I'm pretty sure most people here read r/leagueoflegends, but people might have thoughts on this, so posting.
Svenskeren has been fined $2.5k and suspended to last SK Gaming's first three games in groups at Worlds in an
unambiguously critical ruling by Riot, standing in contrast to SK's
somewhat more halfhearted apology. The short version is that Svenskeren changed his summoner name to taipeichingchong while on the SEA servers and taunted a SEA player he was talking to at the time about it. Riot have fairly clear-cut policies on racism with a wide variety of punishments available for the offence, and players were briefed on cultural sensitivity beforehand. Fines have been handed out fairly liberally for not following policy to the letter and a bunch of players have been LCS-banned for toxicity, so it's not very surprising.
Most people who are speaking out about it seem to think this is a good thing, which surprises me because it has a serious effect on SK as a team; I expected it to be more unpopular as a result, especially when many LoL players would think nothing of saying similar stuff themselves and many complaints have been made about punishments instated against LCS players who frequently do comparable things in solo queue (both for more punishments and for fewer...). But people on Reddit actually have surprised me; before Riot's ruling, they were condemning the idiocy of a player who would go to an international tournament and racially caricature the host country. Context is important here, but it also appears to be personal. It seems a lot of people already disliked Svenskeren and fredy because they are well-known for flaming in solo queue, which Svenskeren has received official warnings for before, so if he didn't already have a reputation, he has one now. Svenskeren is a dumbass.
I think it's a good thing that Riot is actively condemning this and trying to clean up their scene. It's a necessary and significant step towards making their international game more inclusive and respectful, as well as making it more accessible and professional. It's also not new; Riot recently instated that policy for faster punishments against people who use racial slurs ingame and Lyte et al. have been working pretty hard to convince people LoL isn't That Racist anymore.
But I am really surprised at the apparent lack of controversy given all the drama wrt. gamer culture recently. The LoL, especially r/lol, community is super fickle and Cop just got released so they need a new hatewagon, but they're not big fans of the esports team for a number of reasons -- and they love to make the same kind of racist jokes themselves about players
and champions, although the mods ostensibly delete them as of Lucian's prerelease. Where are the SK fans, are they just getting buried by happy TSM supporters or are they too ashamed to say anything?
My not-very-unique opinion is that the organisation (and to a lesser extent, the teammates, but they weren't directly responsible here) is at fault for not taking Svenskeren in hand long ago when he developed a reputation for toxicity and began receiving warnings, and they should have done better by everyone, including the team and their fans, and impressed that this is his
job. SK has a history of employing notorious flamers as well, so they should know they have to keep their players in hand by now, more than if they went about their job sensibly.
Thoughts? Anyone think it was unfair, feel sorry for nRated, or believe a different punishment was warranted or would be more elegant, or just want to complain about how Reddit are as usual hypocrites? I'm really interested in people who sincerely believe this is overblown (not devil's advocates) because the community is being so meek and mild about racism for once. Also SK fans, I'm not seeing many of those flairs LOL
edit: here is a nice venn diagram I made, entitled 'people who think svenskeren fucked up' because that is at least a noncontroversial statement most people seem to be defaulting to.