Hogwarts Legacy and the Dilemma of Ethical Consumption

@franzlska: Ten days, is the answer.

I'm sure that dude will use this as a springboard for his now full time career as a right wing conservative youtuber.

@panfoot: if the wet blanket that never dries Colin Moriarty has taught us anything, it's that the longer these assholes can pretend to be victimized for being assholes, the more money they'll make.

Edit: ugh also, "YouTube video coming soon" is like the worst combination of words I can imagine at this point.

Old enough to remember when those Orson Scott Card games came out while he was very public about being against LGBTQ+ rights and the game industry, game fans, and games media were all like: Eh, if you don't like it don't buy it!

Kind of wild to reflect on how much things have changed since then. These days, he'd probably not be allowed to walk into a game studio at all.

It's okay, everyone. The game is going to be very inclusive now.

While it's cool, I guess, to hear that some of the development team is trying to make it at least somewhat less shitty than one would expect from a Harry Potter game, the big takeaway there for me is that management pushed back against it, as well as taking so long to respond about the Leavitt situation at all.

I feel bad for the developers who do disagree with Rowling's views that have worked for years on making this game, but I'm sure Leavitt will have a field day playing the victim, and the average person will point to his firing as well as the character creator as proof that the game is fine, ignoring the deeper issues with the project's management implied in these stories, as well as the game's continued upholding of HP as a franchise (and Rowling's fame with it, which she actively uses to sway politicians and silence her critics to this very day.)

@franzlska: I couldn't agree more. This is the Cyberpunk situation all over again, where you can bring up the problems with the game, and deliberately obtuse fans will now be able to say, "well there's a character creator that lets you pick male body parts for a female character, tHaT'S MoRe InClUSiVe ThAn MoSt GaMeS" and shut down any other conversation.

Such as why would the dev team feel the need to do this, almost as if there's an inescapable anchor named Joanne tugging at the game's ankle...

On the bright side, if this game does it, I hope this spurs more games to have these sorts of options in character creators.

@lonelyspacepanda:

And that is progress. Its why many conservatives and The Alt-Right/Gamergate are so afraid of something as simple as decoupling voice options from character models or hasbro (?) putting both potato head doll parts in the same box. It is "the little stuff" that moves that needle.

That being said, I am nowhere near as optimistic as you in terms of keeping folk like Card out of games because... what thread are we in again?

@lapsariangiraff: While I agree with the overall sentiment, I do have to take issue with that argument. By that logic, if other games do gender neutral (? Sorry, not sure exactly what terms are appropriate here) character creation then it is clearly them trying to cover up that other game that had Rowling involved.

Like with Cyberpunk, it will be important to look at what the implementation is and what the actual effects are. Bad stuff can do "good" things and vice versa and the good should be celebrated wherever it is.

While I think it's good every time some asshole like the above gets booted from a project ultimately I don't think there's just any real way to salvage this or Harry Potter in general. Not so long as Rowling is the way that she is and I'm not optimistic that she is going to reach an epiphany anytime soon.

Because right now even if someone comes along and creates the best most inclusive and wonderful Harry Potter property ever... it's still lining a TERFs pockets in the end.

@gundato: I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I implied that every game with a genderfluid character creator has malicious intent. Like, at all.

It's a case by case thing. In Cyberpunk's case, they did it to hand-wave the other content in the game that got them the flak in the first place. And the implementation itself, as you point as being so important, was ramshackle. If they never got that flak, they wouldn't have made that change.

Same goes for Hogwarts Legacy. This is a clear attempt to mollify Rowling's, and by extension, the game's critics. When in the end, the most prominent anti-trans voice in the UK, and possibly the world, profits and gains more resources to spread her message, which actively hurts trans folk. So that'd be a net negative in this case.

I think saying, "On the brighst side... I hope this spurs more games to have these sorts of options" is pretty clearly saying the positives for other games, lol. You just can't avoid the context in this case.

@lapsariangiraff: Have we seen it in action yet or seen what it impacts?

The issue with Cyberpunk's character creator was not that it was trying to draw attention away from the other problems. The issue was it still had some REALLY "awkward" restrictions (that aligned with said problems) and mostly all it did was let an NPC make a circumcision comment.

If the HL one is actually good AND has absolutely zero impact on gameplay? That is a good thing. If it lets the fans/apologists say "Well, at least it did character creation right" then... at least it did character creation right. And if it ends up somehow being transphobic then it is also somehow transphobic.

@gundato: Oh boy. Okay.

Yes. If we talk about the character creator itself and only the character creator, in an absolute vacuum with nothing else taken into consideration, it's a positive.

But this character creator does not exist in a vacuum, and I'm not talking about it as if it exists in one. It is a character creator for a Harry Potter game, the sales of which directly profit JK Rowling, who uses said resources to loudly campaign against trans rights. This isn't about media critique or normalization or representation -- this is about the rights of trans people in the real world. So the game itself is still negatively impacting the trans community, whatever representation is afforded in the game, due to who it is profiting.

And I even went so far as to charitably point out, twice, that if this inspires similarly open character creators in other games, that'd be one good thing to come out of this mess. Which you ignored. Twice. What are you arguing for, here?

To defuse a bit, I'm hoping this is just a misunderstanding, where you're trying to discuss the option at a micro scale, and I'm trying to put it in the greater context of the game itself and who it affects. Is that what's happening?

@lapsariangiraff: Yes. Do not use that to "redeem the game" or anything. There are very serious issues and even if I were a harry potter fan I would not be supporting this for reasons similar to why I don't watch AEW anymore even if I love the vast majority of their talent.

But this "it can do nothing right" mentality hurts progress. Its all about moving that needle and if even a game licensing the work of a transphobe can have an inclusive character creation system then that is GOOD and attacking the motives of that just serves to discourage others from bothering. Maybe it is just an attempt to deflect and... fine, it is still a moderately high profile game doing a good character creator. And maybe it is the "At least we are going to do X" right by some passionate devs. And just acting like it should be dismissed because it is associated with some trash discourages those kinds of efforts.

When we inevitably find out that somehow this character creator is transphobic trash I will be right there with a huge "What the fuck?". But, on paper, it sounds "good" and attacking that as just being an attempt to deflect or somehow part of the problem only serves to discourage others from fighting for that. Because HP is pretty fucked. But there are a LOT of borderline games/media and I can easily see an exec saying "We aren't going to spend money on that" if they (... probably rightfully) assume that some other trash in that game will overshadow it.

I guess I'm not sure if it matters in this instance whether they do individual things right or not.

I dunno, just some real "You do not under any circumstances gotta hand it to them" vibes about it.

@efesell: I guess my thinking is less "you gotta hand it to them" and more "maybe just don't bash them for it"

And if, down the line, folk say "Well, at least they did X right"... at least they did X right. If it is so borderline that acknowledging one not horrifically evil fuck up negates everything then... you do you. Otherwise? There is so much other stuff you can bring up that it REALLY does not matter and the people who will fixate on that were never going to engage in a good faith conversation anyway.

@gundato: I guess, but at the end of the day the timing (as well as the timing on the Cyberpunk example lapsarian brought up) feels very convenient, with the news coming right on the heels of a major spike in public attention for shitty behavior (in C2077's case, I believe coming right around concerns about the fucking 'mix it up' ads, as well as a number of questionable moves by CDPR's twitter accounts).

While including it period doesn't necessarily read this way, I cant help but read some level of calculation into HPHL's character creation news landing so soon after the Leavitt situation, especially considering this game has seemed more or less radio-silent since they announced Rowling wouldn't be directly working on it. What's more, it's a tactic that clearly works, considering I've already seen dozens of people making memes acting as if it's some massive "gotcha" to Rowling, and the number of people during the C2077 situation that acted like that was a massive gift and nobody could call CDPR transphobic ever again.

@gundato: I'm not saying that it can do nothing right -- for the third time now (it's getting funny how much you're talking around the olive branches I'm offering here) I hope this inspires other games to do the same. And that's a positive!

But the original Klepek tweet I posted, and the point of my posts have been, to not lose sight of who this game supports. It's a good change that is in service of a game that still can't be supported, and I feel for the devs who reportedly had to fight to get it in. I was just exasperatedly anticipating the ways bad faith arguers and fans would run with this change while ignoring the greater context.

To quote a joke my friends and I made when this news first came out, this is like a gay character option in an Ender's Game video game. Would that make anyone in the queer community want to actually support it? Of course not. It's the same here, as you said as well. If I ever run into the devs at GDC, I'll say something like "hey man, you did the best you could, thanks for trying, I appreciate it." But I'm not gonna buy this game in a million years, and I am going to stay laser-focused on how it affects people in the real world, because that's all that matters.

On the "there are a LOT of borderline games/media"... this is an unfortunate side effect of intersectionality and identity politics becoming more mainstream, but I think it goes without saying there are varying levels of fucked up. And those varying levels tend to get conflated by people outside marginalized communities.

There are "problematic" older works that are still part of the cultural canon, but their authors either took those views back later, or never did so but are now dead so they can't use their resources to make things worse. Then there are well intentioned people who just mess up in their representation or the way they write some characters or lean into tropes because they genuinely didn't know better or any different. I'd feel okay supporting any of these if the work as a whole was worth it. For example, I bought Borderlands 3 even though Randy Pitchford is a piece of shit, and I still watch John Waters movies despite his pretty bad takes.

That being said, Harry Potter is none of these things. JK Rowling is alive, she is campaigning against trans people having the same rights as cis people, and the popularity/profits of her work give her both the platform and the resources to spread that message. She doesn't do so in error, people have tried to explain to her how she is harming the trans community, but she doesn't listen and has in fact doubled down multiple times. So profiting her, in any way, goes over the line. So I'm not going to waste time talking about character creators in isolation.

She should transition into becoming a hardcore drill rapper so she can escape accountability for the problematic things she says

Just went through this thread after feeling the same way about OP for a while now.

I like to think of myself of an ally, most of my friends are part of the community and it's so disheartening to see all of the author's comments and ideology messing with what I think is a pretty fantastic world.

The books got me through some very dark times growing up, like really bad and I still find myself going back to them when I need peace and quiet. Hogwarts Legacy looks like an absolute dream to me with every item in young me's wishlist being ticked off as they announce more things about the game.

I haven't pre-ordered, still waiting/thinking about it. Found it super easy to stop listening to music created by artists who were later found to be "disgusting" (putting it lightly) but much harder to do it for this franchise in particular...

The wild part is how she got worse in the short time since this topic fell off.

Doesn't surprise me in the slightest. Her head's up her own twitter feed. Like when Graham Linehan went off the deep end.

I'm not one of the " there is no ethical consumption under capitalism" people (if the options are deprive yourself of happiness to have 0 effect on anything or be happy, be happy. The latter option results in a net positive outcome). If you think you will enjoy this game, go for it. As others have mentioned, your not purchasing the game will not impact the world at all, won't have a punitive effect on rowling, and won't help any trans people.

@zappymufasa: You know, usually I'd have to type up a whole thing about why that's not the case at all, but there's already a whole thread of great arguments. Lucky me!

(And may I point out, arguments from two years ago, when Rowling was much less unhinged. If anything the dilemma is even more obvious today.)

So, as a straight cisgender male who has a mild fondness for the books and movies and doesn't have any beef with the LGBTQIA+ crowd, I only see three ways that I can approach this:

A) Don't buy the game and feel one way or another about not playing it.

B) Buy the game, but be at the mercy of people who are strongly against buying the game and would label me as a TERF, and kinda feel like an asshole towards LGBTQIA+ people.

Or C) Reluctantly buy the game, perform the same mental gymnastics of trying to separate the art from the primary artist like with other problematic creatives alive and dead, such as H. P. Lovecraft, Dave Chappelle Tim Lambesis, and (maybe) Marilyn Manson, but still be at the mercy of people who are strongly against buying the game and will label me as a TERF, and still kinda feel like an asshole towards LGBTQIA+ people.

Thanks, Rowling. Thanks a bunch.

Nobody is going to label you a TERF for playing a video game, and if they do, you probably shouldn't be interacting with those people anyways.

I read the first page of this thread and the fifth page and have seen some discussion of Leavitt in relation to this game too, but has it been discussed here that the game is not only linked to a known terf, but is also rampant with antisemitism? The plot surrounds quelling a "goblin uprising", said goblins having been tarred with the "obsessed with money" and "best off as slaves" tropes throughout the series.

Buy it if you want to buy it, really. Those in the minorities impacted by the creator(s) will likely not shun you for buying it (the consumer is not necessarily the problem here), but you gotta be ready for those mental gymnastics. The product exists either way.

I'll leave this here, for those who need receipts.

Edit: As for the argument that "choosing not to consume something based on ethical concerns is choosing not to do something that makes you happy", I find this farcicle as consuming something that I am ethically opposed to will not make me happy. I am much happier when I find and consume media that is not intrinsically linked with horrible people/practices.

@lyndbako: As far as this site goes: True, because I like to think we collectively have a pretty good understanding of the nuances of the situation and can respect other people's opinions and decisions to either buy or not buy the game. ...well, most of us anyway.

As for those that I know in person: That's a tossup between those who know about who Rowling is in regards to trans people, those to care about video games, those who feel one way or another about the LGBTQIA+ community, those who understand the LGBTQIA+ community as well as F.D Signifier, and those who understand the LGBTQIA+ community as well as Dave Chappelle. I've known those with a more progressive outlooks, including family members. And I've known those with more homophobic and transphobic outlooks. ...including family members.

And as for Twitter and Reddit... apply my statement to those sites and spot the lie.

@broshmosh: Hey, I'm with you. If the rowling taint (which I think most people here recognize is real) will render you unable to enjoy the game, don't buy it. Why would anyone buy a videogame they wouldn't enjoy? I think the question at hand is whether people who like harry potter and want to play the game should not do so because of the rowling taint. I just have a hard time believing any de minimis negative impact on the world caused by this purchase will outweigh the enjoyment of the game ( assuming the game is good, obviously).

I'm just going to throw this out there, not in specific relation to any of the last couple posts, but as a resource for people coming back to this thread since it got necro'd. TL;DR, trans vilification and ramp-up to genocide is occurring in the US right now, so the threat is real; Rowling's hateful rhetoric has stepped up in intensity in support of said vilification; and we have evidence that financial pressures work in getting Warner Brothers to sideline Rowling and not launder her reputation. Consider how she is now presented as a controversial but unavoidable problem with Harry Potter, and not the role model of liberalism she was considered only a year or two ago. So conscientiously abstaining from buying Hogwarts Legacy is indisputably helpful in the struggle for trans rights.

Surreal

It’s not a dilemma for Simon P£gg!

It won't be a dilemma for a lot of people, to be honest. Art is forever. The artist is a mere mortal.

@shindig: You mean Muggle.

I know there won't be a GB review (because they write those so rarely in general, so easy to skip this one too), but I do wonder if there'll be a Quick Look. Are the higher-ups gonna tell em "We need the clicks!" ?

This game hasn't even been released yet and I already hate it and all of the chuds that reviews of it have brought, and will continue to bring, out of the woodwork.

Yeah its a tough one. I always try to separate the art from the artist. I first remember this coming up back in the day for Shadow Complex. The author of the story was kind of a shit head and i remember some discourse around it.

I feel if you don't want to play it because Rowling is a shitty a person is fine but I also think you shouldn't prevent someone from buying or enjoying the game.

Like Gary Glitter is a horrible person but they still play "Rock and Roll pt 2" at sporting events, or Kanye sucks but i know at some point I will be able to tolerate his music again.

I'm going to buy it at full price at launch, play it, and enjoy it

@sombre: ok

I think that's fair but also nobody is doing this. At worst someone might point out you're supporting a shitty person and try to make you feel bad about it. I'm not even going to do that unless someone has inserted themselves into The Discourse.

But there's absolutely going to be a whole host of people acting like they crawled through the trenches and barbed wire in order to pick up their wizard game.

The Discourse is just mind numbing. Basically every side (in this case, the people protesting the game, JK Rowling, and the people buying the game) agree that people who buy the game don't give a shit about transpeople, but the Discourse is about whether or not it's ok to make people feel bad about buying the game.

And the fact that this thing keeps on happening with every sort of media. "I know about the human rights violations of Saudis but I'm still going to play SNK games / watch the WWE blood money PPV", "I know about the dead migrant workers in Qatar, but I'm still going to enjoy FIFA". I'm not going to pretend I don't have problematic faves, but holy shit I'm not going to act like a victim if someone criticizes me for supporting something abhorrent.

Yeah for the people acting like that, fuck 'em. I just know that this week you will see a bunch of youtube thumbnails of a bunch of chuds making that dumb face with "'They' are stopping freedom of speech and wont let us be wizards!! Heres is my review (shitty politics ensue)"

It's a fucking video game. Buy it and play it if you're going to, but don't act put upon if the trans/gender-nonconforming people in your life give you a hard sigh or a side-eye. IMO, as a trans person very fucking sick of Rowling and the hand-wringing over all this (and yes, whether you want to accept it or not, buying it does help feed into TERF bullshit even if you're not one because it keeps the IP in the public eye, and even when she's not involved she's still part and parcel with it and it brings her name back to the forefront every single time—and for a lot of people, that's enough to legitimize her views), I think the most ethical way to purchase it is by doing so used. But at this point I'm just exhausted by the "ethical debates" going on.

And FTR, yes, separate the art from the artist if that's your way. It is mine in some ways, but it's a sliding scale. In cases like this, it's harder because it's not just someone with shitty opinions on, like, politics and the like; it's tied to someone who is front-and-centre as the focal point of this thing, and whose opinions actively spread dehumanization that causes us harm and convinces others to treat us as criminals, pariahs, and fucking pedophiles.

So buy it if you're going to, but don't go to your trans friends/family/siblings expecting understanding. Some might give it, some might not, but none of us owe that. Whether you think there's an ethical debate here or not, it's your choice, and it's the choice of us in JKR's crosshairs to react however it feels right for us to react on an individual level. In my world, I know a few people who intend on getting it second-hand, and that's fine. For me, I can't enjoy it on any level because at this point, with the level of vitriol directed at us transferring into real-world threats and misinformation being used to legislate against us, and this world's creator as such a strong focal point for so many of the arguments, it has been irrevocably tarnished for me. Whatever love I had for the books, the films, etc., has been harmed in a way I don't think is reversible. It wasn't that way at the beginning, but the relentlessness of it has worn me and many other trans people down. It's just a video game, but it's a symbol of something greater in a fight that feels more and more like a desire to just paint us all as the worst humanity has to offer. I don't feel ill will toward the talented teams that have brought this game to fruition, but I also feel no compunction to give them a pass and just support them because they were doing a job tied to something that, for many, is sullied beyond repair. Make your own decisions and know what the ramifications are, and judge for yourself whether it's worth it.

@retris: Rowling didn't make this game. AFAIK her only involvement was creating the world and the characters some 25 years ago. Comparing this to Arab countries who are actively sportswashing their image isn't really a fair comparison. There has also been zero evidence about how much money she makes per game sold. I'm sure the number isn't 0 dollars but it's going to be pretty fucking low considering how expensive AAA games are to make and how many middle men there are taking their cuts. Yet some people are acting like folks are sending tens of thousands of dollars to her GoFundMe page.

Just for the sake of argument, suppose that George Lucas came out and said something horrible. Would you then insist that actually Star Wars was always bad and that everybody should boycott Jedi Survivor, and every other Star Wars game and property?

@apewins: Sure, if George Lucas became a public activist for some horrible cause and said that the amount of Star Wars fans is proof that the majority agrees with his views, and that they will use royalties they get from Star Wars to fund organizations furthering that cause, I'd think of less of you if you acted like the victim in this situation.

Heck, it's not even controversial to say this about Orson Scott Card. The only difference between him and Rowling is that Rowling is popular.

I would absolutely stop people from buying and enjoying this game, if I could. Don't support bigots. Don't support their art. It's not even about whether or what they get paid off of this. If her stuff continues to succeed, she continues to be in the spotlight, and continues to have a soapbox to stand on and use to hurt people.

@spectralcat: Hot Take, I don't think you looked into shit.