UPDATE 2022/9/4 (CST):
GMT abraker's reply to this post and the further replies has made me anxious about this post - this post itself might have already posed political threat to the osu! community's atmosphere/environment. Sadly it doesn't seem that I can delete my post if that happens. So if you are to post your opinion here, please, PLEASE ensure that your replies are unbiased and don't contain anything about your political standings - read the paragraph below carefully. This post may end up being locked by mods if something happens but I doubt that all osu! forum mods work 24/7. If that happens and the mods aren't here to stop those people in time... oh my god.

First,

this post is about politics and osu!. I do NOT want to see anything that would hurt the osu! community to happen because of this post(eg. censorships) so I will refrain from talking about my political standings. I DO NOT want replies with express or implied political standing statements here. THIS POST IS NOT EXPLICITLY "FOR" DIRECT POLITICAL DISCUSSIONS. If this post ITSELF was already a risk for osu! or the community to get caught in a vortex of politics, DM me and I'll delete this post as soon as I see your message... if I could. I haven't posted in the osu! forums before.

Now, let's get started.

I am going to cover two major happenings on the Earth by the time of the writing:

A. The Taiwan Problem.

B. The Russian 'Special Military Operation' in Ukraine.

Here are my questions, that I would like to ask the community:

1. Currently Taiwan is listed in the leaderboards as an independent entry with its flag being the ROC's flag (NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH TODAY'S PRC!). Since this leaderboard's title is 'country' instead of 'country or region' the osu! team might be in favor of Taiwanese Independency. HKSAR and Macao's situation is similar, only the flags are really the SARs' own proper flags, respectively.
(ONCE AGAIN, NO STATEMENT OF YOUR STANDINGS ON ANY POLITICAL PROBLEMS, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE ONES REFERRED IN THIS POST!)

1.1 Is it likely that some bastard would tell the world about this, make osu! catch the Chinese government and the CPC's attention, and then cause a heavy blow in the osu! community of Mainland China, with leaving players and censorships? Or even worse, since Chinese osu! players has done quite a lot of contributions to the global osu! community (eg. osu!mania), will that assumed incident affect the global community as well?

1.2 Assuming the osu! team is considering about changes to the country info, then:

1.2.1 What kind of changes would make osu! politically safer (less likely to face, or might face less powerful political disputes)? Changes in China's favor (eg. "Taiwan" to "Taiwan (China)" and "Hong Kong" to "Hong Kong SAR (China)" or something like that), changes that are more neutral (eg. "country" to "country or region" only, or "Chinese Taiwan" like the Olympic solution), or keeping the current does-not-seem-so-friendly-to-China setup?

1.2.2 Considering only the standing of Australia, what will the osu! team do to the country info in order to make the game politically safe, at least in Australia?

a brief note: minecraft has changed the "hong kong"（香港） into "hong kong SAR" （香港特别行政区）in its language settings; the mainland chinese people has two different reactions: some people were pleased/a little bit excited for this change, while some other people thought that it has had to be this way ever since the very beginning so there's nothing to be excited about.

2. On the conflict between Ukraine and Russia:

2.1 Which side should the osu! team stand with to just be politically safe?

2.2 Are there already words against either sides on osu!? Or even worse, bad happenings like malicious reports or argues in the osu! chat/forums?

3. Has osu! stated anywhere that it would be neutral on any political issues? If not yet, would announcing this to the world cause trouble for osu!?

Now. Before you compose your reply I would really like to carefully read the first paragraphs of this first post where the caveats were described once again. This is our community. To be responsible for it is a must for all of us.

I think the osu! community should side with both Russia and Ukraine and try to sort the whole thing out

If it proves to be a problem seems like just changing countries to countries/regions would be enough to have plausible deniability without siding with either party in global conflicts.

with the ukraine war, I dont see why osu needs to do anything yet.

As for asking if there have been arguments/discussions about these topics in osu chats/forums, yes there have been and I don't see the issue, people should be allowed to have opinions and I don't see why we should stop them as long as they stay mostly civil, GMT will and do lock topics/silence or ban users that stop being civil and attack or harrass others based on political beliefs though as that breaks rule 3. Its a consequence of having a global community that there will be differing opinions on global issues.

osu itself is apolitical.

legal/Terms

osu! does not endorse any User Submission or any opinion, recommendation, or advice expressed therein, and osu! expressly disclaims any and all liability in connection with User Submissions.

also,
wiki/Rules/Song_Content_Rules

In the interests of keeping a game about rhythm strictly about rhythm and in accordance with community rule #3, content which is deemed excessively political by the administration is disallowed.

We adhere to no one particular "end" of a political spectrum — osu! is strictly apolitical and we want people to enjoy themselves, not start feuds or squabble over politics.

we are allowed to express opinions, and post maps of songs that are political in nature but are not allowed to do so in an antagonistic way.

MaxIsABigKaiju wrote:

I think the osu! community should side with both Russia and Ukraine and try to sort the whole thing out

its more likely to stay neutral and do not stand any of the parts of political stuff if youre in a company.

also, taiwan flag has been on osu since a lot of time, i don't think that this should be a problem and i also dont think that china its gonna do something about it

Rigbyuis wrote:

MaxIsABigKaiju wrote:

I think the osu! community should side with both Russia and Ukraine and try to sort the whole thing out

also, taiwan flag has been on osu since a lot of time, i don't think that this should be a problem and i also dont think that china its gonna do something about it

And also, there are flags of territories that are considered as "different countries", but this isn't because of osu! itself but because of internet providers. You have the case of French Guiana and other overseas territories being listed as independent despite being 100% French, or Aruba and Netherlands Antilles being different from the Netherlands; or Puerto Rico, Guam and North Mariana Islands different from the US.

None of these has to do with osu!'s recognition of any entity whatsoever.

I think you shouldnt be looking to a game in a political way, it shouldnt be disrespectful to put taiwan as a country or region to anyone (maybe fanatics) people are here to play, not to discuss politics and decide what is and what is not. also osu! is a team of people germans, british, swedish, chinese, taiwanese guys participate in the group, and putting taiwan as a country is just another way to simplify things and make a leaderboard for taiwanese people, not guarantee the independency of them lmao, dont overthink. I dont like Brazil being a republic, but it doesnt mean I feel angry by playing using the flag, I'm not an activist, and you shouldnt be one here too.



Minecraft never changed hong kong to hong kong SAR, because minecraft stopped selling in 2014. there is only Microsoft Minecraft now, and thats a totally different thing. Notch would never do such thing as a solo and free developer

chnjnz wrote:

1. Currently Taiwan is listed in the leaderboards as an independent entry with its flag being the ROC's flag (NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH TODAY'S PRC!). Since this leaderboard's title is 'country' instead of 'country or region' the osu! team might be in favor of Taiwanese Independency. HKSAR and Macao's situation is similar, only the flags are really the SARs' own proper flags, respectively.

This extends to the international standard. The territories listed on leaderboards are determined by ISO 3166-1. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1

chnjnz wrote:

2.1 Which side should the osu! team stand with to just be politically safe?

3. Has osu! stated anywhere that it would be neutral on any political issues? If not yet, would announcing this to the world cause trouble for osu!?

osu!team's stance is to avoid politics and any stances. See ppy's stance on this map, which pretty much extends to all political/controversial topics. In short, to remain strictly neutral, the moderation team been instructed to not delete comments that are pro or anti trans. This naturally extends to every other comment that has people cheering for Ukraine, Russia, Taiwan, China, etc. Unless they strictly break the rules by wishing death or something along those lines.

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

abraker wrote:

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

he's getting close to break a rule tho

Polyspora wrote:

abraker wrote:

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

he's getting close to break a rule tho

tbh i don't see the political attack and abraker explained everything i think

- Marco - wrote:

Polyspora wrote:

abraker wrote:

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

he's getting close to break a rule tho

tbh i don't see the political attack and abraker explained everything i think

it is not... yet. my guy is holding the ends to not make a political attack rn

Polyspora wrote:

- Marco - wrote:

Polyspora wrote:

abraker wrote:

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

he's getting close to break a rule tho

tbh i don't see the political attack and abraker explained everything i think

it is not... yet. my guy is holding the ends to not make a political attack rn

what do you mean? sure its obvious that they have an opinion - as everyone does, but nothing in their post points to them wanting to berate or harass others who don't share that opinion. They even made an effort to keep their post mostly unbiased, and urged others to do the same, if in a slightly aggressive way. Though that could be a language barrier thing.

WitherMite wrote:

Polyspora wrote:

- Marco - wrote:

Polyspora wrote:

abraker wrote:

As a moderator, while these threads are not against the rules, they are usually locked because they tend to produce heated discussion - insults, discrimination, and what-not which is against the rules.

he's getting close to break a rule tho

tbh i don't see the political attack and abraker explained everything i think

it is not... yet. my guy is holding the ends to not make a political attack rn

what do you mean? sure its obvious that they have an opinion - as everyone does, but nothing in their post points to them wanting to berate or harass others who don't share that opinion. They even made an effort to keep their post mostly unbiased, and urged others to do the same, if in a slightly aggressive way. Though that could be a language barrier thing.

Maybe I'm overreading then