In today's episode of "Misty is writing a paper and would like some personal accounts to help formulate her ideas," my chosen topic is cyberbullying, with a particular emphasis on online video games (e.g. over Xbox Live, PSN, etc.). I will be using Gamers Against Bigotry and Fat, Ugly, or ****ty as some of my source material, but I'd love to hear about any personal experiences you've had with the issue--from both sides. Some questions to consider... Are there any particular instances that stick out in your mind of either observing bullying online or being the target of it? Can you talk a bit about them? What are the typical insults you hear thrown around? Do you find there is a particular group slinging them (e.g. people on the losing team)? A particular group targeted? Do you, or does anyone you know, shy away from online gaming (especially with strangers) because of the often hostile environment? Have you ever been the aggressor, or sexually harassed someone while playing online? What made you stop, if anything? Do you believe we can (or should) eradicate bigoted language, harassment, or bullying from the online environment? What can companies like Microsoft, Sony, or game developers do to meet the challenge? & any other thoughts you have on the topic. You're welcome to ask some of your own questions, too! Thanks a lot!
1. Not really, sorry. 2. I would say that I usually hear the word "******" or something insulting gay people, I would say this for any group really, no I'm not going to be the usual and blame the COD audience, I've even heard this in TF2 and Left 4 Dead 2. 3. No, I just mute them, and just enjoy my game with mature people who just want to have fun. 4. Yes of course I have, I've been called autistic, ******ed, a jew, a *** (a "psychofag" as one person said) I didn't really stop playing, I either ignored the person or muted them, never to talk to them again. 5. I don't think there is a way to stop it, lets face it, I think people are going to keep doing it no matter what. Halo 4 now has a rule where if you sexually discriminate against anyone, you will get a lifetime ban, and already a bunch of people are freaking out about this.
I never play online, I never even tried, but I suppose the comments made there are just as witty as you-tube comments (meaning it' s a cesspool). It shouldn' t come as a surprise, given the amount of kids/teens that play video games and the cathartic and competitive nature of that activity. I assume it would be very hard to police, if not impossible, but I' m not sure we should anyway. Sure, I' m rather witty and I don' t keep my tongue in my pocket so that' s easy for me to say, but most of all I think it' s my perspective on that kind of behavior that allows me to dismiss it so easily : as far as I' m concerned someone who' s insulting everyone and everything is just making a fool of himself big time. In public. He might as well draw pictures on him with his own doodoo, it' s almost comical to watch. At the end of the day I' d pick prevention over prohibition in a heart beat. I' m afraid freedom of speech comes with freedom to insult, we can' t police speech without amputating ourselves in the same move.
1. Not sure if this counts as bullying, but this one guy I encountered in an online game would not stop harassing me for a long time. Everytime I blocked him/her, they made a new account and proceeded to bug me again. This eventually stopped but this person just kept sending me hatemail on PS3 with messages like "Don't act like this doesn't bother you, stupid ***." Stuff like that, I forget what started it though. 2. Typical insults are "***, noob, you suck, l2p". I don't play group online games for the most part so these insults are always directed at me 3. Yes, I avoid online gaming for the most part because I can't stand most of the random people I encounter. I'll do it occasionally but I usually regret it within minutes. Even though you play with more players with online play, I actually find it very antisocial because of how people behave. It's like these people have never been taught social skills or common courtesy. It's also worth mentioning that a lot of these people come off as sore losers. If something doesn't go the way they want, they'll whine or disconnect. Of course, that's not everyone but it's enough to make me stay way from online gaming. 4. Probably not, I don't generally insult people anyways. 5. I personally think yes, it would make online gaming a lot more pleasant I would think. I think banning repeat offenders is probably the best way of handling cyberbullying. I think Nintendo's method in Wii U is a bit much though how you can only use prescreened words that have to be approved. I think that kind of stifles conversations and hurts online gaming. While I think it would be nice to do more against this, it's not really a necessity, because we always have the mute and block functions, thank God. coincidentally, IGN put this article on their site today. it doesn't do much beyond stating the obvious but maybe the comments will have more insight: http://www.ign.com/blogs/ereeeek/2012/11/13/when-did-gamers-become-bullies
1. A few. Sometimes there are people bashing because someone isn't that great or something, or if they're losing (but who listens to losers anyway lol jk) 2. Alright well . . . a lot of different one's. I don't really want to type them out but the people who use them are often on the losing team. 3. No, it's not like they know where I am, why should I care what they say? 4. Not really. I smack talk with my friends but it's all in good fun, I don't just start bashing people I don't know. Plus I really don't like talking online with strangers, I'm not good with people. 5. Yes, it really is quite unnecessary. They do have report options. Though i'm gonna say, most bashing I see is just people saying what comes to there mind, be it in anger or joy (lose, win) There's not really a way for people to know, in most cases, what race gender or sexual preference you are/have. I don't like bullying in real life, and I don't even like real life. But I love online (the internet) now bullying is making it's way there and to games, i'm ready to wage war.
1. Well as a girl gamer, I've been subject to some (though very little) sexual harassment over PSN. Mostly though, the ridicule is over my voice. See, if you don't know that I'm a sixteen year old girl, my voice can be mistaken for that of a young boy. As a result, playing some of my favorite games like Uncharted and Marvel vs. Capcom can be a hassle sometimes (granted the people who do know me stick up for me and such when we're in parties). I can understand questioning a twelve-year-old on a mature rated game like Call of Duty, but when these asses start resorting to "gayfag" and "pussy," that is where I draw the line, and it really sucks because my usual 'oh lawl, let me curse them out' method isn't an option whenever my mom/grandma/dad is within earshot. So I have to sit there and use words like "jerk" and "wuss" which leads them to believe the lie even more, despite the fact that I hear these eleven and twelve year old kids using the same language. 2. Going back to my previous response, they tend to curse. A lot. Most of them seem like they're 20+ and they usually go after kids who're underage (like 10-13 or those who haven't hit puberty). They really don't insult based on winners or losers, but on age or skill and while I could agree with a bit of lighthearted taunting over the latter, the former is a whole other story. 3. Not that I know of, but I will sometimes quit a game I want to play just because of the people. Even if I mute them, I know they're just going to be throwing insults around, and it makes me sick. 4. I will admit that I'm not innocent here. The only time I really call someone out is for self-defense, but I do sometimes criticize kids based on their age. idk, I guess it's just how I was raised ("there's a time for everything and all those kids playing those games and watching those movies now are just rotting their brains; rant rant rant"). What's made me stop is actually getting to know the person behind the voice. To this day I've made friends on PSN who aren't older than twelve or thirteen, and I still play with them when I get the chance. 5. I think companies can try, but it's really a matter of gamers stepping up and choosing not to say those things. Sadly, I don't see it happening at all considering some of the cavemen (to put it in lighter terms) who decide to play. On top of that, the games themselves aren't exactly helping either; the places where I see this the most just happen to be in games that have a lot of violence/blood/cursing like (I hate to keep using this but it's one of the best examples that I've played/seen/dealt with this frequently) Uncharted. Though Drake doesn't really go into the more colorful cursing, shit is a pretty frequent term in the single player campaign, and there is more than enough neck snapping and grenading to go around. It's not the developer's job to stop this, it's up to the people who're doing it. Why should Sony have to clean up a mess that it didn't make? They're not our parents, though plenty of gamers are certainly acting more childish than the kids they make fun of. ~Give Cat homework, she wastes all her time on KHV ~Give Cat a debate on video games, "OH GOD, LET ME GET TO WORKING"
I normally don't talk to people while I play online, but I am fond of using voice while playing Assassin's Creed multiplayer. Since it's a series that many girls tend to play, but still many more boys, I seem to be fine, but my voice is naturally high and childish, and so sometimes, the boys poke fun at me and harass me a little here and there, but it's never been so bad that I've had to stop everything I was doing and report it or whatever. I mean, I sound like a ten-year-old girl sometimes, but it's only when I start kicking their asses that they start getting rough with me. There has been one or two cases of sexual harassment, but I've just told them to stop and threatened and the what not to show that just because I did sound extremely young, didn't mean I wouldn't find them and cut their puny dicks off. There's generally a lot of cussing going around, but it's not something that's out of the norm; people get frustrated, and cussing is proven to release stress when you're tense. Some times the older people ( who are mostly men of 18 and up ) call out the younger kids, saying things like " ****** " and " little ***** " or whatever, but they're mostly just angry because they're sore over losing and stuff. I don't, for sure. Just because a few mean words were tossed my way, doesn't mean I'm going to freak out like a baby and ragequit multiplayer like that. I don't have many friends, so I can't give examples for the latter part of the question. I normally keep to myself until someone talks to me. This question is exempt because it turned into something bigger than it needed to be. I didn't stop playing with them, though. I hate this question. People who can't handle it should just NOT listen in. You don't HAVE to have a headset, you don't HAVE to talk to them or listen to them. If it bothers you so much then YOU do something about it. Don't make it a bigger thing that what it needs to be. If the major companies need to monitor it, then someone is obviously being a baby about something. You don't have to play online, and that's that. This isn't a daycare. As for it being possible, well. That would take a lot of people, and waste a lot of times, and while that might have an impact on jobs and stuff, even though this and that are different, I think having thousands, possibly more, people monitoring conversation in the online gaming world is a big deal, and doesn't seem really do-able. Even if it was possible, I think it's silly.
Hum, this sure sounds interesing. Are there any particular instances that stick out in your mind of either observing bullying online or being the target of it? Can you talk a bit about them? I normally play online very often. I play a game which has a lot of communties. From all theese comunities, the biggest one is the BR (Brazilian) community, which have around 30k of players online playing, when the second biggest one has 12,5k always online. The BR community from that game sucks, people keep calling each other names over no reason, and most of them are greedy and extremely rude. It kinda reminds me how people suddenly fight each other with no reason, like their color or likes and all this racism and xenophobia which sometimes look inevitable to have issues with. I have been target of Cyberbullying in a lot of online games but I don't care, I just use the ignore feature the game has and done. However, that's not enough since it is pretty normal to watch and find theese kind of discussions all around the internet and even outside the internet, in the real world. I remembered once I was browsing a site and there was a person with the avatar of a black person. It was when someone just posted saying how ugly and son of a **** he was. Since I'm part of the Staff of the site, I deleted the post and went to talk to him. He said me each one has their own likes and his likes weren't black people. I just can't believe in theese people, they "dislike" black people because of their color? Ugh, I hate people who thinks like that. What are the typical insults you hear thrown around? Do you find there is a particular group slinging them (e.g. people on the losing team)? A particular group targeted? I pretty much always hear things about racism. All over the internet the all time. Racist people all over the online games and everywhere you can think of. That's the most typical problem I see around the internet nowadays. Do you, or does anyone you know, shy away from online gaming (especially with strangers) because of the often hostile environment? Yes, a friend of mine stopped playing an online game we used to play because he was frequently targed of racist people. Have you ever been the aggressor, or sexually harassed someone while playing online? What made you stop, if anything? No. I never had, never will. Do you believe we can (or should) eradicate bigoted language, harassment, or bullying from the online environment? What can companies like Microsoft, Sony, or game developers do to meet the challenge? Pretty much what everyone else said.
1 Yep when the people I would help train to get better were new to something and people knew that. Wow they are ruthless, but seeing as how I was bought up. The people I play with will not take that lightly you ever step to the squad you will be dealt with personally and will make sure that you whole team or the people you play with knows this. What happened was these kids who boosted hard in Halo Reach were talking mad ish. There's this trick people use called the Triangle trap. Meaning they get both sinpers, and someone with the sword waits in the middle. Little did they know I had my sides sniper so I told them about this trick telling them to stay in the spawn. Within in 30 seconds I dome pieced every single person and was talking so much sh**. I made sure they knew never to mess with my team at all. And kept coming back saying they suck you are only winning because they got you. My reply is that you swallow and was deep throating my bullet its a team effort and since you guys think that weak clan tactic works I proved you wrong. Calling me and them gay, ***, pussy, saying I suck. I just say back so not only did this gay *** make you suck him off by getting your head blown I am top for both teams so what happened? 2 Well for me its a lot of your mom stuff, or for most of the girls on my friends lists its go back to the kitchen. The target it who what ever team feels is the weakest link. That's just what I see because even when my squad is out matched we'll make them work for that win. But mostly the target it what ever team feel they have the crown and will destroy what ever team is who talks the most game. 3 I think that's how people are bought up into the gaming online because of that stuff. No matter who you play with when you play with randoms its bound to happen you can't escape unless you play offline, or just stay in the party. But then you never know who's gonna say what so I don't think you can escape. The way I was bought up is if you can't handle it you don't deserve to play with us. Because people will always talk no matter what you do or say its just the nature of competitive online gaming. But no one I know would shy away from that stuff because they had to then shut them up quick and fast to create peace and get respect that way. 4 I have been the aggressor because people who feel they got such high kd's or are pro turn to mush when they face me. My favorite is when they call me the really b n word. I will not lie I say the one with the a at the end at times, but they just use the one with er because they thinks its cool. So I blow up on them and will not stop until they just stop playing the game I'm playing entirely. I actual then start to take the game serious and kill them easy even if they are try hards I destroy with. The reason why I stopped is because I'm already on my 2nd warning for probation with my 360 since some things I had with Need For Speed Carbon on my old 360. I got too many complaints I cheated(I don't cheat in street racing games that's a no no.) or too good so I was banned from that for a while, and had to resolve things. Got a letter from EA and was told to take it easy from now on. I stopped because I let my skills speak for themselves its easier and funnier that way. Not to say I won't talk sh** because that's when my other persona comes outs. I usually stay out of drama unless they want it bought to them then we can do it I'm down for the bullsh** period. 5 Well the companies can't really do anything because the games says Online interaction isn't rated by the ESRB so that right there is fair warning. And also if you really have a problem with how it is online no one said you had to buy the system anyways. You can't escape it once you pop that game in and play online no matter what you do. You can say no and give how ever many reason I'll just say bull you still must be new to this kind of thing.
Japan has a high risk chance of getting cyber bullied rather than in America. I haven't played any games online but I can tell you that when I play Call of Duty on the XBox and use XBox Live, a lot of people tend to swear at me for shooting at them even though you're supposed to because they're your enemy. If someone swears at me on XBox Live--I'll just say, "So what? You'll be dead anyway." And shoot them in the game. CX That's my comeback. The typical words that people call me on XBox Live are **** you and go to hell. But do I care? Nah. Just like I said earlier--I just shoot them and they'll shut up since they're dead already in the game.
