Wednesday, April 05, 2017

Boycotts

Drama is one of those things that happens all around us all the time. Usually, it's small and unimportant to us, but sometimes important things are happening.

And those things are not always good.

Role-players seem especially prone to drama. It's part of what makes us good role-players - we get invested in things, and they are important to us.

So we get angry when a company betrays us by not behaving as we expect them to. It happens all the time, and is nothing new.

A few months back, Simon and Schuster signed a contract to publish Milo Yiannopoulos' book. This triggered a ton of calls to boycott S&S.

If you don't know who Milo is, can I come live where you live?

When (not long ago) they canceled that same contract, a ton of people started yelling about how people shouldn't end that boycott because "it was only a business decision."

Here's the thing: A boycott is an attempt to sway business decisions. That's the whole point of a boycott. So Simon and Schuster canceling the book means that the boycott was successful.

Yes, there were other things going on and the decision wasn't completely due to the boycott. It was more due to the fear of further boycotting by customers. But that's beside the point. The boycott's goal was "Keep S&S from publishing this book." And S&S decided not to publish the book.

You hear all the time that people will "vote with their wallet." And we do. Who you choose to buy from is important. Buying from McDonald's instead of Burger King means that McDonald's makes money from you and Burger King doesn't.

But that's different from a boycott.

When you boycott a brand (or line), you are telling that company, "I will not support X."  And you need to actually tell them. Really. It's voting with your wallet and your voice.

And it's relevant to gaming. Honest and for true.

Not liking a game (or game line) isn't the same as boycotting it. I don't like Munchkin, for example. It just does nothing for me, and it kinda drags in the endgame. But I'm not going to tell my friends not to buy it (if they like it - and a lot of them do). I'm not going to write Steve Jackson Games and tell them they shouldn't publish it. I'm just not going to buy it.

But I haven't bought anything from Games Workshop in more than a decade. Nor have I purchased anything that has been licensed from them. Because I've seen how poorly they've treated their fans and retailers over the years. I've seen what they do to the overall hobby.

But that ... seems to be changing. Part of that is due to the outcome of the Chapterhouse Studios lawsuit from a few years back, and part of it is new management (also as of a few years back). Either way, GW seems to be mending their ways. They're listening to fans. They're loosening their grip a bit on online sales. It's enough that I'm ... I'm thinking about jumping back in.  You know. Giving them another chance.

UPDATE: Since writing this, but before it went live, I had a couple of communications with GW customer service, and I am ending my boycott of GW product. I won't call myself a fan of their product, but I am willing to buy their things again.

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