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Steam may now remove "content that may violate the rules and standards set forth by Steam’s payment processors and related card networks and banks, or internet network providers. In particular, certain kinds of adult only content."

So far there has been a crackdown on incest games.

Recently in the news, payment processors forced Fansly to ban substance use, furry content, hypnosis, and more. So I'm sorry hentai-free and gamer-gulag gang but I implore you to do some critical thinking and read history. There will sadly have to be a queer/pervert united front.

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[-] LangleyDominos@hexbear.net 4 points 1 day ago

Apparently this wasn't Steam or Visa randomly deciding to do this. They were lobbied by an Australian NGO to remove SA and Incest material:

https://www.collectiveshout.org/

Steam wouldn't remove SA games so they went to the payment processors and complained until those companies put pressure on Valve.

Or they're just taking credit for something that was already happening. Hard to tell.

[-] BynarsAreOk@hexbear.net 59 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I'm realy not sure where the intersection between hating Gamers and the shallow reasoning Visa should be the ones to set our moral standards. Like shit you must realize they're two steps away from labelling anything LGBTQ+ as "morally deviant" too.

Yes I'm entirely aware its whataboutism but I'm not sure there are any other points one could take. I'd rather put more direct pressure from movements and whatever direct pressure on Steam one can make rather than just looking at this as some sort of W because 4chan got their fav games banned.

Steam says payment processors got a say but realy they got the final decision here. It makes no sense to imagine Steam agrees this is good for them in the future either. In the future what is to say games from a certain country must be banned because Visa says so. Might as well substitute that for the US State Department already.

This is a slippery slope where a cheap W doesn't mean its a good outlook. With still 3.5 years of Trump left and the tariff shit still going I'm not surprised if eventualy they force region locking by default. Oh you're Brazilian? I'm sorry you can't buy because Visa doesn't allow this game to be sold over there and Visa also says local payment systems should be banned(literally current news).

[-] SeducingCamel@hexbear.net 8 points 2 days ago

People always think you're defending the thing too. Like I'm not an Alex Jones supporter but when the card processors stopped supporting his site I was already thinking it's going to lead to them blocking whatever they want, even if it's legal. I absolutely agree with your morally deviant point, I can easily see this leading to anything the morons lable as "woke" getting banned

[-] MizuTama@hexbear.net 29 points 3 days ago

Well you see gamers are removed so we must critically support payment processors. /s

[-] BeamBrain@hexbear.net 31 points 3 days ago

For real, it's the same level of knee-jerk contrarianism as when I saw r/gamingcirclejerk defend microtransactions.

[-] ThermonuclearEgg@hexbear.net 7 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Oh you're Brazilian? I'm sorry you can't buy because Visa doesn't allow this game to be sold over there

Is it possible encouraging pirate-jammin like that could backfire on them though?

[-] Ithorian@hexbear.net 55 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

This is really not good. Steam is by far the largest pc platform and where most indie games make the majority of their money. The likelihood of indie LGBTQ+ games getting banned over completely benign "sexual content" is huge.

[-] BeamBrain@hexbear.net 38 points 3 days ago

Yeah, I think it's very telling that these payment processors never apply pressure to remove the racist, misogynist, violent shit on sites like Pornhub. There is no genuine moral dimension to this, it's about punishing "freaks" and "weirdos."

[-] Thordros@hexbear.net 30 points 3 days ago

Yeah, I think it's very telling that these payment processors never apply pressure to remove the racist, misogynist, violent shit on sites like Pornhub.

They did. Pornhub responded by... becoming a front-end payment processor itself.

[-] Lyudmila@hexbear.net 24 points 3 days ago

Valve could easily just go this route and extend this to be a service for the entire industry, and be almost universally lauded for saving everyone while simultaneously ratcheting their monopoly up a few notches.

Or, they could just do nothing and let the money printer keep flowing indefinitely, so it's just gonna be that.

[-] Thordros@hexbear.net 20 points 3 days ago

Or, they could just do nothing and let the money printer keep flowing indefinitely, so it's just gonna be that.

yea

[-] TheFinalCapitalist@hexbear.net 17 points 2 days ago

I could see them making the attempt. They are the company that is bruteforcing Linux into becoming a legitimate consumer operating system

[-] LENINSGHOSTFACEKILLA@hexbear.net 31 points 3 days ago

Yeah, same idea with all the laws trying to equate trans people and homosexuality to "child endangerment" or straight up pedophilia: the goal is to set precedent for removing queer content

[-] blobjim@hexbear.net 17 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I guess this is how the US gets morality-laws-with-American-characteristics. Just another aspect of the corporate censorship and surveillance state. There's another post on here about people having to submit photo ID in the UK to use certain sites. Plus the ad-tech computer-fingerprint tracking technology that has existed forever. I completely agree it's going to start being used for way more invasive and damaging kinds of censorship if it isn't already. But I doubt we'd see any article written about Steam removing a game from a sanctioned country unless maybe they're Russian or something like that.

I wonder if Valve has even gotten any complaints for payment processors though, or is this just preemptive or an excuse? And I wonder if this is more of a ruling-class consensus and not just an isolated instance.

[-] SuperNovaCouchGuy2@hexbear.net 36 points 3 days ago

content that may violate the rules and standards set forth by Steam’s payment processors and related card networks and banks, or internet network providers

Why would these companies set these standards? Its not like the average consumer cares about whether their payment processor lets them pay for both cod and nekopara.

[-] Crucible@hexbear.net 33 points 3 days ago

My understanding is that there's been legislation over the past couple years under the guise of being anti-human trafficking which targets payment processors for anything related to sex work. The processor companies have attempted to just get as many people to switch to PG content proactively instead of having to change their internal systems to comply with new standards. IIRC this happened a couple years ago to Patreon

[-] makingStuffForFun@lemmy.ml 21 points 3 days ago

I've been trying to figure this out also. These are some of the largest, greediest corporations that exist.

[-] Runcible@hexbear.net 10 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I'm not going to hold the developer of whatever godforsaken game is listed responsible until MasterCard is brought to justice for letting me use my bank/money to buy it!

For real though this is obscenely necessary for steam. All sorts of Hitler dating sims and other morally repugnant shit

[-] Lyudmila@hexbear.net 24 points 3 days ago

They're not even gonna go after the stuff that's actually repugnant.

A handful of slop asset flips with taboo subject matter will get smacked. (Most of the banned titles are incest themed.)

Then this will quietly just become a background part of the behind the scenes process used to go after LGBTQ+ content just like it has every single time.

[-] Azarova@hexbear.net 22 points 3 days ago

All sorts of Hitler dating sims and other morally repugnant shit

they absolutely do not give a fuck about these. they're going to use this as baby steps towards forcing steam to purge queer content.

[-] TheLastHero@hexbear.net 30 points 3 days ago

i-think-that let the smut go, first they came for the perverts and I'm speaking the fuck out for them before they come for me

[-] ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml 28 points 3 days ago

Jarvis, generate a meme using the "the myth of consensual sex" template, where the consenting parties are labeled "Steam" and "Gooners" and Jesus is replaced with Visa and Mastercard

[-] MayoPete@hexbear.net 23 points 3 days ago

First they came for Hunie Pop...

[-] peeonyou@hexbear.net 16 points 2 days ago

i wonder if this explains why there aren't any games that are outside the US imperial box when it comes to violence and what not.. there should be all kinds of 9/11 games and destroy the USA games.. but you won't find any

[-] ComradeOohAah@hexbear.net 22 points 3 days ago

I'm never gonna get the CCP Milker on Steam, am I? Oh well. Back to the brainwashing mines.

[-] sisatici@hexbear.net 7 points 3 days ago

Cool, I hated how incest got normalised

this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2025
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