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[Audioboxer]

Pretty sure they're making the best out of a bad situation here. It was flagged (and by their own admission rightly so) yet still made its way in knowing that this was a likely outcome.

Pre-Kekistan flag. There were people in this topic who were saying fire someone right now who even kept saying kek is not the kek flag (because some posters were saying but kek means lol?). Kek originated from World of Warcraft to mean lol. That could get flagged as a cultural reference in 2015/2016 but if it's harmless at inception why would anyone care?

It's kind of like if Bungie put the 👌 sign on a piece of armour or something resembling it in 2015/2016 and then lots of people started saying a white supremacist works at Bungie as the okay sign is now co-opted in 2017. There have been posts by users saying it's better now not to use the okay sign.

 

[TatteredHat]

Their explanation sounds plausible enough that I'm willing to accept it was an unfortunate coincidence.

 

[Atomski]

Yup

but hey as long as they keep shutting this shit down and making example of them

I suppose thats the best we can do?

it probably gives them more exposure in a bad way to. Some will see it as anti freedom of speech and go further into their bubble.

Plus its there for their lulz and I'm sure they are loving its press attention now.

 

[Stallion Dan]

Could be intentional trying to sneak it in, could just be an artist ripping off artwork and not realising what he is ripping off.

Edit, I see buried in thread replies that it was innocent.

 

[Par Score]

Fucking feels good to be so right. Everyone who called this a reference to the stupid kekistan flag, who called the artist a "white nationalist", who demanded for the artist to be publically shamed- eat fucking crow and bite me. Y'all shitty people, and I hope y'all feel righteous in your fight against coincidence .

I was right as per Bungie themselves. Fuck outta here.

Ooh fucking look, they even reference the chevron iconography that I fuckig brought up in emblems and class designs- and y'all argued me on that too. Fuck y'all.

Oh please, please forgive me for not instantly giving some games company the benefit of the doubt when it comes to coded White Supremacism.

Edit, I see buried in thread replies that it was innocent.

Bungie saying it was innocent in some arse covering PR is not the same as it being innocent.

 

[Apt101]

Why is everything turned into a white supremacist thing? Wasn't kek translated lol in WoW when you were the other faction? How do we go from that to white supremacy? And who decides who owns something? Who makes the most memes?

That is where it originated.

I had no idea about this flag, or the alt-reich's ironic worship of kek. They are so embarrassing. I can't believe so many of them are working adults.

 

[thepotatoman]

I'm satisfied to know it was designed in 2015. To my knowledge there's no connection to anything bad that far back. Just the word kekistan was barely getting started back then. It's also a good job on whoever it was that caught it before release, and not so good it still went through to release.

I still think it's worth having a little bit of a guilty until proven innocent stance on this sort of thing, just because of how many do hide behind the "coincidence" stance, but not to the point of doxing or anything like that before there's even a chance to prove innocence.

I get that kek wasn't considered so bad at time of review, but man, is it unfortunate that both the typography and color scheme somehow perfectly matched the Kekistan flag later. It kinda is still unbelievable.

 

[Strazyplus]

Why don't they just retexture it, remove the symbolism and put a peace / anti-hate symbol on it. surely there been who liked it because of the symbol of their group. now they would be showing support for their opposite of their views. they would take the armor off in defeat.

Only bad thing is that some small internet hate group got noticed by senpai (the news & public attention).

 

[thepotatoman]

Why don't they just retexture it, remove the symbolism and put a peace / anti-hate symbol on it. surely there been who liked it because of the symbol of their group. now they would be showing support for their opposite of their views. they would take the armor off in defeat.

Only bad thing is that some small internet hate group got noticed by senpai (the news & public attention).

They probably will. The client side patch will take a while to make it through cert.

 

[thepotatoman]

Also, I'm like 95% sure the Kekistan flag was astro turfed. It went from being nowhere to being everywhere between Jan 31 and Feb 1st 2017, even though the comments on it were generally negative, complaining about how obvious the nazi reference was (note: not complaining it's nazi reference in the first place, just how obvious it was).

Just a side thing I picked up over the whole ordeal. Astro turf or not, it's very clear it's an alt right symbol now.

 

[Audioboxer]

Also, I'm like 95% sure the Kekistan flag was astro turfed. It went from being nowhere to being everywhere between Jan 31 and Feb 1st 2017, even though the comments on it were generally negative, complaining about how obvious the nazi reference was (note: not complaining it's nazi reference in the first place).

Just a side thing I picked up over the whole ordeal.

4chan and trolls seemed to push for it, and then the white supremacists enjoyed the symbolic nature of the flag appearing similar to the Nazi flag and co-opted kek/Kekistan. As posted in here the flag is now seen along with demonstrators of white supremacy.

As Stazyplus said

Only bad thing is that some small internet hate group got noticed by senpai (the news & public attention).

This whole scenario including people saying Bungie were 100% white supremacists and praising Kekistan has just gaslight 4chan and trolls into fits of laughter, laughing at the left. Not that they need to be given any ammunition to do that, that's their whole sad existence. Trying to create false flags and concern-troll thousands of people.

Sadly it kind of worked here as a vocal minority really did go all in and proclaim 100% complicity before Bungie could even prepare the conclusion they now have. People then don't like the idea an entity on the internet they dislike will be mocking/laughing at them, so often double down and want to continue believing their initial survey of the situation. Unfortunately here, no matter how noble you thought you were being in your cause against white supremacy, this individual instance has not been one of taking down a Nazi(s) within Bungie HQ.

Time to accept the apology, reasoning and patch and move on, and not make the situation any worse (conspiracy theories here are only going to stir the pot further and lead to more trolling of us).

 

[Kinyou]

Oh please, please forgive me for not instantly giving some games company the benefit of the doubt when it comes to coded White Supremacism.



Bungie saying it was innocent in some arse covering PR is not the same as it being innocent.

Bold strategy by Bungie to risk it all by covering up for a white supremacist. You really think they'd do that when anyone of the hundreds of employees could just look up the original files and leak it to the press?

 

[Militant17]

Oh please, please forgive me for not instantly giving some games company the benefit of the doubt when it comes to coded White Supremacism.



Bungie saying it was innocent in some arse covering PR is not the same as it being innocent.

Wow you are deep in that echo chamber.

No one asked you to give them the benefit of the doubt, level headed people were saying let Bungie investigate what happened and punish people if it's found they intentionally did this. You and a lot of others seemingly just wanted people to lose their jobs without due process, something that could potentially cause legal issues for Bungie. So they're in a shit situation really, move to slow and some say their complicit with racism but move to fast and open themselves up to legal repercussions.

As for you not believing the explanation well that just proves you already had your mind made up on whether they were guilty or not.

 

[thepotatoman]

4chan and trolls seemed to push for it, and then the white supremacists enjoyed the symbolic nature of the flag appearing similar to the Nazi flag and co-opted kek/Kekistan. As posted in here the flag is now seen along with demonstrators of white supremacy.

As Stazyplus said



This whole scenario including people saying Bungie were 100% white supremacists and praising Kekistan has just gaslight 4chan and trolls into fits of laughter, laughing at the left. Not that they need to be given any ammunition to do that, that's their whole sad existence. Trying to create false flags and concern-troll thousands of people.

Sadly it kind of worked here as a vocal minority really did go all in and proclaim 100% complicity before Bungie could even prepare the conclusion they now have. People then don't like the idea an entity on the internet they dislike will be mocking/laughing at them, so often double down and want to continue believing their initial survey of the situation. Unfortunately here, no matter how noble you thought you were being in your cause against white supremacy, this individual instance has not been one of taking down a Nazi within Bungie HQ.

Time to accept the apology, reasoning and patch and move on, and not make the situation any worse.

Definitely they wanted there to be either a nazi or confederacy reference. I'm just suprised it went from 0 to 100 without there being something where people talk about how much they like it. Mostly it's just people saying they don't like it, and then some commenter shuting down discussion before it begins by simply saying "this is the flag now". Feels very weird, especially considering we know that some form of astroturfing is happening according to the government. I wouldn't be surprised this is one of them.

A certain big name alt right twitter account did post it Feb 1st, so some of that could be part of his ability to shape the community on his own, but still feels unnatural to me considering its status Jan 31st.

Oh well, whatever. Just was an interesting weird thing to me. Doesn't matter much either way.

 

[Audioboxer]

Definitely they wanted there to be either a nazi or confederacy reference. I'm just suprised it went from 0 to 100 without there being something where people talk about how much they like it. Mostly it's just people saying they don't like it, and then some commenter shuting down discussion before it begins by simply saying "this is the flag now". Feels very weird, especially considering we know that some form of astroturfing is happening according to the government, and I wouldn't be surprised this is one of them.

A certain big name alt right twitter account did post it Feb 1st, so some of that could be part of his ability to shape the community on his own, but still feels unnatural to me considering it's status Jan 31st.

Oh well, whatever. Just was an interesting weird thing to me. Doesn't matter much either way.

There's a huge crossover between basement dwelling Conservative trolls and white supremacy. So, if the trolls decide to attack the left somehow, you can bet your boots the white supremacists are like kids in a candy shop to joining in. Both of them want blog and article posts written in the MSM such as "Bungie are complicit in Kekistan and apologise". Or with Kekistan in general, getting news stations to run pieces on it (MSNBC apparently did https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdCq46RTm6k ~ Source on this is terrible so watch in incognito mode to save your YT recommendations). They get a rise off of what they perceive to be outrage culture. Just look at the YouTube comments around anything to do with this armour, or comments on social media/blogs/articles. 90% of it is "hur hur liberals" or "people were seriously upset and angry over this?" or "omg kek means lol what is wrong with outrage culture?". Then a lot of stuff far nastier and explicit than that.

As I said unfortunately here they've had their field day of laughing because Occam's Razor really did occur. The explanation Bungie gave at the start after a left leaning website (Waypoint) ran an article was the truth. Or I don't know if it's okay to call Waypoint left leaning, it's not a political site, but at the very least the article did appear to think very likely it was intentional. Some people didn't want to ever entertain the original apology and statement of no intent and went on to create the circus that lasted 48~72 hours till Bungie investigated further internally (checking dates of creation/reasons why created and obviously internal communication between teams/designers/coders).

It'll be another one of these internet dramas the trolls chalk up to "haha liberals and the left trolled". Not much can be done about it now (other than NOT continuing to double down on conspiracy theories), just chalk it up to a situation that showed yes, sometimes in life coincidences can happen and things can have unintended results. Not everything is 100% sinister and ill-intent. Especially not if we're talking graphics in a video game.

 

[Andronicus]

After how many similar elements in a piece does something stop being a coincidence?

So it was flagged, but for something else & bungie says its was a coincidence it closely resembled a hate sign...ok. Obviously bungie will try to cover their ass but at the same time this isn't some bungie hail hydra shit.
All it really takes is someone to say "oh wait i didn't mean it like that" ( eg. pewdiepie) to rile people up on both sides even worse. I don't buy that it was innocent but this is the route they are going with the story to kill the attention and end the conversation.

As for the whole "digital lynch mob" & "kill this persons career now!" shit some of you are insinuating that was happening in here (as far as i cant tell which wasn't), do you not believe in consequences for actions? or have you just never had to face any?

 

[davepoobond]

After how many similar elements in a piece does something stop being a coincidence?

So it was flagged, but for something else & bungie says its was a coincidence it closely resembled a hate sign...ok. Obviously bungie will try to cover their ass but at the same time this isn't some bungie hail hydra shit.
All it really takes is someone to say "oh wait i didn't mean it like that" ( eg. pewdiepie) to rile people up on both sides even worse. I don't buy that it was innocent but this is the route they are going with the story to kill the attention and end the conversation.

As for the whole "digital lynch mob" & "kill this persons career now!" shit some of you are insinuating that was happening in here (as far as i cant tell which wasn't), do you not believe in consequences for actions? or have you just never had to face any?

Supposedly the armor piece was designed in 2015 and the kekistan flag rose to rapid exposure in early 2017. The only reason it was flagged was it's association with "lol" rather than white supremacy since that connection wouldn't exist for a year+

 

[Takuan]

People still calling for a lynching need take a look at themselves in the mirror. Y'all blinded by bloodthirst.

 

[mebizzle]

After how many similar elements in a piece does something stop being a coincidence?

So it was flagged, but for something else & bungie says its was a coincidence it closely resembled a hate sign...ok. Obviously bungie will try to cover their ass but at the same time this isn't some bungie hail hydra shit.
All it really takes is someone to say "oh wait i didn't mean it like that" ( eg. pewdiepie) to rile people up on both sides even worse. I don't buy that it was innocent but this is the route they are going with the story to kill the attention and end the conversation.

As for the whole "digital lynch mob" & "kill this persons career now!" shit some of you are insinuating that was happening in here (as far as i cant tell which wasn't), do you not believe in consequences for actions? or have you just never had to face any?

A hate sign that has only been a hate sign very recently. They said they flagged it 2 years ago. If you don't believe that then you don't believe that but it would be such a shitstorm if it ever came out that this was a cover-up that the rational thing to do is accept that they have done their due diligence and are being forthright in this situation. I understand the skepticism, it's hard to trust anything these days, much less a big company, but with how easily information leaks to the public it's hard to believe in conspiracy. If major state governments can't keep shit like this completely under wraps, how can a game developer?

As far as the second part, you are literally doing the "digital lynch mob" thing in the second half of the sentence that also says it isn't happening.

 

[SmiteOfHand]

They said they flagged it 2 years ago.

Not true. The timing is vague.

Although the design wasn't emulative of the meme in question, the armor piece was eventually flagged by another team responsible for reviewing content for cultural, geographical, and other sensitive issues.

 

[Andronicus]

A hate sign that has only been a hate sign very recently. They said they flagged it 2 years ago. If you don't believe that then you don't believe that but it would be such a shitstorm if it ever came out that this was a cover-up that the rational thing to do is accept that they have done their due diligence and are being forthright in this situation. I understand the skepticism, it's hard to trust anything these days, much less a big company, but with how easily information leaks to the public it's hard to believe in conspiracy. If major state governments can't keep shit like this completely under wraps, how can a game developer?

As far as the second part, you are literally doing the "digital lynch mob" thing in the second half of the sentence that also says it isn't happening.

That's what you took from that? lmao i'm done

or do i have to say if said person was to have done this willfully? is that not implied? or is everyone here just bloodthirsty?

 

[MistakenMobius]

By the way, someone in here asked what it looked like on a chest piece earlier

Another arm screencap

That second higher res picture does make it look more like >| |< than a K due to the outline around the shapes. As in > attached to a straight line |. Yes, |< can still read as a K. My favourite band is |<orn. You can read that as Korn (not my favourite band... lol). Just saying it appears the artist(s) have used lines/arrows for the whole design (shapes), not actually typing a K into the graphics design software.

edit: I think I'm partially colour blind. I went back and looked at the original image for this topic and you can make out a faint darker grey around the |<. It genuinely looked like one solid grey K to me prior to now, such as actually typing K on a keyboard, not piecing together | and <. The border around it is clearer to me in the second image above though than the original for this topic.

Reminds me of a restaurant/bar/club in Luxembourg (probably 10years old)
https://ikki.lu

 

[Kinyou]

After how many similar elements in a piece does something stop being a coincidence?

So it was flagged, but for something else & bungie says its was a coincidence it closely resembled a hate sign...ok. Obviously bungie will try to cover their ass but at the same time this isn't some bungie hail hydra shit.
All it really takes is someone to say "oh wait i didn't mean it like that" ( eg. pewdiepie) to rile people up on both sides even worse. I don't buy that it was innocent but this is the route they are going with the story to kill the attention and end the conversation.

It would be much easier for Bungie to just say that they fired the guy. Covering it up would be a gigantic risk for them that outweighs any possible benefit.

As for the whole "digital lynch mob" & "kill this persons career now!" shit some of you are insinuating that was happening in here (as far as i cant tell which wasn't), do you not believe in consequences for actions? or have you just never had to face any?

Sure, but how about knowing first how guilty that person actually is?

 

[Andronicus]

It would be much easier for Bungie to just say that they fired the guy. Covering it up would be a gigantic risk for them that outweighs any possible benefit.


Sure, but how about knowing first how guilty that person actually is?

we'll never know, probably better with these internet sleuths digging things up etc

 

[ZeoVGM]

Fucking feels good to be so right. Everyone who called this a reference to the stupid kekistan flag, who called the artist a "white nationalist", who demanded for the artist to be publically shamed- eat fucking crow and bite me. Y'all shitty people, and I hope y'all feel righteous in your fight against coincidence .

I was right as per Bungie themselves. Fuck outta here.

Ooh fucking look, they even reference the chevron iconography that I fuckig brought up in emblems and class designs- and y'all argued me on that too. Fuck y'all.

Plenty of that happening in your post already. Dunno if anyone else can spare any.

 

[Kinyou]

we'll never know

Well then I'd rather not demand any consequences and leave it to the people who do know

 

[Audioboxer]

Reminds me of a restaurant/bar/club in Luxembourg (probably 10years old)
https://ikki.lu

Jeez, it's almost like they just copied that and added 4 lines lol

Then again apparently the Kekistan flag was copied from a Lake Kek logo - http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=249026786&postcount=368 Which may well be intentional, but I've never heard Lake Kek mentioned before.

 

[HiredN00bs]

As for the whole "digital lynch mob" & "kill this persons career now!" shit some of you are insinuating that was happening in here (as far as i cant tell which wasn't), do you not believe in consequences for actions? or have you just never had to face any?

Are those the only options? Does a critical examination of the evidence have any bearing on forming an appropriate reaction?