The Game Jar | Hate Speech ? Anonymity of Online Gaming

Undoubtedly this is one of the most conflicted pieces of writing I?ve ever done. I care?passionately?about my hobby and I want to see this kind of behaviour go away?permanently, but I?m also acutely aware that this is a tricky subject to talk about, and I?m not sure whether I have the skill to do it justice.?Nevertheless,?I feel I have to write this?piece, if only for my own sanity. I have to figure out whether things are getting worse, or if age is making me more sensitive to these kind of things. Is this a?generational?thing? In today?s?interconnected?world anyone can start up a gaming blog or podcast and air their views to the rest of the planet.

Do I, as a pre-internet gamer just need to harden up and accept there are some unpleasant people out there, and some of them will be gamers? I wouldn?t tolerate hate speech from?colleagues?in the workplace, so why should I?tolerate?it over Xbox Live or anywhere else my hobby takes me? Everything I mention in this?piece is something I have experienced personally. When I refer to something said in a lobby or over voice chat, I heard it personally. When I refer to something I heard on a podcast, it?s because I downloaded and listened to it. If I reference a Tweet or blog, I actually read it. So before I move on I?d like to make it clear, everything written here is my opinion, and mine alone, and I write this I because I care about where gaming is heading. I?m not looking for page hits or?controversy, so please bear that in mind as you read.

Verbally abusing your?opponent?whilst playing Street Fighter for example, could?very?well lead to an actual real life fight. There was no?anonymity?involved, and you couldn?t get away with saying vile things about his or her mother, or the colour of their skin.

Once upon a time gaming was putting a ten pence coin in an arcade cabinet, and multi-player?gaming was putting a ten pence piece into an arcade cab whilst standing next to the person you were playing. Verbally abusing your?opponent?whilst playing Street Fighter for example, could?very?well lead to an actual real life fight. There was no?anonymity?involved, and you couldn?t get away with saying vile things about his or her mother, or the colour of their skin. Not long after, consoles came along. With no internet,?multi-player?still involved being in the same room as the person you were playing, only this time you were at home and playing with friends. The risk element of a total stranger reacting badly to some smack talk had gone, but racial abuse still wasn?t acceptable, even amongst people you knew well. Gradually console gaming changed.

Graphics got better, games got more complex, the number of people who could play together at the same time grew. Console makers began to explore just what the internet meant for gaming. No longer did my friends and I have to be in the same room to game together. The internet enabled me to not only game with my friends without leaving the house, but to talk to them too, at the same time. And it wasn?t confined to friends living in the same street either, for the first time ever, I could game with and talk to anyone from around the world, all thanks to the this new thing called the world-wide web.

No doubt that last paragraph just went over a whole load of things you already knew, but if you look carefully there?s one thing that?s missing; the moment at which society decided that hate speech was perfectly acceptable when it?s said?on-line.?The reason it?s not there is because it never?happened. Not one single class during my education taught me that racism or homophobia was?OK?if done?through?a headset?whilst?playing Halo. My parents never taught me that anti-Semitism was?acceptable when said to total strangers?in another country. Throughout my childhood and into adulthood, society had rightfully decided that hate speech was not acceptable. And so as I look back through my gaming memories, going over all the changes I?ve seen in the technology, and what developers have been able to do with it, I find myself unable to pinpoint a moment in society, outside of gaming, when our attitudes towards racial equality changed for the worse.

Racism and homophobia has always existed, and putting an end to it once and for all may be impossible, but if there?s one section of society that should know that under the skin we?re all the same, it?s gamers. Our consoles are gateways to the wider world, we?re connected to millions of people from a myriad of different cultures and?ethnicities, we simply don?t have the excuse of ignorance.?We are all gamers, we are all people, we are all the same.

And yet I find myself reflecting on some disturbing things. I?ve been in Rainbow Six lobbies and heard racial abuse from one member of the team to another; in that case they were all total strangers. I?ve been in Call of Duty games when former fellow clan members sang songs about??hanging n******??or??the Jew in the gas chamber?. He genuinely thought he was just being funny, obviously?spurred?on by other clan member?s laughter. This year I?ve un-subscribed from to two different gaming podcasts because I found the humour?contained?within quite offensive. The first podcast contained a ?joke? about??getting gay men to have sex with women?, and the second a had a line about how they could tell?which?guest had written something because??it had a picture of a Jew being strangled underneath?.

I?ve read Tweets from gamers defending a friend?s vile comment about a black British?Olympian because somehow it?s a matter of free speech. One guy even tried arguing it was in fact patriotic to have disgusting opinions on?immigration. General homophobic slurs are increasingly common, as is the use of the word rape, (something I think most users would be reluctant to say if they actually knew a rape victim personally). I am perhaps willing to concede that a large portion of the hate speech used is less about genuinely held racist views, and more about shock value, but that doesn?t explain why they feel it?s?OK?to say it?on-line?in the first place, or why right thinking gamers don?t stand up and say something at the time.

Is there really a generation of gamers who don?t understand that hate speech is never OK, even if it?s directed towards that one camping so-and-so that?s killed you six times?already in a game of Call of Duty?

Right at the start of this piece I said I was writing this for my own sanity. I look at the generation of gamers younger than me and I?despair. Why wasn?t the friends of the guy on Twitter telling him to apologise and move on? Why weren?t my former fellow clan mates taking the song-singer aside and telling him in no uncertain terms that his behaviour was unacceptable. In fact, why were they even laughing? Why did the people editing the podcasts not realise that some of what was said was highly?offensive and cut it out? Are twenty-something gamers really so ignorant of what?s right and wrong? Are they just?desensitized?to it all now? Or am I just getting worked up over nothing? In my experience, things are getting worse. No longer is the hate speech confined to the gaming lobbies, people are taking it with them to their Twitter feeds, to their blogs, and to their podcasts. Whilst writing this piece I?ve been unable to conclude whether I really am right. I need your help to put my mind at rest. Is there really a generation of gamers who don?t understand that hate speech is never OK, even if it?s directed towards that one camping so-and-so that?s killed you six times?already in a game of Call of Duty?

If you are a twenty-something gamer, the chances are you?ve not enjoyed any of this article. You probably feel that I?ve?unfairly?tarred you all with the same brush. I apologise for that, I really tried hard not to. The problem is I don?t hear this kind of thing from?my?circle of gaming friends. We?re all around the same age, we?ve started to settle down and have families. The only time we hear this talk is when we game with people of?your?generation, and we?ve heard it a lot. But I don?t want to finish off on a negative, the use of racism?certainly?isn?t exclusive to those under thirty, and no doubt you could fill the comments box with examples of gamers older than you saying some pretty nasty?language? Put me right, tell me that you don?t?tolerate?these kind of things, even from your friends. Please, restore my faith in gamers.

Source: http://www.thegamejar.com/2012/11/hate-speech-anonymity-of-online-gaming/

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