I have barely touched anything lately because work and life and whatnot but I finally found a rackable 6 foot barbell for the power cage in my 7x7 shed gym so that rocks!...but fam...we need to chat.
*loosens tie, puts on backwards baseball cap and turns chair around backwards before sitting down to rap with y'all*
So little crim ****ing LOVED Dukes of Hazard. General Lee, stars and bars and all that. Then I learned who General Lee was and what the stars and bars represented. I couldn't get down with dem Duke boys anymore. Especially after the year I spent in deep south Georgia when I was in 5th grade where they refer to the Civil War as the War of the Northern Aggression. Now, am I saying that from historical context we should wipe out all traces of the confederacy? Nope, we need to learn about that ****. But if you can not have it in a game with a simple bit of code, why not do that so it doesn't ruin somebody else's experience?
Another more timely example. An African, Ugandan to be exact, student noticed the baller Sonic watch argyle gifted me way back. He immediately pointed it out and we started chatting a bit. He oddly asked how I felt about Knuckles. Weird. Then I figured out why. The Ugandan Knuckles thing. Turns out he actively hates Knuckles because of what people associate him with, cheap and low effort knockoffs. He said he used to love Knuckles as a kid but this meme really got under his skin. Now, clearly Sega didn't do this but if they did and they realized they could do something about it, I am sure they would. Not because they are good but why affect sales or public perception of the product?...oh wait, Sega did absolutely do this same thing with Yakuza 3 on PS4. They removed the bit about the trans person chasing Kazuma. I just beat the game this year and the absence of those substories did absolutely nothing that affected the game negatively. In fact, it was better off for it. Since Yakuza 3's whole point is how to be a man and how important it is for men to show love and be vulnerable with each other, that substory chain contributes nothing and just muddies the point. Be a great man but please continue punching down on marginalized people?
Which is to say, the flip side of representation mattering is that it is not there to be used to exclude others. If something can be done, it should be done to make people feel better about it. It's not just about putting marginalized people into things, it's about bringing them in to older things as well if possible. The GTA whatever with the Confederate flag shirt guy still exists. You know what else still exists? The GTA where they mission is Kill All the Haitians too. But it won't be in this trilogy collection because that's not ok. And it's ok to change things that are not ok. Confederate flag shirt guy will still be scum, the shirt doesn't need to be there. But if it makes people more comfortable to play the dumb crime game sans a literal symbol of hate, that's cool with me.
I'm not about hate (of any kind) or symbols of hate. Having said that, I'm also very much about creative freedom/freedom of expression in general. I find it easy to accept symbols/messages (grounded in real life or otherwise) I may not like within artistic expressions (of all types). I think we run into trouble when we start censoring expression, no matter how distasteful. Again, to emphasize, I'm not pro-hate or pro-violence/anything dark. Dude, I'm a man of love. And I understand those who feel differently. I'm not trying to start a social/political discussion. I just wanted to voice my cliffs-notes views. Love to all my brother!
Fair point, crim. I would suggest the flag as used in the game (being on a character's shirt) is just a shorthand way of making it clear the guy is a redneck who might be a racist. Art should be able to include such a character for narrative purposes without anyone feeling excluded. Again, most of the characters in GTA games, playable and NPC, are murderers with animosity toward different groups, and it's often parodied and mocked and exposed for what it is. I know this is old school, but I think we're better off as a society when we don't just bury/hide all that but address it intelligently and sometimes subtly in art, comedy, etc. Richard Pryor did more to open up my eyes to racism than anyone saying, "Don't do that!"
And I understand those who feel differently. I'm not trying to start a social/political discussion. I just wanted to voice my cliffs-notes views. Love to all my brother! 
