Google bans Doki Doki Literature Club from their store due to "sensitive themes"

[curl-6]

Chrkeller said:

curl-6 said:

This.

If private companies can conduct business however they please, then they can say refuse to serve people based on their gender/race/sexuality, or ban games if they contain LGBT+ content or criticise a government or political party, or any number of things.

Nope.  LGBT have constitutional rights that protect against discrimination.

Videogames dont have constitutional rights.

So no.  Nothing in your post is accurate.

For the last time the game takes place in highschool, which means kids here in the states.  Sexual themes, implied sex, self harm via a group of kids (which is what highschoolers are) is controversial.  Google got rid of it for brand protection.

This couldn't be a more non story.

There's nothing stopping a storefront from simply delisting a game with LGBT content and citing "adult themes" or "sensitive topics" as the reason, since it's technically not discriminating against a real person.

Sexual references or themes in teen media has not really been controversial outside of hardcore conservative circles in decades, even in the 90s it was mainstream.

If this was really about the content itself, Google would simply have refused to approve the game when it arrived on their storefront last year. But they did approve it, and sold it on their storefront for months. The game's content did not change in that time.