Actually you can clearly see on both rating boards that we’d easily fit within the lower rating. Our gore isn’t overly realistic and overall pretty minimal. There is an argument that can be made for 18, but I think it’s fair to say that an argument for Teen would be just as easy.
Sources:
ESRB - Xbox – ESRB Website
PEGI
Wrong. There are no laws (at least in the US) prohibiting minors from purchasing M or R rated media. There is pressure on companies to ensure that they don’t sell that sorta content to minors, but there’s nothing legally restricting them to do so. In fact, attempts to make such laws have been struck down as being unconstitutional in the past. Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association - Wikipedia
You can argue there is a moral obligation to restrict who can access our content, but that again conflicts with the fact that there is no official ranking on the game itself. With that being said, putting in a “don’t ask don’t tell” 18+ policy like you suggested would do nothing to fulfill that moral obligation. We all know it’d do nothing to stop minors from joining and it wouldn’t magically remove them from our community. If anything, it’d be worse since we’re actively pretending like the obvious isn’t happening. With all due respect, it’s a silly argument to make.
I respectfully disagree due to the points I made above this.
I’ll just reiterate an earlier point… Pretending like you’re actually 18+ when you do nothing to weed out minors and remove confirmed persons who are underage doesn’t grant you the moral/ethical high-ground. I’d argue that it puts you in a worse spot. On that note, we’re not the only server who doesn’t enforce an 18+ rule. We are the largest, but not the only one.
To summarize, an argument coming from, “Think of the children, make it 18+” is a bit silly since again, you can argue where the actual age rating should be. There’s a clear argument for both sides and without any official board ranking us (which wouldn’t be possible anyways due to the online interactions), it’s a bit of a pointless argument to make. It gets a bit worse when you’re suggesting to put in a policy that is actively deceptive in nature.
Having an 18+ “don’t ask don’t tell” policy is nothing but a CYA move, it does nothing to address the actual problems you’re presenting. Which, honestly, fair enough. I understand why people do it, and hell, we might even do it at some point. But pretending that it actually solves anything is just wrong.
This is all wildly off topic now. If you want to continue the discussion, I ask that you make a new topic. (I arguably should have done the same)