In the wake of Activision removing Nickmercs’ Call of Duty Operator skin after his negative comments about the LGBTQ community, at least some other high-profile content creators are weighing in on it. One of them is longtime Call of Duty player Dr Disrespect, who made big show uninstalled the game over streaming and said he wouldn’t “consider” playing Call of Duty again unless Activision publicly apologized to [Nickmercs] or repack it.
Previously, Dr. Disrespect called the procedure “pathetic”, later expanding on his comments that this was a bad PR move on Call of Duty’s part:
“This one is cruel. Why again?” he said. So, what I have to do, what we have to do, is uninstall the number one game. Don’t be mistaken, this year’s Call of Duty is the worst in the franchise, but this is a decision that CoD’s PR marketing team made, I’ll tell you now, it’s a decision difficult to comprehend.”
It all happened yesterday as controversy raged over Nickmercs’ comments, which were over a post showing anti-LGBTQ protesters attacking LGBTQ supporters during Pride.
Nick followed this up by framing it as a “parental choice” issue about gender education in schools, a frequent discussion point for Republicans, and his PR said a larger statement would be issued detailing the issue. Instead, he issued a tweet merely thanking his supporters for standing by him.
Dr Disrespect is probably the most well-known creator to make a statement most supportive of Nick. While announcing his plan to quit Call of Duty rather than apologise, he also said:
“That’s one thing. I’ll talk about awards, we’ll talk about sports. Those are the topics we’ll talk about, but the one thing we won’t talk about is politics. These people online, they’re extremists one way or another. We don’t have time. We’re here to put on a show.” .
This is a common fallacy, as supporting Nick in this situation is a political statement in and of itself. Saying nothing as a great creator is also his form of speech.
This isn’t the first time Doc has threatened to quit or uninstall Call of Duty, which he did several times before returning to it. He is currently developing a competing shooter, DEADROP, which is an extraction-based game with blockchain elements including NFTs that were initially sold to get access to older versions.
Dr Disrespect was also infamously banned from Twitch temporarily in 2019 for Flocking inside the bathroom at E3, after which his badge was also scrapped. This act would also likely be a violation of California privacy invasion laws. He was later reinstated, but later permanently banned from Twitch in 2020 for reasons that were never disclosed.
As for his claims, there’s no doubt Activision won’t issue a public apology to Nickmercs, and it would be surprising if they reversed course on selling his customer skin. I suppose it could be brought back in the future under some sort of claim that it was a “temporary hold”, but who knows. I also wonder what it might look like to hold the appearance of similarity between publisher and creator. There’s probably a relevant provision there, in case, you know, a situation just like that.
We’ll see if any further action is taken, or if Doc, Nick, or any of the other players continue this saga. Nick hasn’t personally been banned from Call of Duty or anything like that, though I assume he won’t be playing with Doc at any point after his supposed “uninstall”. For as long as this has been going on… I asked if Doc had any additional comment beyond what was already said, and will update if I hear back.
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