Halo 4 permaban for sexism

[eliasfrost]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2012/11/go...-comments/

What do you think about this? I personally believe it's one of the best things that happened for a while. It's awesome to see the devs doing something about something that's been plaguing the gaming community for so long. Big kudos for this! <3

[Zaffre]

I'm glad they're actually doing something about it. Years ago, only witty kids would swear or say something mean, and they'd only do it once. Now it's just brats screaming the same profanity over and over in hopes of getting their opponent to quit because they're being a douche.

[Yuhaney]

I wonder how they are going to monitor all the actions.
If it works, hats off. Hopefully it becomes a standard for all platforms.

[xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Whoah I didn't even know sexism was that big of a problem in multiplayer games... but then I'm rarely playing multiplayer games at all and when I do I don't use voicechat. This is sad, really and I don't understand it either.

But playing on mute is still better than taking the chance that I'm opening myself up to a roomful of players for whom a woman's voice is a trigger to spout off the same repulsive, sexist garbage lines I've already heard ten thousand times.

I mean what the hell? How come young men have such a hate for women? Did they have bad experiences with them? Struggling with their own sexuality? Or just blindly imitating others without thinking? How do such people reproduce? I mean - don't they want to have a girlfriend at some point in their lives?

I'm honestly completely confused right now. Seems like I was pretty oblivious to whats actually going on in some parts of the gaming scene, even though I've always been very interested in it. Anyway, I'm glad to hear they're being more strict with such offenders now. But its only treating the symptoms, isn't it? I would really like to know whats actually causing the problem.

[Yuhaney]

I would really like to know whats actually causing the problem.

Bad experience with other sex. Bullying in school. Parents' alcoholic, drug or any other problems. Exclusion and alienation from everything and everybody.

[eliasfrost]

I mean what the hell? How come young men have such a hate for women? Did
they have bad experiences with them? Struggling with their own
sexuality? Or just blindly imitating others without thinking? How do
such people reproduce? I mean - don't they want to have a girlfriend at some point in their lives?

It's because gaming and geek culture in general is dominated by male consumers and developers. And for women to take part in said culture, they need to learn to shut up and agree with all the hate, sexism, slurs and death/rape-threats. If they don't then they have no place there, and it's sad. I think it's because they don't want to adapt to the outsiders, instead they want everyone else to adapt to their conservative and vile culture that's been established for decades. And by outsiders, I mean women, from their point of view. And by making demands, they feel like their culture and their integrity is being violated and intruded, while all it boils down to is humane and civil behaviour.

There's been a pretty recent storm on the internet about a male who harrassed his female gaming teammate during a Streetfighter tournament, and he got shitloads of critique for it, which is a good sign. But then again, almost just as many defended his behaviour by calling it out as "culture", "part of the game" or "it's what you have to expect". I wonder, do female gamers have to listen to thing like: "what's your bra size?", "show us yer tits", "Wanna see my dick", "get back to the kitchen", "make me a sandwich" (the list goes on) in order to be a part of the gaming culture? Hell no, this has to stop and this specific action that the Halo 4 devs took is incredibly important to make a change, and I'm glad that it's getting better.

Sorry for the rant, I just had to say that.

I wonder how they are going to monitor all the actions.
If it works, hats off. Hopefully it becomes a standard for all platforms.

The same way they have been since they started to enforce good behaviour: spectators, reports and examining/listening to audio/video-recordings. The difference here is that this specific action has zero-tolerance, and grants permaban on first evidence of gender discrimination.

[CorinthianMerchant]

FINALLY!!!

[Obliviator27]

I have mixed feelings on this one.
On one hand, the sensitive types would be able to speak up, and not feel "attacked" for being female. Though really, you're assumed to be a 12 year old boy until you prove otherwise.

It's a good step forward, but I don't know if I see it as needed.

This IS Xbox Live we're talking about. Where 12 year olds sleep with my mother and everybody calls each other a faggot because your general Live player is a generic douchebag, particularly if it's a game such as Call of Duty or Halo.

Is this just another example of people being oversensitive to everything? The moment a sandwich joke pops up, somebody gets offended? (Which, by the way, taking offense is little more than whining, I feel)

I also read that the author (A woman) noted that she had more fun playing online games with her friends. So, as a solution, why not just go into a party chat? Those have been available for a while and it's quite easy to mute other players.

For one, I've had quite enough of feminists claiming sexism everywhere. However, if the permabans apply to those who insistently call somebody a faggot, or threaten them (Commonplace things that are said to males) then I say they're definitely taking this in the direction it needs to go.

[Kreekakon]

This IS Xbox Live we're talking about. Where 12 year olds sleep with my mother and everybody calls each other a faggot because your general Live player is a generic douchebag, particularly if it's a game such as Call of Duty or Halo.

Is this just another example of people being oversensitive to everything? The moment a sandwich joke pops up, somebody gets offended? (Which, by the way, taking offense is little more than whining, I feel)

Just because a fanbase is full of jerks doesn't mean we should just accept it, and let them go on with it with the reason being "There's no use stopping them anyways". Rules should still be enforced. Not doing so would be like letting criminals run loose because people claim "that's just how society is".

I know that's probably not your main point here, and that the typical Xbox live player will trash talk. There is however a distinct difference between a insult being able to be brushed off as a playful joke, and actual insults that attack another gamer very negatively. Either way, even if you probably don't give two shits about what mud he's throwing at you, the insulter should still suffer some sort of punishment to prevent him from bothering other people (Under the condition that it's actually insulting as opposed to simple over-reacting to gestures more playful than threatening of course)

I also read that the author (A woman) noted that she had more fun playing online games with her friends. So, as a solution, why not just go into a party chat? Those have been available for a while and it's quite easy to mute other players.

Well, sometimes people like to have nice fun chatting with the more friendly strangers on a server, and it would really stink for it to be ruined by some silly kid. You could stop him by muting him, but that doesn't stop him from going to cause ruckus elsewhere. He could be muted there as well, but it's generally causing inconvenience for tons of people.

On the other hand, if bans are handed out to people who really deserve them, I'd say it's well in place, and doesn't give jerks chances to be jerks somewhere else.

[xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

This IS Xbox Live we're talking about. Where 12 year olds sleep with my mother and everybody calls each other a faggot because your general Liveplayer is a generic douchebag, particularly if it's a game such as Call of Duty or Halo.

Only that 12 year olds shouldn't be playing those games in the first place.... I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not the kind of person who supports strictly enforced age requirements or something - hell, I played all sorts of games before I was old enough.
But if the kids are behaving like this, that shows pretty clearly that they do not yet possess the mental maturity required to play games that were made for adults. Therefore, banning them from playing the game might be just the right thing to do.