visa and Mastercard need to know, that they do not have the power of moral judgement over private citizens. Period.

[Ramu]

Bunch of porn-addicted coomers complaining.

Really? Because it's not Steam, but Itch.io banning games like Mouthwashing - a genuinely fantastic horror game with dark themes - shows the logical conclusion of payment processors getting to decide what can and can't be played. Who says it won't be games with LGBTQ themes next? Maybe a game where there's a child protagonist who gets hurt? What's the logical conclusion of payment processors and puritanical groups getting to ban legal content?

[SSchorik0101]

Bunch of porn-addicted coomers complaining.

No it's about companies forcing you to pay extreme amounts of interest to buy stuff and then they tell you what you can or can't buy. It shouldn't be you can only purchase stuff that your credit card company likes and if they dislike something you're not allowed to purchase it. You work hard to get your credit up to get credit cards so you could build your credit even further to get cars and houses. I didn't build my credit so I can be told that I'm not allowed to purchase something. If they are allowed to get away with it with this stuff they'll just keep doing it more and more. Until you ain't allowed to buy half the stuff because someone on the board of directors don't like it. By the way there isn't a single thing that I haven't been able to purchase so this don't affect me at all I just think the idea of it is dumb af

You make a fair point and after thinking it over I agree. My comment was unfair and judgemental.

[General DuPree]

Good Riddance!
If I was in business with someone and they communicated to me that sexual content isn't something they want to support, I'd honor that responsibly.

[Ayra]

Good Riddance!
If I was in business with someone and they communicated to me that sexual content isn't something they want to support, I'd honor that responsibly.

Please read every other comment who's concerned about general censorship getting pushed.

[1234567890]

Good Riddance!
If I was in business with someone and they communicated to me that sexual content isn't something they want to support, I'd honor that responsibly.

Then you advocate for the censorship of free speech, because whether or not you like it sexual content falls under that. There is no middle ground. Either all of it is allowed, or none of it is.

[Dana]

Credit cards are not "peoples" money. They are the financial institutions loan to you - by them. You want that stuff, go get a steam card and top up that way. Ez.

Except Visa makes my bank's debit card. You know.... the direct line to MY money. Its a payment processor not just a credit company ffs. That also doesn't change the fact that a bunch of companies are delisting items entirely for sale. How do you expect me to use a steam card to buy a product that's no longer available on steam because of Visa?

[Sylas4]

For people who are assuming it's only affecting gooners and whatnot about porn, I need yall to know that sex happens irl. People have sex, people fall in love, people kill each other, and they keep doing that and more. I've seen a game that I personally know tackles serious questions about depression, suicide, and our place in everything, that game was taken down because it dealt with heavy adult topics.

R18+ isn't just for sex, and even when it is, a card company that acts as the middleman between your bank and YOUR money, shouldn't have control over games or anything else legal you want to buy. Collective Shout got Infamous banned in Australia because one of the characters was abused by her father in her past and it is relevant to her motivations. Their reasoning? "Violence against women". They did the same with GTAV where they claimed you could gun down and torture women on the street and that was the point of the game in their words.

If you've played GTA you know violence can happen but you're not progressing the story by using cheat codes and rampaging through the streets. But CS doesn't care. They lied to get games banned, and they're proud of it! So who else should be able to lie and get creations and art, games, movies, and everything else cutoff from us, not because the content is illegal, but because it's icky to them?