Nothing in the game is inappropriate whatsoever except trade chat. I remove it in every city I go to.
I’ve played for over 12 years and have never seen any npc, or outfit, joke, or emote that is inappropriate.
Just compare female characters in WoW to many female characters in anime if there’s ever any confusion about what sexualizing a female actually is.
I think people just have an issue of “Oh this looks attractive” and screaming “SEXUALIZATION” instantly. Though usually it’s not like even inherent by the company doing it. They just have attractive characters and skimpy mogs available. Players sexualize their own characters with them. Male or female. End of the day it’s their character anyway.
Funnily enough I think this whole “enlightened” movement of a specific group of people is going to just deem every advancement we make is harmful in some capacity, clutch pearls and send us back to the Dark Ages. What are we, the Amish? A female character shows her bare calf and people shriek. I expected this of the super religious back in the 80s, not the people doing it now who are the polar opposite.
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I think calling it “sexualization” is just an attempt to throw negative shade at anything that could be viewed as attractive because in the US sex is dirty but violence is ok.
If a person wants none of these things perhaps they should ask if they can join the Chinese servers instead of trying to Taliban the rest of us into wearing burkas.
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It wouldn’t bother me nearly as much if it wasn’t the same people going around preaching “Wear what makes you feel good, who cares if it’s skimpy, take pride in how you look!” who are also saying “HOW DARE YOU HAVE AN ATTRACTIVE FEMALE CHARACTER?!”
It’s like people have no idea what their own basic operating logic is and hold very conflicting viewpoints that they don’t see at all. The same people who say “Oh yeah, wear very short skirts and low cut tops and a choker in public for good measure” are the ones getting outraged that people like the look of sexy.
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I just find it laughable that people are getting bent out of shape because something is “too sexy” in a rated for Teen and older game. As you pointed out we aren’t Amish.
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That’s funny you say that. As playing an Orc and having to invade the nightelf outpost, killing nightelves and hearing them, I quit playing horde and went back to my nightelf druid. 
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My favorite experiences in-game have been within communities run by women who - frustrated by the same issues you faced - set up (or heavily influenced) their own.
My TBC guild had a woman as MT and raid lead. In Wrath I was in a highly ranked guild whose raid lead was a woman (largely male team) and a late-night organization that recruited alts from multiple top guilds) run by two women. They both had a very different culture. The guild was all-business and highly disciplined and the alt organization was all about fun, jokes and banter (but we progressed well).
After some bad experiences with progression guilds run by young men - one creating quite a scandal scamming carry’s out of gold and two others where the guild lead g-kicked everyone and kept enormous amounts of gold (in one case the GL sold his account) - I transitioned away from “competitive” raiding to focus on PvP. I was in two PvP organizations run by a woman (with several male leads and callers in rotation).
Is that to say that groups led by women are drama-free? Certainly not. But then I don’t expect leaders of either gender in a game to approach the role with the kind of professionalism and training that I might expect of a 65.83 billion-dollar corporation (like, you know, Activision/Blizzard).
There have been strong hints in the past that toxic elements of Blizzard employee and player culture existed. Google up references to the feature band “Cannibal Corpse” and “Blizzcon” when singer George Fisher joined Blizzard’s art director, Sam Didier’s band on stage at the company’s annual fête. The unedited version of the clip can be found on YouTube but please be warned it really is a non-stop stream of swearing, mysogeny, phobia, and other really grim stuff. No, I’m not judging “Cannibal Corpse” or their fans. People can like what they like and some people like that subculture. But that Blizzcon disaster had a lot of people in the mainstream asking “why did Blizzard think that was okay for a Blizzcon audience”? And now I think we know.
I don’t think it would have happened if Blizzard had female executives.
[EDIT: minutes ago I just read that J. Allen Brack has resigned and will be replaced by Jen Oneal and Mike Ybarra as co-heads. The Blizzard studio will be co-led by a woman for first time in its history]
But what I think female leadership does in a gaming group (and in a corporation) is it tends to limit the degree to which young men fight tooth and nail to defend their ability to transgress and offend at will, clinging desperately to the 20th-century social mores that centered their needs while at the same time also countering elderly men who weaponize their entrenched privilege and power.
Maybe women in positions of power 'man’date this through rule-setting, or maybe its just that the kind of men who tend to act in a misogynistic way don’t even apply to raid groups, PvP organizations, or corporations where they do not believe their toxic levels of aggression will be tolerated. They adversely select against inclusive organizations - be they game groups or gaming companies.
Again, I don’t say all men act poorly or that all women act appropriately. Its a certain percentage. If asked for a number I’d say about 5% IRL. Online it’s higher than that because of the anonymity factor.
Obviously the toxicity level can rise geometrically if leadership doesn’t just ignore toxic individuals in their midst - but actively supports and promotes toxicity. In contrast, leadership can screen the toxic ones out or create an environment they do not wish to take part in (select themselves out).
Its not easy to do that - but its simple - once you’ve made the decision.
But regardless of what goes on within exclusive groups (communities like guilds or corporations) here’s the thing: Globally this ends one of two ways. We all die hating each other, or we start acting like other people exist and are deserving of the same respect and consideration that we demand for ourselves. Either we set boundaries for what is acceptable or not within social or work environments or we don’t.
Either we decide to be part of the problem or part of the solution.
EDIT: Today’s statement from Blizzard goes on to make explicit that J. Allen Brack being replaced by Jen Oneal and Mike Ybarra as co-heads is directly related to working culture:
"Both leaders are deeply committed to all of our employees; to the work ahead to ensure Blizzard is the safest, most welcoming workplace possible for women, and people of any gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or background; to upholding and reinforcing our values; and to rebuilding your trust. With their many years of industry experience and deep commitment to integrity and inclusivity, Jen and Mike will lead Blizzard with care, compassion, and a dedication to excellence."
So what’s your play?
“You” might be an in-game community leader or participant or it might mean you as a corporate leader or employee. Either way, you have choices to make.
The clock’s ticking.
The longer this needed change takes, the more it will become an uphill struggle to convince those outside the games industry that it is, in some ways, a mature medium for mature, thoughtful people.
Both Co-Leads have gamer cred, and have not been with Activision Blizzard all that long, which at this point is probably a positive.
Speak for yourself, don’t let the fact I’m on a forum fool you. I have a carrier pigeon delivering things to my friend who supposedly communicate with people using a magical cube using a rectangle adorned with pebbles that have letters upon them.
It is not uncommon for us to send carrier pigeons to the houses of women we would love to court with a request for them to send clothed pictures of themselves.
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Your sarcasm aside, the US has more than enough fundamentalism going on without trying to censor expression in a game for teens and up to the extent some on here would prefer.
…it is a VIDEO GAME. Stop pretending this is real. That is the issue. People misinterpreting this FICTIONAL PRETEND NOT REAL FAKE game for real life.
This is why we lost the spit emote - or my wife probably losing her barbarian warrior bikini tmog…because people are confusing fiction with reality.
sad times…
True, and I agree it does. Issue is in a way you’re actually dealing with the same people which is what I was alluding to earlier. 40 years ago you were dealing with the lunatic hyper religious wing of the right trying to censor anything remotely provocative in appearance. Now it’s the lunatic fringe of the far left doing the same thing for basically the same reason on a fundamental level but they’re not intelligent enough to realize that and think because their reason is different that the principle is different.
One side felt they were protecting youth from being corrupted by lust.
One side now feels they’re protecting people from being objectified for purposes of lust.
End of the day, moralistic busybody people on either side need to be shown the middle finger, and the door.
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I fully agree. People need to wear the “Big People” pants and not get bent out of shape by every little thing.
Oh no…she’s showing cleavage!
How dare she show her belly!
I have female friends that look at Chris Hemsworth like a steak 
I consider it human nature to appreciate human beauty, just mind boundaries.
I would fully support hotter looking male pc avatars.
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Your quote of me: “the guild was all-business and highly disciplined”?
I’m not sure what it is in what I said that you objected to.
What isn’t real?
When I play this game I am sitting in a real chair at a real desk with a PC on it regularly engaged in a team activity with other real people.
It’s not a “FAKE game”. I’m pretty sure the game is very real - the business that created it is worth more than 60 billion dollars USD. If the game is “fake” the company’s investors will be shocked.
Video games and the people who play them are every bit as real as people who sit at separate workstations in an office (or who dial in remotely) for purpose of their employment.
If some of us who play this game choose to play it in a businesslike and disciplined fashion why should it bother you? I am not bothered by the fact that you apparently don’t.
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You’ve come back home <3
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Nope.
I find some stuff creepy (I’m looking at you bug-eyed gnomes with giant heads 
) but that has nothing to do with being a woman.
I’m not a woman but I want man thongs.
So I can roleplay as Conan.
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As a woman, I have not been offended by anything in game. I don’t mind the Alex A. self gratification NPC s being removed.
I’m not interested in seeing old content changed or ‘burnt down’, but looking forward to new stuff!!! Hopefully, in a direction that honors the franchise.
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As a guy…I figured I would mansplain all the things wrong with wow while defending the company saying it was only a few women, and think about all the good that blizz has made in WoW…and blah blah blah
Yeah no, no defending blizz here, no matter how they try.