Riot Asks Players And Casters To "Refrain From Discussing" Political Issues At This Weekend's League Of Legends Tournament

In the wake of the difficulties Blizzard has had this week with pro-Hong Kong statements at its professional Hearthstone events (and elsewhere), Riot Games has issued a statement regarding its policies for political speech at this weekend's League of Legends World Championship Group Stage. The message comes from John Needham, the global head of League of Legends esports, and was posted to the official Twitter account of LoL esports:

A message from John Needham, Global Head of League of Legends Esports pic.twitter.com/5Au9rE7T86

— lolesports (@lolesports) October 11, 2019

The salient parts are that Riot has "reminded our casters and pro players to refrain from discussing any of these topics on air." "These topics" include those that fall under the category of "political, religious, or otherwise," which "cannot be fairly represented in the forum our broadcast provides." The goal is to "keep our broadcasts focused on the game, the sport, and the players," so that they "do not escalate potentially sensitive situations."

Seeing as how Riot Games is 100% owned by Tencent, it's perhaps not surprising that the company would come out with this kind of stance. What would be more surprising is if it's adhered to this weekend, not only by the players but by fans in attendance at the event and those watching via livestream. There's no way that Riot management isn't cognizant of how things are likely to go, so this reads more like a "cover our asses" statement that they can point to afterwards and say, "Well, we tried, but things were out of our control."