Here's the thing. Parsers are not toxic. Parsers do not cause anything. Literally, all they do is parse.

This follows a similar conversation the gun debate. Guns do not kill people. Guns shoot bullets. That is specifically all that they do. It's how the gun is used, which is determined by the user - the human behind the gun.

Mmm. But I think I need an even closer analogy to that for parsers, as we're talking about people judging you based on information provided by these parsers, rather then something simple like bad people using guns to do bad things. This isn't exactly "bad" people using parsers to do bad things. It's shrewd (astute, or sharp in partical matters) people using parsers to generally make their own lives easier.

When I think about how that could be analogous to anything, I come up with this.

What if your school/college transcripts were public record? You apply for a job, the employer just plugs your name into a database, and boom, they see your academic transcript. They see you didn't make an A in a particular field. They don't even bother calling you or messaging you to give you the well known "We'll call you in two weeks" let down. Hell, it could be that they automated this, and no human ever saw your application. A machine that employers are finding popular for weeding out people quickly, and without their effort, has judged you unworthy.

Of course, the majority of people, the ones who don't have the greatest of transcripts, would hate this system, and thus demand that schools only issue them upon request by the transcript holder themselves. Something like the current system we have.

And the few who simply have supperb transcripts would be pleased without the hold on transcripts. less effort on their part to provide additional information to employers, and they are found by employers much easier.

This sounds a lot like the current parsing system, and the community at the end game using it, doesn't it?

Naturally, the argument exists that we should be able to view our own transcripts (parses). SE actually doesn't care if you do monitor your own parses. Colleges let you monitor your own transcript. However, because of the control of it, Colleges can actually say that only you can see your own transcripts, and you can not see anyone else's transcripts. SE could have this power quite simply. Have a toggle selection in the chat logs, automatically set to "off", that publishes your battle log information in other people's battle logs. Granted, those other people would be pissed that they can't use that to judge you, and demand you turn it on.