Edge-centric

An ongoing discussion on one of the email listservs I frequent has gotten me to thinking about -- of all things -- morality.

On Nov. 15, Sony Online Entertainment will roll out its new version of Star War Galaxies, which I've learned is called a MMORPG, for "massively multi-player online role playing game." This is not the kind of stuff your Ragged Edge editor knows much about.

And what's happening is that a game that was fairly accessible is becoming inaccessible, on the Internet. That's something your Ragged Edge Editor does understand the meaning of.

The person on the email list who's been seeking advice is visually impaired.

From the listserv:

I've managed to figure out how to play with trusted friends to follow. I also target them then I shoot what they shoot so I don't have to try to aim.

Sounds violent to me. But whatever. It's gaming, I guess.

But Sony, evidently, is lusting for the new -- perhaps simply for newness's sake:

They are totally changing this, even the key map and how you move in the game. It was mouse-based before and quite easy for me.

Other people playing the game, she says, are starting to mention that they will not be able to use this new system either, because of their disabilities. "So...does this company have to make this game accessible to us?.... I'm sad that I might not be able to continue to play."

Over the days, the story gets clearer:

The others that are also in the same boat are people with physical disabilities that cannot use both hands to maneuver in the game as they used to. The way it is set up now is very lefthand-mouse oriented. One person uses Dragon Naturally Speaking to type in the game, as they can't even use a keyboard effectively.

Right now you can play the game with just your mouse and very little keyboard usage. The new changes will have it so you have to use the WSAD keys for movement, and the mouse for steering. One person in particular only has the use of one hand and that is minimal at best. He/she can't use the new system at all because it requires two hands.

What the disabled gamers want, she says, is that Sony "keep the old way of interfacing with the game."

After discussing it with others on the email list, she says, "I will write Sony Online Entertainment or try to place a call and see if I can't get some answers."

One person on the list tells her,

At this time there is no case law to my knowledge that supports the idea of commercial internet websites having to be accessible to people with disabilities, including those who are blind. The one case that has gone to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (Southwest Airlines was the defendant) was decided in favor of the defendant.

I am always surprised that things like this continue to startle and amaze me. I should be wiser now, I tell myself.

And I think of morality. What Sony Online Entertainment is doing seems immoral to me. There doesn't appear to be any reason to change something to make it inaccessible. The reason, I suspect, is simply that programmers like to do new stuff. They get bored.

To hell with gimps that can't keep up!

And it isn't even illegal.

I wonder why everything today is couched in economic rather than moral terms? We have all that rightwing quasi-religious crap going on in this country, and the really immoral stuff continues unabated. Nobody even seems to notice it. To call what Sony is doing "immoral" seems faintly ridiculous, doesn't it? And yet...

And yet I think it is immoral. And I suspect the 3 of you reading this blog think so, too.

I think that a lot of our problem is that the Religious Right wingnuts have stolen "morality" and turned it into a codeword for stuff we can't stand to be associated with. "Immorality" is being used incorrectly.

And then I think about leaders -- real, true, honest leaders -- the kind of leaders who in past rights movements would use words like "morality" without embarrassment. Well, that was then. This is now. I look around for such leaders and don't find them.

This morning, reading through my email, I come across this message from her, to the list:

Well I tried calling Sony Online Entertainment yesterday and pretty much all I got was, "Hi, this is Will. Can I help you?" When I told him why I was calling he said he couldn't help me. When I asked if he could transfer me to someone that could he said "no."

I don't know what to do now.

And neither, I think, does anyone else. That's the problem.