Community Manager
I'm writing this after the decision to remove certain "offensive" elements from the pack.
I'm not blind to the atrocities that Koreans (and many other Asian ethnicities) endured during WW2. But, you need to understand that simply getting offended by something is not a valid excuse to demand a feature to be removed from the game. Especially when these features (shrine worship) are an integral part of Japanese culture and religion.
The fact that the Japanese forced the Koreans to worship shrines is terrible but that doesn't mean that shrine worship ON ITSELF is terrible. Religion has been used many times in the past to oppress people but that doesn't mean religion is the problem. People who use it this way are the problem!
Here's another example. I'm Greek and in the past, when Greek people where under Ottoman rule, the Ottomans (that were Muslim) oppressed Greek and other non-Muslim populations in horrible ways. Is this valid excuse for me to demand that the Muslim-inspired clothes and objects (that came with the September 2019 update) be removed from the game, since they "evoke imagery with painful historic meaning"? No, of course not! Hijabs and taqiyahs are harmless, similarly to shrine worship and Japanese fan patterns in clothes! (and BTW I'm not actually offended by these, it was just an example)
Now, I understand that as an international company you wish to be politically neutral, and this is why I suggest you remove these elements from the Korean version of the pack ONLY (similarly to how a Rising Sun Flag was removed from the Korean version of Persona 5 in 2017). Imagine a Japanese simmer being excited to see their culture represented but then not being able to have their sims worship a shrine (as they usually do in Japan) because of a Korean controversy. This is not the kind of "inclusivity" you want for the game, isn't it?
