The ArenaNet Catastrophe Has The Whole Game Industry Rethinking Harassment Policies

Pemmin

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

I'm sorry if I misunderstood the whole thing, but the twitter messages seem quite clear to me : the guy tried to tell her how to do her job, by stating the obvious, and she lashed back.

If I missed something please enlighten me.

he merely stated that he disagreed with her(and he was polite about it)

she then proceeds to call him a rando asshat. he's pretty active in the community...to the point of he actually has an NPC in game named after him....hardly a random youtuber or asshat

he apologizes and dips out

she then proceeds to imply he's sexist

Deroir prior to these tweets has made mention of JP in the past and its always been positive in nature and it seemed like he was a fan of her work. she did him dirty and that's what had the fan base initially angry. then anet fired her for a breach of an online ethics clause....and the gaming journalist come running to her defense with all the virtue signaling, hit piece writing, gamergate bullshit you could ever want.

people are angry because we're being told she shouldn't be accountable for her actions because within the gaming industry ethos sexism exists.

Xasapis

rpmcmurphy said:

Eurogamer piece about other female game devs getting abuse https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-07-13-in-the-wake-of-the-arenanet-firings-women-game-devs-are-experiencing-a-new-wave-of-online-harassment

I have to say, the side that try to exploit this in an attempt to get other women fired or reprimanded are the weakest people on the planet, imagine being so sensitive that the idea of a woman working on something makes you start twitching and acting like an idiot.

The biggest flaw of this article is that it tries to equate this case with every other case out there. Every case is unique and should be treated as such.

The damsel in distress angle is merely there to increase viewership, since (apparently) nobody cares if a male developer gets fired.

Ghavrigg

They should probably focus on something important.

Xasapis

It happens on every single job out there.

It's just that in those artistic ones (music, movies, gaming etc.), they seem to be under the illusion that can abuse their customers without repercussion.

Obviously customers can and are on occasions obnoxious. But that's again something that it happens on any job where there is customer interaction, especially for dissatisfied customers.

FrodoFragins

Dragnelus said:

Since then, mobs have tried to employ similar tactics against more women

Wait what?

What strategy was used against Ms. Price other than an honest disagreement that could have led to legit dialogue?

What a load of crap from Kotaku.

Xasapis

You say gamers are is they are some special class of people, when in reality there are no barriers for entry and anyone can be one. The entitlement you're witnessing is widespread all over the western world. You just notice it more on gaming, because that's where your attention is focused on. Ask some book writers how they feel about some of their readers. Or actors on how they feel for some of their viewers. And so on.

FrodoFragins

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

I'm sorry if I misunderstood the whole thing, but the twitter messages seem quite clear to me : the guy tried to tell her how to do her job, by stating the obvious, and she lashed back.

If I missed something please enlighten me.

It's quite clear that he had a differing opinion and stated it in a polite manner.  She chose to turn it into a sexist attack.  Is every game developer right?  what if another game dev had written that they disagreed with her statement?

If his opinion was misinformed, why couldn't she have handled it professionally and politely?

I'm VERY unlikely to ever support a game she or her supporters work on at this point.  She was completely out of line

Scot

DMKano said:

Every company has their own policies, it doesnt matter what the "industry" says - read the HR handbook - every company has it.

If you have questions, discuss it with your HR.

Whatever happens to employee X at a company Z because of a reason Y - is not guaranteed to happen exactly the same at your company - again bring up the scenario with your own HR and discuass that.

Thats all that matters, all the media theorycrafting = bullshit

I am afraid that in todays world it is social media that is HR, it is also judge, jury and executioner. It does not matter what a companies policies may be or government laws are, the only thing that matters is what people on social media think.

From what I have seen she should have got the sack, but who I am I to have an option based on some tweets I have seen and no idea of what is going on behind the scenes? It is not somehow the responsibility of Twitter to make that decision, it is an HR responsibility.

FrodoFragins

Anyway, the smart policy moving forward is:

1) Do not attack the customers - ignore them, block them and/or report them to management

2) You can't hide behind "it was my personal account" - it doesn't work if you say hateful/racist things and it shouldn't work when attacking the community of your game

3) If you are oversensitive or insecure, don't use social media like Twitter- use a blog with full control over who can reply

Most devs have no business communicating with the players anyway.  They are generally ill equipped for the task.  Leave it to people that know what they are doing and can leave emotion aside.

Slapshot1188

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

Yaevindusk said:

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

I've read several articles about this... gotta love when youtube nobodies try to tell developers how to do their jobs with obvious statements and then think they are very smart.

Price shouldn't have answered to that idiot at all, but the guy is a little prick.

Now he can be happy, he made two people lose their jobs while he keeps on doing his crappy youtube stuff and thinks he's a kind of star.

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

I'm sorry if I misunderstood the whole thing, but the twitter messages seem quite clear to me : the guy tried to tell her how to do her job, by stating the obvious, and she lashed back.

If I missed something please enlighten me.

This actually makes me a bit sad, with a slight, growing anger the more I think about it.  The point of this response will be the topic of blaming an individual for another's actions and not whether I think a firing is justified.

Shouldn't really listen to articles or of other people telling what is or what isn't.  On the first, when someone holds AMAs (Or "ask me anything") as a representative of a game or company they're working on and goes on to speak of such, then you invite questions and people to ask you questions or respond to your words.  Thenceforth you need to learn how to act around people with differing viewpoints (more on this later) as not only are you a representative, but you asked people to take time out of their day to provide feedback and questions.  The twitter post was a continuation of this, as said by Price herself:

"Since I spent all kinds of time saying it on a Reddit AMA, and I haven't talked about actual game dev on Twitter in a while, here's a thread about writing for the PC character in an MMO."

That is, a public thread in the same vein as what was done previously with reddit.

Then a prominent member and contributor of the community makes a post of his own that did not show any disrespect at all -- and immediately apologized once he noticed that he caused a negative reaction by her.  In addition to that, he also apologized on his own before and after this overblown shitstorm happened.

To the crux of this response:

To even THINK that someone is responsible for participating in a public forum (reddit / twitter) with such a simple post and apology (which he didn't even need to do as he wasn't the slightest bit disrespectful with having a differing viewpoint) is absolutely appalling to me.  Apparently everyone in the world should just shut up if they have differing opinions just because some people -- who invite them -- also can't handle them.  This is further evidenced by past behavior and on her past profile of "I block people often" and "I won't play demure with you".

The last two should have been huge red flags for ANet and her saying, in the same paragraph, that she works for them.  Since then people have dug up absolutely toxic behavior regarding what she has said in the past to the point where I question the leadership of Arenanet not for the decisions regarding this debacle, but not firing her a long time ago to avoid all this (though they claim disciplinary actions were already proceeding against her prior to such for past behavior).  This was equal parts her fault as well as it was her employers since she was obviously never (publicly) discouraged from acting as such until it pissed off their customer base (and if she was, then this was the last straw).  In this paragraph alone I have defended Price's behavior and shifted blame onto the company itself, but that does not mean I condone anything she did (and I stated many contracts, orientations, laws, etc. which justify the firing in past posts regarding her behavior) -- and I simply will not sit here and read someone blaming a "nobody" they don't even known for participating in a public thread where they didn't say anything wrong and yet still instantly withdrew with an apology.

He had no control over what she would say or if she'd get mad or how'd she take something, and if one can't handle even that, they shouldn't publicize themselves in the first place.

This is a horrible case of blaming a victim by asserting the guy is a little "prick" and trying to demean him by calling him a "nobody".  I'd suggest -- without knowing where they are from -- that you go back to which articles you read that gave you this interpretation and just delete them from your favorites and history as theirs is among the worst of "journalism".

Mind you, this is coming from someone that has consistently hated on Guild Wars 2 on this forum.

Point taken, thank you for this extensive explanation. Approved and acknowledged. As I said, I'm sorry I misunderstood some parts of this story.

I'm still not sure it's worth someone to lose their job, and I still don't have much respect for people who exist through youtube - yeah sorry, they are "nobody" to me, in the way that they don't have any more rights than the other customers playing the game, and I never understood the kind of worshiping some of those people get.

Personally, if I had been the boss of that person, knowing the whole story, I'd just have forbidden her to communicate with the community directly. Something like "Listen, Jessica, you don't seem very good and very patient at communication with the players, so I'd like you to let the community management do that part of the job from now on. You're a very good writer, focus on that, let the others do the public relations".

Firing someone from his job is a very harsh decision. Specially when made to satisfy the "crowd".

Yes, but it's not her first offense like this:

http://https//twitter.com/Delafina777/status/1000045432007938048

I totally agree that people losing their jobs is a bad thing.  But what she did was absolutely disgusting.  She attempted to smear a customer (fuck who cares... even if it was a non-customer they are still a human being) as a sexist jerk.  She attempted to use social media to make sure the world was aware of her smear.   She did damage to that guy (where does he go to get his reputation back?) and also to other legitimate instances where people suffer from discrimination.  

Quizzical

Phry said:

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

I've read several articles about this... gotta love when youtube nobodies try to tell developers how to do their jobs with obvious statements and then think they are very smart.

Price shouldn't have answered to that idiot at all, but the guy is a little prick.

Now he can be happy, he made two people lose their jobs while he keeps on doing his crappy youtube stuff and thinks he's a kind of star.

By youtuber do you mean a prominent member of the Guild Wars2 community?

Games with hundreds of thousands of players spread across many servers generally don't have prominent community members, except in the relative sense that a very small fraction of the playerbase has ever heard of someone, but not quite a small of a fraction as just about everyone else.

Nilden

Pewdiepie explains. skip to 10:20

Theocritus

I found one very simple solution: Avoid all social media...Nothing good ever comes from Twitter or Facebook, and most often it leads to disaster, especially if people know who you are and what you do for a living.

Quizzical

The customer is always right.  Even when the customer is completely nuts.  People who are paying a game company to be involved with a game (by playing it) can get away with more than people who are being paid by the game company to be involved with it (as employees developing it).

Quizzical

Scot said:

I do feel we are very much in the "something must be done" stage now, gaming studios must take a "hard look" at themselves, Twitter needs more moderation.

As someone recently said in a very different context, Twitter is a nasty place and I don't recommend that you go there.  The very design of Twitter encourages misunderstanding what was intended, taking things out of context, and forming lynch mobs.  It isn't fixable by this or that moderation or policy change.  If you don't like it, then your only recourse is to not use Twitter.

Scot

rpmcmurphy said:

Eurogamer piece about other female game devs getting abuse https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-07-13-in-the-wake-of-the-arenanet-firings-women-game-devs-are-experiencing-a-new-wave-of-online-harassment

I have to say, the side that try to exploit this in an attempt to get other women fired or reprimanded are the weakest people on the planet, imagine being so sensitive that the idea of a woman working on something makes you start twitching and acting like an idiot.

Thanks for posting this, I questioned the OP as to whether there had been any articles on this. A couple of points from someone who just does not tick love against everything following the narrative meme of the day.

We see posts from someone, we don't know who they are. Shall we call them "random internet user"? We see tweets from RIU but not what got sent to RIU, so no way to judge any abuse that RIU supposedly received. The article then just automatically assumes Hazel must be right without seeing any other evidence.

There is then a petition (which has snowballed to one tick, I guess RIU gets a vote?) and that's it? That's evidence? the petition just mentions that she supposedly says she hates gamers. To me that's one RIU who is an idiot, it is not somehow part of a wave of harassment.

Then the second example, please note only two examples to show a wave of harassment is occurring. Now this one with Jennifer, I agree is evidence of people using JP as a springboard to try to get other women sacked, it mentions JP and attacks Jennifer from a similar angle. So to me that's one example of harassment that's been engendered by JP's firing, not a "wave".

Women being harassed on Twitter is a reality, does anyone out there think that's not the case? But this sort of "journalism" just turns it into a hot topic, the facts do not matter, jump on board the band wagon. The narrative has now had a "wave of harassment has occurred because a women was fired" meme added to it with hardly any basis in fact.

That article blows what has happened out of proportion and just seems to think we will give it a pass because we know this is a real problem.

The need to be shown to be "on side" should not make journalists put their reason on hold, it only allows those who want to pretend this is not happening scope for argument. But I can understand why women are jumping on the bandwagon, they have all experienced it and are beyond fed up.

rastapastor

Oh buuuuu, cry me a river.

If You attack the customer of the company You work for, expect consequences, no matter if u have a dick or vagina. Just suck it up and stop beeing an ass or expect repercussions for Your fail  actions.

Slapshot1188

Quizzical said:

The customer is always right.  Even when the customer is completely nuts.  People who are paying a game company to be involved with a game (by playing it) can get away with more than people who are being paid by the game company to be involved with it (as employees developing it).

True, but irrelevant IMHO.  There is NOTHING the guy did that was wrong.  He was probably the most polite guy I have seen.  As soon as he saw that she was over-reacting he attempted to politely withdraw and even apologized to her (for doing nothing wrong).   This has nothing to do with a customer being out of line or acting inappropriately. This is about Jessica acting like a bully and attempting to smear an innocent guy as a sexist jerk.

Dragnelus

rastapastor said:

Oh buuuuu, cry me a river.

If You attack the customer of the company You work for, expect consequences, no matter if u have a dick or vagina. Just suck it up and stop beeing an ass or expect repercussions for Your fail  actions.

Women in general cant let things go. 

Nilden

Xasapis

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

Dragnelus said:

rastapastor said:

Oh buuuuu, cry me a river.

If You attack the customer of the company You work for, expect consequences, no matter if u have a dick or vagina. Just suck it up and stop beeing an ass or expect repercussions for Your fail  actions.

Women in general cant let things go. 

Now THIS is sexist. Way to prove her right.

Whose point?

Scot

Nilden said:

Whoever buys that will need this one as well:

rastapastor

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

Dragnelus said:

rastapastor said:

Oh buuuuu, cry me a river.

If You attack the customer of the company You work for, expect consequences, no matter if u have a dick or vagina. Just suck it up and stop beeing an ass or expect repercussions for Your fail  actions.

Women in general cant let things go. 

Now THIS is sexist. Way to prove her right.

Lul, dunno if troll or....

Interitus

I have to say what the youtuber suggested wasn't earth shattering as an idea. I'm sure he did have good intentions, but it was pretty simplistic of an idea.  And her response to that was adequate. I've seen people call her angry, or lost control.  How meek are the women who you are around?  Someone gave a simple and and she gave a snarky answer.  At best this is a ding against professionalism.

Now that's just for that tweet.  Some of her other tweets were handled very poorly.  All around there were a lot of hastily done and said things. And I think it is a great example of why it can help to sit back and think on the moment. And not act on impulse

Dragnelus

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

rastapastor said:

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

Dragnelus said:

rastapastor said:

Oh buuuuu, cry me a river.

If You attack the customer of the company You work for, expect consequences, no matter if u have a dick or vagina. Just suck it up and stop beeing an ass or expect repercussions for Your fail  actions.

Women in general cant let things go. 

Now THIS is sexist. Way to prove her right.

Lul, dunno if troll or....

Yeah, really, dunno if generalizing about women is sexist or not.