Poll: BBC News Article: Sexual harrasment in video games

[Dragoon]

So I just read a BBC article on sexual harrasment in online games and thought I would share it with you guys.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18280000

Have any of you experienced this online? There's a good chance you have if you play online games but why is this happening? Is it because of the recently popular immature jokes of a womans place being in the kitchen or is it just because people are jerks? I think that due to jokes like these people are thinking that it's okay to be sexist because its "funny".

Do you guys think enough is being done to prevent this from happening? It seems to me that companies like Microsoft just seem to be ignoring the issue and only addressing it when pressed by campaigns like the Extra Credits one. I liked how they mentioned the Extra Credits campaign because it shows that not every gamer is a jerk which makes a nice change.

 

[Shavon513]

I've never experienced this, because if I ever *do* play co-op or MP portions of games, the mic stays off. That way you don't have to listen to the uneducated dingbats who can only act tough online.

 

[Lilani]

Oh yes. I'm a female admin on a TF2 server, and I like to use my mic whenever possible. Usually when I get on the server, I just go about my usual business. Most of the time I won't get too much serious crap from people (all the regulars know me so it's only strangers that grief), but we'll get the odd kid or socially constipated man child who tells me to make a sandwich and get back in the kitchen. I might fling a bit back, or just start to flex my admin muscles, turning on noclip and changing my character's color and whatnot. Maybe even slap or slay their character. If they don't stop, then I'll mute them for harassment and disrespecting an admin.

I think it's the sort of thing that won't abate until the community stops tolerating it. When I go to other servers when I don't have admin powers and it happens, many will stay quiet and only start talking again when the harassment stops. Like there's some taboo against telling people those people it's not cool.

Of course it will never completely stop, but there is still a lot of improvement that can be made from the point we're at now.

 

[Muspelheim]

Sadly, there isn't much the companies themselves can do about that, beyond perhaps more careful moderation along those lines.
Of course, as a community, we could do more. An insecure manchild taking out his furstrations by howling out sexist whining should be called out on what they are; complete jerks. C'mon, we don't have to stand for everything.

It shouldn't, and doesn't need to be like that. It's not cool, and if the gaming community want to be reguarded as mature and worthwhile, it's time we started acting like it.

Furthermore, I do like how those jokes tend to snap back at themselves quite alot. After all, if you drop the "arr kitchen sandvich olololo"-line, you've basically confessed that you can't manage to make your own sandviches and need a perpetual mum to look after you since you can't do that yourself. But I suppose seeing that requires a bit more insight than what most of the perpetrators can muster...

 

[Soopy]

Men give each other shit in a similar fashion all the time, you just can't take it to heart. Considering all the equal rights things that have gone on in recent history, this was inevitable.

Kitchen jokes are on par with poofter jokes towards heterosexual men. Just give it back and keep going. I think if Women are going to be precious over things like this, its only going to hurt their standing in society.

 

[BathorysGraveland]

Well, I do know the admin of a Mount & Blade server I frequent sexually harassed some of the female players. Got kicked off eventually, though he still shows up in alternate troll accounts. Some pretty weird shit in some communities.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

How is anonymous trash talking sexual harassment? Christ, grow the fuck up.

 

[Zeckt]

Oh, give me a break. It's not like women are the only one harassed in games they are just the biggest "minority" (not really a minority at all). Try being a male with a soft voice, you get treated much much MUCH worse then the usual woman. And you know what? thats just the way it is. People online will cling to anything to insult somebody if they can use sex as the reason they will. If there is a soft spoken male they will cling to them like fleas and pester and won't shut up till you mute them. I don't complain about it, I just mute and carry on my way.

Many, many types of people get treated like crap online. Being all feminist will never change that as those bags of wind that throw those insults know they can get away with treating EVERYBODY like crap. Not. Just. Women!!

 

[Muspelheim]

Or you could say that they think they are above the menial task of making a sandwich and believe that a woman should do it for them because they think they are a lesser form of person.

You can twist anything to suit whatever viewpoint you have.

Well, I imagine it's how they personally see it. But honestly, if manly broness is their aspired goal and value, why do they paint themselves in a way that makes them look like big, helpless babies? It's not particularly manly.

Also related, it seems we're not going to have a better community. Because things are the way they are. Well, then I can't see why the gaming community should be considered in a mature and positive manner than it is currently in the media...

It doesn't take much to call someone out on idiotic behaviour. Sure, it's a drop in the sea, but it's better than masking apathy as a "Deal with it"-thing, since the latter implies something is being done at all.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Also related, it seems we're not going to have a better community. Because things are the way they are. Well, then I can't see why the gaming community should be considered in a mature and positive manner than it is currently in the media...

I think it depends on the game in question. From what I've seen, the less casual the mechanics and the less the appeal to dudebros, the better the community. But yeah, my CoD experience (for instance) was that you find pretty much all the CoD stereotypes running around with a UMP in any given session.

It doesn't take much to call someone out on idiotic behaviour. Sure, it's a drop in the sea, but it's better than masking apathy as a "Deal with it"-thing, since the latter implies something is being done at all.

Certainly what I try and do. That, or being particularly trollish. There was this one guy in TF2 a couple days back with the username "don't be a f*****" (of course he plays spy, of course he sucks at it, and of course he uses the YER) and I took particular pleasure in hunting him down with the Pomson whenever his terrible spy tactics gave him away.

 

[boag]

If you run into a group of asshats online, dont fucking stay there, get out of the server and go to another one, there are shit tons of them everywhere, or mute, or ban, or kick.

There are tools in place for this, USE THEM.

 

[Mr Jack]

I find the "It's just the way it is" argument short sighted and defeatist. Why bother trying to change anything? Similarly, people who say just mute and move on are ignoring how with a few adjustments you can vastly improve the atmosphere in a community.

On XBL for example, you have to mute a player manually. Extra Credits suggest that if a player receives too many complaints, they are automuted. With that one simple change, you take away much of the abusers power. Personally I would have them banned, but MS won't do that for financial reasons. It's one of the reasons I prefer playing on well admin'd PC servers.

Perhaps we should stop giving idiots the ability to broadcast every inane thought that enters their head. You can say that men give each other shit all the time, but would you really walk up to a complete stranger and tell them that you would rape them and that you hoped that their family died? How can you defend a system that does nothing to discourage this kind of behaviour?

 

[Valdus]

Why is someone being threatened when playing Call of Duty news? I'm a guy and if someone said they hoped I'd be raped and my family kill over COD I wouldn't make the news. I wouldn't consider it out the ordinary - to the point that I no longer touch online only games. Odd as this may sound the problem isn't that gamers are immature idiots and assholes, it's that people are idiots and assholes. Just like with any other medium you'll find different crowds in different genres.

Not to pick on it, but have any of you seen the Twilight fanbase? They can be out-right dangerous if you anger a group of them enough. When I talk about this fanbase I'm talking mostly about teenage girls. You know what I would get if I complained that I wasn't being accepted into this fanbase? I'd get a lot of people asking me things like "You like twilight? why?"

Now this could just be very well a really bad example on the part of the reporter, so I'd take this rant with a grain of salt, but still...I feel there wouldn't even be a discussion here if it was the genders were swapped around. If I played some online girly game and got flamed by the female players I sure as hell wouldn't be getting interviewed.

Don't get me wrong, I do feel more should be done to combat harassment in games. I recently quit League of Legends permanately (even asked Riot to delete the account) purely because of it's horrendous fanbase. But when I read articles like this that act like the situation only happens to one gender it makes me feel like the author has an agenda of some kind.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

If you run into a group of asshats online, dont fucking stay there, get out of the server and go to another one, there are shit tons of them everywhere, or mute, or ban, or kick.

There are tools in place for this, USE THEM.

yeah basically this.

not to mention, it's the internet...you CANNOT take it so personally, otherwise you won't survive in the slightest.

Granted, if someone is really being a cuntnugget for no reason, I might speak up to tell em to fuck off, but otherwise there are very easy simple measures to avoid that person(s)

Not to mention, the two people talking might know each other,(you being the 3rd party) and constantly do that to each other for a bit of fun (I know around a few of my friends, in a fun way we constantly talk shit to each other, especially online, you couldn't say a single damn sentence without uttering a curse word between every other word. It get's pretty funny sometimes.)

 

[Sneezeguard]

Now where's that slowpoke image? I left it somewhere here.. Oh well.

This has been going on since the dawn of online play, why are people suddenly caring now and being shocked/appalled/outraged/whatever. Why not sooner? What changed in gaming that forced this?

Still it's good we're starting to deal with this but this should of happend earlier.

 

[Chairman Miaow]

I had never realised it was so bad, although, I have only once played a match with a female player online and she recieved no hate. She was REALLY shit though. Loads of my female friends play games and they've never mentioned it.

I mean, I knew it happened, but they have to be exaggerating.

 

[The Funslinger]

Men give each other shit in a similar fashion all the time, you just can't take it to heart. Considering all the equal rights things that have gone on in recent history, this was inevitable.

Kitchen jokes are on par with poofter jokes towards heterosexual men. Just give it back and keep going. I think if Women are going to be precious over things like this, its only going to hurt their standing in society.

Yeah, but there's a difference between light ribbing and not letting someone getting a word in edgewise around the barrage of sandwich and kitchen jokes.

Plus some screens of fairly violent, rage fueled rants I've seen along the lines of threatening rape and disembowelment over having a killstreak broken, or something.

 

[robot slipper]

I'm a female gamer, and the only time I speak on my headset is when I am in an XBL party with friends. It's just not worth the trouble when I'm playing against strangers, because you do get douchebag comments. I'm an adult, and when I play an online game I shouldn't have to be dealing with comments that belong in the schoolyard. Even my ex when he used to play COD would constantly be called a "******" by other players just because he was male, so it's not like females are the only ones subjected to insults here. In fact, I sometimes have my headset on but on mute so I can hear what teammates are doing, and people will still call my gamertag a "******"! I think idiots will always do this because they are able to hurl abuse at people in a mostly anonymous way. I always do submit a bad report thing, but I'm not sure how seriously MS take it.