Roblox Banned: Russia Blocks Access Over “Terrorism” and “LGBT Propaganda”
It was arguably only a matter of time, but it is now a done deal: Russia has just banned Roblox within its territory, accusing it of spreading “LGBT propaganda” and even “justifying terrorism“.
This is not the first country to block access to the gaming platform, as Turkey and Iraq had already done so previously in the interest of “protecting” children.
The success of Roblox and criticism of David Baszucki
If you only know Roblox by name, chances are you’re a millennial with very limited contact with today’s youth. For the record, it is a platform for distributing and creating online games, extremely popular with kids, which has been operating for nearly 20 years now. So far, so good.
The problem: Roblox hosts theme parks designed and thought out for little ones just as much as more mature games (sometimes in rather poor taste), but also sexual predators, scammers, and other such delights. On this subject, David Baszucki, the company’s CEO, has repeatedly been criticized for his tendency to “exploit inappropriate games for profit“. No, it’s not particularly glorious.
Lack of control in the crosshairs
So inevitably, it’s hardly surprising that a platform so quick to give free rein to, um, let’s say, the creativity of its users finds itself targeted by various countries and organizations for its lack of oversight.
Unfortunately, although it is mostly the issues mentioned above that motivate associations and individuals to denounce Roblox’s excesses, things are a tad different when the decision comes from an entire country. You guessed it: they tend to group these real risks with a desire to ban any form of opposition, particularly regarding anything related to LGBT issues.
Roskomnadzor and propaganda accusations
These are precisely the real reasons for Roblox’s ban in Russia today, according to the newspaper Reuters. The Roskomnadzor, Moscow’s media monitoring agency, stated that the platform is allegedly “filled with inappropriate content capable of negatively impacting the spiritual and moral development of children.“
As our colleagues at PC Gamer note in their report, this is a fairly accurate remark that could have sincerely applied to many aspects of the platform. Well, until the government information agency RIA Novosti justified this restriction by “the discovery of massive and repeated distribution of content justifying terrorism and extremism, calls for violent crimes, and LGBT propaganda.”
The Stalker 2 precedent and the extremism law
Note that the definition of “justifying terrorism and extremism” is particularly broad for the Kremlin. Stalker 2, for example, faced similar accusations for its content deemed “aggressively Russophobic and pro-Ukrainian“. Which, by the way, Joshua Wolens of PC Gamer found particularly unclear.
But that’s not all: since March 2024, the government has added “international LGBT movements” to its list of terrorist and extremist organizations. Concretely, it is therefore quite possible and even probable that this is what is meant in the case of Roblox.
Roblox’s official response to the ban
Perhaps the most annoying part of this affair is that Roskomnadzor does not hesitate to conflate this “LGBT propaganda” with the—very well-founded—accusations of harassment and sexual blackmail of minors. Needless to say, this isn’t likely to reduce confusion…
On the Roblox side, executives were questioned about this ban by both PC Gamer and Reuters and replied with little more than this:
“We respect the local laws and regulations of the countries in which we operate and are convinced that Roblox offers everyone a positive space conducive to learning, creating, and building enriching connections. We are deeply committed to safety and have implemented a robust set of proactive and preventive safety measures designed to detect and prevent the spread of harmful content on our platform.“
Which, effectively, answers nothing. A habit for David Baszucki and his employees.
Scarlet Deng has been dispensing JV advice and recommendations for many years, and her ancestral wisdom is invaluable. Some might be tempted to classify her as a "new recruit", but given her PC knowledge and her passion for hairy RPGs, her admirers recognize her more as a "teacher" or "senpai". In fact, here we simply prefer "grandma" to better reflect her benevolence: since her reflexes have gone soft, Doom Eternal has largely given way to Stardew Valley...
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