Fenixp: I'd also like to point out that the pure usage of the word 'censorship' on a single store which refuses to sell a product is ... Just stupid, really. I would understand the argument if someone said "GOG is censoring all porn games on their site" - fair enough, they sort of are as they refuse to release this particular kind of game, within the boundaries of their own store of course. I would also understand arguments of censorship if all major stores refused to sell Hatred - yeah, okay, I get it, you quite literally can't purchase the title. But there is no habit on GOG's part to have any basis to assume that this is a political decision, nor are there limited sources from which you may purchase Hatred, in fact the biggest PC game retailer out there is going to sell the game. In this context, using the word "Censorship" just completely strips it of any meaning.
Well, as said in a previous post, I'm not really convinced by that argument. there is an ambiguity there. Maybe between the "act of censorship" and the "state of censorship".
See, by this logic, if all stores had chosen to not sell Hatred, then all stores would be exerting censorship. But if one store (or the biggest store, or half the stores) did sell Hatred, then the remaining stores (who refuse to sell it) would not be exerting censorship. Even though their act, motive, mindset, would be the same.
It would also imply that, if all the other stores were refusing to sell Hatred, then GOG's decision would be of a very different nature than now. They would be awful censors by acting as they do now, and they aren't now thanks to other shops. If no other shop sold Hatred, then GOG would be "morally forced" to sell it ? Their refusal to do it would suddenly turn all the other stores, and themselves, into censors ?
Again, the issue may simply be the ambiguous word and its slippery, easily shifting, meaning. But I am not at ease with this argument. I have no clear position towards it. And no analogy helps here : If you take "mobbing" as the act of collectively ganging up against a scapegoat, then is one person's hostility already "mobbing", or does it start when it becomes collective and consensual enough ? If you take "discrimination", then one person applying it is sufficient to accuse him of discriminatory behaviour, you don't need it to be collective. "Discrimination" and "mobbing" (as I used the word, maybe it's being used in a broader sense nowadays) define the required qantity of actors. But does "censorship" ?
Plus, even if "censorship" works like (my understanding of) "mobbing", would it imply a moral obligation of behaviour shift ? It happened to me : I used to dislike and express contempt towards a student in high school, and ceased to when too many started to do the same, scapegoating him collectively. It became nasty, and made me change my attitude towards him (not my opinion) as well as my attitude towards the others (I became sarcastic towards their sarcasms). In that situation, it's like the numbers, the attitude of unrelated others, changed the nature of my own attitude, and forced me to ditch it (there was no way, there, to "stay myself", the very meaning of "myself" was being redefined by the circumstances). So, does "censorship" function the same way, becoming a thing only past some threshold, when becoming a group thing ? Would the nature of GOG's decision change, and warrant a u-turn, depending on how many other shops act the same way ? Or is GOG's action just GOG's action no matter what's going on around, having to be judged only as GOG's action ?
In other words, would you define (and judge) GOG's refusal to sell Hatred differently, depending on whether they are chronologically the first ones or the last ones to decide that ?