[charleyma]

Toxicity in gaming + virtual communities (particularly against women) seems to be an issue that no company has a great grasp on.

I recently gave Fortnite a try and ended up turning chat off due to relentless abuse by someone that sounded like they were pretty young. It made me a bit sad - I met some of my best friends growing up online in irc channels playing CS, WoW, etc - not sure if I would be able to do so today.

Also Polygon article where Ninja talks about why he doesn't stream with female gamers (for whatever reason espn didn't link...) -

https://www.polygon.com/2018/8/11/17675738/ninja-twitch-fema...

[tbiwiti]

That article is really strange to me. On one hand, he's probably 100% right. There's no other way to avoid rumors and jokes like that. On the other hand, that's a completely unacceptable excuse to bar women from something. Can someone refuse to hire a female secretary out of respect for their wife?

[Bizarro]

That's a dumb analogy and bordering on being disingenuous. He's not barring women from something...you know that. And the people that he plays with are not his employees. You know that too.

[dangeh]

The top competitor in a supposedly open competitive field is refusing to compete with [blank] players for fear of [blank]. So what, exactly, does that look like?

Here's an easier experiment: play out a scenario to the extreme:

When the #2 spot is held by a female gamer, his refusal to play with female players is exactly what you claim it's not. By refusing to play she will never get the chance to compete for the "top" spot. Then sequentially every other player that is not "a her" will get a chance to "win."

Last point, he's not just playing games he's building a massive brand/business (at this stage) that rationalizes the exclusion of women. The secondary and tertiary effects will be damaging for younger generations - as they will see this as the norm.

[bschwindHN]

> The top competitor in a supposedly open competitive field is refusing to compete with [blank] players for fear of [blank]

He's not refusing to compete with women. He's refusing to do two-person co-operative streams with them to reduce the amount of rumors and garbage that terrible people on the internet will create about him.

> When the #2 spot is held by a female gamer, his refusal to play with female players is exactly what you claim it's not. By refusing to play she will never get the chance to compete for the "top" spot. Then sequentially every other player that is not "a her" will get a chance to "win."

None of this makes any sense, you don't know what you're talking about. Have you ever played Fortnite or watched a stream? Did you even read his own justifications for his choices? I suspect not as you created a throwaway account so you could get angry about something and spout nonsense without repercussions.

To be clear, the gaming community in general is shitty to women, this is known. And it would be great if Ninja supported _everyone_ who wants to stream with him. But you can't just force another individual to have your viewpoints and do what _you_ want. You can criticize him for it all you want, that's your freedom to do so, just as he is free to choose who he plays video games with.

[roel_v]

Well the question is interesting when you look at the legal aspect instead of the 'I feel' aspect. If he deliberately refuses to play with some people based on a protected trait, it might be illegal. This seems like a much less clear cut case than e.g. having women and men basketball leagues. Your claim of 'freedom' doesn't (always) hold, you're not allowed (everywhere) to discriminate in all cases because of 'freedom'.

[bschwindHN]

That would be interesting, are there any existing laws which prohibit his current choice?

[dangeh]

I just read through these again, you might want to as well https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[dangeh]

TLDR;

Ad Hominem - doesn't do anything here.

If one has a problem with harassment, then rationally one attacks the problem (harassment)...not the victim (women). Then there's Ninja...

>You can criticize him for it all you want, that's your freedom to do so "freedom" is an interesting word choice, given the whole problem we're discussing

Are you a gamer? Can you explain how gaming with girls works or doesn't work the point of excluding them? I've watched some streams, not a ton. Not my cup of tea - but some kids I know are obsessed.

More importantly does Ninja "streaming" with a random player, give that player massive exposure & potential opportunity?

>None of this makes any sense...

Just clarifying: using absolute conditions is a common way to wash out the noise/distortion to get to the crux of the issue - it's meant to over simplify. It's helpful in highlighting the implications of the action in question. So to make sense of this - i think - swap "compete" with "stream" with "opportunity." And the implications remain the same.

>Did you even read his own justifications for his choices? I suspect not as you created a throwaway account so you could get angry about something and spout nonsense without repercussions.

Yep, a lot. Read quite a few articles trying to sift out the hyperbole, learn about his history and backstory. Btw, attacking me is possible sign you are confused or defending something you don't know how to defend. I'm not upset with you, unless you did something that was offensive - then I might be offended.

It doesn't help prove how Ninja's actions are helpful to a "community." Taking such a position - when in power - has ramifications (direct and indirect). I'm actually more concerned about the indirect - which is highlighted by responses like yours.

PS I haven't been on HN in a while (ie lost my login)...karma still works just fine though. Sooo...I'm ok if you're ok.

[bschwindHN]

> If one has a problem with harassment, then rationally one attacks the problem (harassment)...not the victim (women)

In this situation, the harassment is directed at Ninja and his wife, thus he and his wife are the victim, not women. Also it is not feasible for one person to "attack" the problem, which is that there are a lot of shitty people on the internet. I'm sure if he could "attack" it he would.

> Are you a gamer? Can you explain how gaming with girls works or doesn't work the point of excluding them?

I am to a degree, nothing competitive, but I at least understand how the game and streaming works. What he's made very clear is when he streams one-on-one with women, there's an increase in rumor youtube videos, hate mail, harassment, and attacks against him, his wife, and others who may be involved. He doesn't want that, thus he doesn't stream with them.

> More importantly does Ninja "streaming" with a random player, give that player massive exposure & potential opportunity?

Yes it does. But note that streaming with Ninja is not the exclusive way to gain subscriptions and viewers on the platform. And yeah it sucks that he doesn't stream with women but that's still his choice to make.

> It doesn't help prove how Ninja's actions are helpful to a "community."

I'm not trying to prove that it's helpful to the community. The community is mostly garbage anyway, have you ever seen the chat in a stream? I'm just saying he made a personal choice that, by what we've observed so far, is his to make.

> I'm actually more concerned about the indirect - which is highlighted by responses like yours.

Please say your point explicitly. _What_ is highlighted by my response?

It comes down to this: We're talking about a guy who plays video games while other people watch. And people want to mandate _who_ he plays with. What right do they have to demand that?

Edit: I do want to say, if it turns out there is a law which prohibits what he's doing, then I find that interesting and would no longer defend his right to do so. Perhaps if his twitch channel is defined as a company and his co-streamers are legally his "employees", then I could see there being a case. Interested to hear from anyone who is educated in these legal matters.

[tbiwiti]

Getting to stream with Ninja would have a large, direct effect on their income, not to mention the promotional aspect.

But sure, lets instead imagine a male-only social club that directly promotes the business and career interests of it's members. That would get shut down real fast.

[hnzix]

If a pro tennis player declined to play in mixed doubles to shield their spouse from paparazzi gossip, would you call them sexist?

[roel_v]

What Joe Random would call them isn't so interesting, but the legal question is (can be, I haven't had my coffee yet...)

[sushid]

Not sure if you read the article, but he's more than down to play with women in group settings or public events. It just happens that 1. you tend to banter and joke as you play together 2. due to his popularity, any innocent interaction is clipped and made into a scandalous clickbait for profit by people online.

If anytime someone in an office had a private meeting with the blinds down with a female employee led to accusations of infidelity would you continue having said meetings with the blinds down?

[thecatspaw]

I get what you're trying to say, but your analogy isnt the best imho. It would be more like having the blinds open, and you both get photographed going into the room, and taking of a jacket (oh look, they go in there and undress)

[thecatspaw]

I(male) cannot play with ninja either

[roel_v]

Time to raise up against The Man who is holding you down, my friend.

[lwansbrough]

It’s not Ninja’s job to fix the immaturity of children. Nor is it reasonable to expect that he could even if he wanted to. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to tame hundreds of children in your chat? Let alone hundreds of thousands.

It’s totally fair that Ninja wants to limit his family’s exposure to that toxic environment.

It’s no secret that women are subjected to excessive abuse in gaming communities (especially streaming to children/young teens.) But they stream by choice and expose themselves to that by choice. Ninja can choose to not expose himself to that, and that’s not “completely unacceptable.”

[bschwindHN]

> On the other hand, that's a completely unacceptable excuse to bar women from something.

So what do you do? Force him to do something he doesn't want? As far as I'm aware, his choice isn't illegal and he's free to choose it and face the social repercussions. It's clear he'd rather take the heat from people complaining about that choice than to deal with the internet trolls and the rumors they start.

[drharby]

Title IX now applies to my twitch stream?

Jumping off the cliff there

[eksemplar]

You can argue that it’s sexist, but really, the platform is so hostile toward women, that I understand why you’d chose not to.

It’s the easy route of course, but we’ve all stood by and watched something shitty happen a few times in our lives.

I mean, have you ever watched the chat of girl/women streamers? It’s some of the most volatile stuff on the entire internet, and those people are who the boys/men also have to deal with.

This may be easy and turning the blind eye, but I don’t think individual streamers can really change anything by going Rosa Parks. It’s the platforms problem, and when it remains as unmoderated as it is, I think decision to ignore parts of its repulsiveness is perfectly understandable. I wouldn’t count on Amazon to foster a healthy culture anytime soon though, and even then you could argue that what is really needed is better parenting.

[curiousgal]

As a woman living in the Third World I will never take the "issue" of women and gaming seriously.

[drb91]

A) I’m not sure how geography plays into this. Perhaps you were making a cultural claim? B) You only need to take the issue as seriously as you take gaming. However, for the companies involved, figuring out what is preventing >50% of their potential market from engaging is a serious, valuable problem.

FWIW one of the main reasons my (woman) SO plays overwatch is that the abuse controls tend to yield tangible results.

[adnzzzzZ]

The problem is not as clear cut as you make it out to be. For instance, I stopped playing Overwatch because the abuse controls you mention got in the way of me having a good time with the game. So while some people may come in as you try to "control" the community, others will leave.

As for geography, I'm from Brazil. It's been my experience that people from 3rd world countries tend to have a thicker skin when it comes to online interactions compared to a number of people from 1st world countries, so that would explain what the poster above said.

[drb91]

This seems contradictory. People from third world countries have a thicker skin but don’t play games because the abuse controls aren’t strong enough?

I can understand some part of this. Shit talking is not automatically abusive. But if you’re playing, and someone says “bitch you suck stop playing” repeatedly, I really can’t blame you for not playing anymore. This is not as cultural as it is psychological IMHO: if you’re distracted from the game you won’t enjoy it.

[adnzzzzZ]

I mean that the abuse controls prevent me from having a good time because they're too tight. For instance, the Overwatch developers prevented people from saying "gg ez" at the end of a match because they deemed it too abusive. This kind of view towards abuse is too extreme to me and eventually sapped my will to play that particular game.

[RussianCow]

The fact that not being able to say "gg ez" sapped your will to play a game is part of the problem, isn't it? What happened to getting enjoyment from, you know, actually playing the game, rather than the pointless shit-talking that literally no one else benefits from?

[drb91]

Yea, sounds like you have a culture mismatch, I wouldn’t play either if I had pet phrases I couldn’t say.

[thecatspaw]

what abuse control has stopped you from having a good time? Do you feel that it was over-controlled? Did you take offense by beeing controlled at all? Have you been reprimanded due to those controls?

[adnzzzzZ]

>what abuse control has stopped you from having a good time?

The Overwatch developers ranged from preventing people from saying "gg ez" at the end of a match to saying that they would scour people's social media accounts and ban them from the game if they deemed it the right move. Just way too many instances where they signaled that they were very ban happy and that they deemed all sorts of things that I think are normal as abuse or harassment.

>Do you feel that it was over-controlled?

Yes.

>Did you take offense by beeing controlled at all?

Yes. I don't like an environment where I can get banned if someone doesn't like my trash talk. It goes further than that though because these kinds of signals from developers shape the way the community behaves and expects other people to behave and IMO this particular direction is one I'm always unhappy with. Contrast this to the way Valve handles their communities which is very hands off. I prefer that a lot more to the way Blizzard generally does it.

> Have you been reprimanded due to those controls?

No.

[eksemplar]

Since when is the worlds 9th largest economy third world?

[drb91]

I always thought it aligned with cold war alliances, in which case brazil would be third world.

Not a terribly meaningful phrase on the whole.... china’s doing well these days, but you’re only going to feel that if you happen to be in the middle or upper class, for example.

[cglace]

China is a second world country by definition.

[cglace]

Third world does not have to do with the size of the economy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

[eksemplar]

You should read what you post, it was coined doing the Cold War but it had to do with developing countries and their economy back when influence was king.

The Cold War ended 20 years ago though, and since then the term started to mean “poor/backwards” countries.

Now in the case if Brazil, you’re post-industrialized country with the worlds 9th largest economy.

You simply don’t fit any definition of the “third world”.

[muglug]

Nobody's asking you to take abuse of women in multiplayer games seriously - at least not you personally.

People don't ask people who've just had a heart attack to take food poisoning seriously. But food poisoning still deserves the attention of people who can afford to care.

[User23]

Everyone gets "abused" in games. Bantzing, shit talking, or whatever you want to call it is a component of every competitive endeavor, from basketball to chess. The anonymity of online interactions and lack of immediate concrete behavioral correction exacerbates this tendency in online games.

I, like all reasonable people, welcome women who want to play in these waters. The argument can be made that women deserve extra sensitivity, because they are more emotionally fragile and less able to handle shit talking, but that strikes me as incredibly sexist so I don't hold that belief.