The PGL Copenhagen Major was put under pressure to exclude Russians from the tournament by members of the Danish government. Let's take a look at why that might be.
Very good article, and as a danish national I am not in the least bit surprised. We basically have a facist system by the Mussolini-definition I.E "merger between corporate and state interests".
The article is detailed and well-crafted. My observation is, that it highlights that as the issues and pressures within Esports become more visible, it is evolving into something similar to traditional sports—a platform for politicians and other power-seekers to exert influence and their own versions of propaganda.
Honestly what you even talking about? " This becomes especially true when you consider the fact that the young and well-travelled demographic that makes up those who compete in esports are, for the most part, exactly the type of comparative cosmopolitan that do not support the activities of dictators."
I appreciate you shining light on the issue but you seem to disregard all the evidence that speak against your believes.
Did you forget that pure scribbled a "Z" during on of their matches before he joined a EUW team? VP got uninvited from a major because they refused to be shown without the russian flag.
The reality is that a lot of your expatriate "cosmopolitan russians" do not care that there is a war in Ukraine and I would wager there are at least a few of them who are secretly in favour of this war, but they are smart enough to not say anything in the western public. Just because you might know some of them and like them doesn't mean you right in general. I assume in this case your personal attachment is clouding your judgement.
Yes there is a lot of double standard in esports but not addressing them and not allowing things to change makes it even worse. Btw pretty much all major sports (football, tennis, olypmics and so on) have either banned russian orgs or players from competing or at the very least they are not allowed represent their country. And just to clarify only Russians are not allowed to represent their country (removing all flags doesn't mean anything).
I have no clue why Dota as an Esport can not show a baseline level of moral integrity and remove players who are obviously in favour of the war and prevent russians and russian orgs from proudly representing their country.
So you mention a whole lot of 2 examples to support your claim that all Russians should be banned from competing. Of course you know better who “secretly supports” the Russian regime, as a person who clearly knows nothing about the Russian people and I would wager have never talked to a Russian. Going back to your examples, VP instantly removed Pure from their active roster when the “Z” incident happened. Also, if you are in the know “Z” is heavily scrutinized in Russia as a symbol for war against the west, as it is a letter from the Latin alphabet, the same alphabet the so-called enemies of Russia use and is not present in the Cyrillic alphabet of Russia. Of course the Russian government is oblivious to the irony in its own agendas. So, as a young person at the time Pure just made an immature joke, he did not openly support the Russian government in the invasion. Of course, it is not something that you can joke about in the current political climate, but I feel like the fact that he was kicked from a promising team and had to issue a public apology, having to reinvent his carrier is punishment enough for a young adult. We should let people make mistakes, especially young people. There was no other similar incident relating to Pure as far as I know.
Of course, you are exactly the type of person that Richard is talking about - someone who doesn’t care about the people involved, but just wants to get internet clout by supporting the “right” moral views. Obviously you would ignore the core argument that if we are to scrutinize athletes for actions of their government we would need to ban people from Saudi Arabia and US(some could even argue Israel) from competing, as their governments have also committed atrocities. But no, in your world Russia bad = Russians bad, and forget about perspective.
Also, who could forget such paragons of virtue as the people running traditional sports, because they are famous for showing high “base moral integrity” when running their competitions.
Where to begin ..... I really recommend reading carefully.
First I gave you more than 2 examples. 2 examples in Dota plus the fact that almost every other sport under the sun is restricting russians. To expand a bit, football, here Fifa and UEFA, have removed the Russian national team and all russian teams from competing no expections. Dota losing the moral high ground to Fifa, an organization that is synomymous for corruption and moral bankrupcy is pretty grotesque.
In chess Russian players are not allowed to compete as Russian nationals and there are hundreds more if you can to look for them.
"VP instantly removed Pure from their active roster when the “Z” incident happened" that is just incorrect. VP forced Pure to record a verbal appolgy after a half assed twitter comment for VP didn't cut it and when that wasn't enough they suspended pure in the hope they would stay in the Tournament (which did not happen). Also to recall the context here VP(at that point they called themself Outsiders) was under owner ship of VK at that time their CEO is Vladimir Kiriyenko one of the people personally name checked by sanctions from the EU and the US. The match in which it happened was against a team with 2 Ukranians. Whether or not the "Z" in the cyrillic alphabet doesn't really matter here. From Wikipedia since you obviously can't be bothered to check yourself: "The "Z" symbol is used instead of the equivalent Cyrillic letter З (Ze) used in the Russian alphabet, which has been described as peculiar, considering the symbol's later association with Russian nationalism and pro-Putin politics." For comparisons if a German player today would scribble a swastika in a match vs Jewish players you couldn't blink fast enough and he would be out of a team and never hired again. That is not an immature joke, it stupid at best to do such a thing vs Ukrainians and while the war still going or on the end just openly hostile.
"Of course, you are exactly the type of person that Richard is talking about - someone who doesn’t care about the people involved...." Two things really you collosal ..... . I worked as volunteer in my city to get Ukranian refugees settled in when the arrived so I do care very much about the people (unless you are talking about Russians and that I don't care about them being inconvenienced) and secondly I see it very much critical that Dota is using oil money to fund events.
"Also, who could forget such paragons of virtue as the people running traditional sports, because they are famous for showing high “base moral integrity” when running their competitions." That is exactly what I am saying we know orgs like Fifa are massivly corrupt and without a moral compass and somehow we manage to get even lower than that.
Very good article, and as a danish national I am not in the least bit surprised. We basically have a facist system by the Mussolini-definition I.E "merger between corporate and state interests".
The article is detailed and well-crafted. My observation is, that it highlights that as the issues and pressures within Esports become more visible, it is evolving into something similar to traditional sports—a platform for politicians and other power-seekers to exert influence and their own versions of propaganda.
Honestly what you even talking about? " This becomes especially true when you consider the fact that the young and well-travelled demographic that makes up those who compete in esports are, for the most part, exactly the type of comparative cosmopolitan that do not support the activities of dictators."
I appreciate you shining light on the issue but you seem to disregard all the evidence that speak against your believes.
Did you forget that pure scribbled a "Z" during on of their matches before he joined a EUW team? VP got uninvited from a major because they refused to be shown without the russian flag.
The reality is that a lot of your expatriate "cosmopolitan russians" do not care that there is a war in Ukraine and I would wager there are at least a few of them who are secretly in favour of this war, but they are smart enough to not say anything in the western public. Just because you might know some of them and like them doesn't mean you right in general. I assume in this case your personal attachment is clouding your judgement.
Yes there is a lot of double standard in esports but not addressing them and not allowing things to change makes it even worse. Btw pretty much all major sports (football, tennis, olypmics and so on) have either banned russian orgs or players from competing or at the very least they are not allowed represent their country. And just to clarify only Russians are not allowed to represent their country (removing all flags doesn't mean anything).
I have no clue why Dota as an Esport can not show a baseline level of moral integrity and remove players who are obviously in favour of the war and prevent russians and russian orgs from proudly representing their country.
So you mention a whole lot of 2 examples to support your claim that all Russians should be banned from competing. Of course you know better who “secretly supports” the Russian regime, as a person who clearly knows nothing about the Russian people and I would wager have never talked to a Russian. Going back to your examples, VP instantly removed Pure from their active roster when the “Z” incident happened. Also, if you are in the know “Z” is heavily scrutinized in Russia as a symbol for war against the west, as it is a letter from the Latin alphabet, the same alphabet the so-called enemies of Russia use and is not present in the Cyrillic alphabet of Russia. Of course the Russian government is oblivious to the irony in its own agendas. So, as a young person at the time Pure just made an immature joke, he did not openly support the Russian government in the invasion. Of course, it is not something that you can joke about in the current political climate, but I feel like the fact that he was kicked from a promising team and had to issue a public apology, having to reinvent his carrier is punishment enough for a young adult. We should let people make mistakes, especially young people. There was no other similar incident relating to Pure as far as I know.
Of course, you are exactly the type of person that Richard is talking about - someone who doesn’t care about the people involved, but just wants to get internet clout by supporting the “right” moral views. Obviously you would ignore the core argument that if we are to scrutinize athletes for actions of their government we would need to ban people from Saudi Arabia and US(some could even argue Israel) from competing, as their governments have also committed atrocities. But no, in your world Russia bad = Russians bad, and forget about perspective.
Also, who could forget such paragons of virtue as the people running traditional sports, because they are famous for showing high “base moral integrity” when running their competitions.
Where to begin ..... I really recommend reading carefully.
First I gave you more than 2 examples. 2 examples in Dota plus the fact that almost every other sport under the sun is restricting russians. To expand a bit, football, here Fifa and UEFA, have removed the Russian national team and all russian teams from competing no expections. Dota losing the moral high ground to Fifa, an organization that is synomymous for corruption and moral bankrupcy is pretty grotesque.
In chess Russian players are not allowed to compete as Russian nationals and there are hundreds more if you can to look for them.
"VP instantly removed Pure from their active roster when the “Z” incident happened" that is just incorrect. VP forced Pure to record a verbal appolgy after a half assed twitter comment for VP didn't cut it and when that wasn't enough they suspended pure in the hope they would stay in the Tournament (which did not happen). Also to recall the context here VP(at that point they called themself Outsiders) was under owner ship of VK at that time their CEO is Vladimir Kiriyenko one of the people personally name checked by sanctions from the EU and the US. The match in which it happened was against a team with 2 Ukranians. Whether or not the "Z" in the cyrillic alphabet doesn't really matter here. From Wikipedia since you obviously can't be bothered to check yourself: "The "Z" symbol is used instead of the equivalent Cyrillic letter З (Ze) used in the Russian alphabet, which has been described as peculiar, considering the symbol's later association with Russian nationalism and pro-Putin politics." For comparisons if a German player today would scribble a swastika in a match vs Jewish players you couldn't blink fast enough and he would be out of a team and never hired again. That is not an immature joke, it stupid at best to do such a thing vs Ukrainians and while the war still going or on the end just openly hostile.
"Of course, you are exactly the type of person that Richard is talking about - someone who doesn’t care about the people involved...." Two things really you collosal ..... . I worked as volunteer in my city to get Ukranian refugees settled in when the arrived so I do care very much about the people (unless you are talking about Russians and that I don't care about them being inconvenienced) and secondly I see it very much critical that Dota is using oil money to fund events.
"Also, who could forget such paragons of virtue as the people running traditional sports, because they are famous for showing high “base moral integrity” when running their competitions." That is exactly what I am saying we know orgs like Fifa are massivly corrupt and without a moral compass and somehow we manage to get even lower than that.