A yellow warning sign with the text "Lan Party", with three stick characters sitting at computers.
I’m guessing a lot of Border House readers are sick of homophobic epithets and attitudes in gaming. Without fail, in every clan, vent channel or game involving built in VOIP I’ve played, there’s been some degree of homophobia, racism and sexism and usually zero challenge to this from other users. I think homophobia, racism and sexism play out very differently in the gaming arena, though, so the methods used to deal with them will be very different. To start with, I’ll talk about homophobia and my personal experiences with it. I’m not saying this is everyone’s experience; I’m wondering what other coping strategies people use and thought I’d throw the discussion open to specifics.
Note: I’m using homophobia here as a shorthand for any hate speech against lesbians, gays and bisexuals. Trans issues are slightly different and I’ll cover them in a later post.
Setting the bar
The problem with dealing with homophobia on a clan, tournament or forum level is setting the bar. Like it or not, “gay” is such a prevalent pejorative where I live that blanket bans on anyone who uses it is probably an overreaction, and to an extent thought-policing. While language maintains a homophobic culture, it’s not the words themselves that are the issue, it’s the attitudes behind them. I think part of dealing with homophobia (or indeed any inter-personal difference) is accepting that everyone is affected by discrimination, even the people discriminated against. We all have learning to do about how we treat other people and we all have our own intersections of disadvantage. I live in a social group of 90% queers, and I think it’s easy to forget that “straight” culture is much more likely to use “gay” as an insult without intending to be offensive, even by LGBT allies.
In my experience there’s a couple of ways people use “gay” as a word. Just to be clear – I disagree with them both, but this is about picking battles. The word “gay” as a pejorative is not the issue to me – it’s the attitude of homophobia that can be behind it, a subtle difference but one worth remarking.
The first way people call something “gay” is when something bad happens, in general. It’s usually directed at something inanimate – perhaps a mission failure, grenade going off in the wrong place, being out of mana. Most clans don’t even blink an eye at this kind of speech, and indeed most users aren’t even totally aware they’re saying it This is one end of the scale – a relatively depersonalized, catchall curse word. At the other end of the scale is when it’s directed at people, either directly or by personifying something inanimate. Normally this is then preceded with another string of homophobic epithets (faggot, queer, homo, cocksucker) and it’s aimed at a person the player doesn’t like – perhaps a disliked clan personality, or someone who just killed them, or an elf (why is it always an elf?). This is clearly homophobic, in the very literal definition of the word, and not just a linguistic tic picked up from socializing in homophobic society. To be clear – there is a very clear and quantitative difference between generally throwing the word “gay” into a sentence, and using a long string of personally directed homophobic epithets.
The problem is most (straight) people don’t seem to realize the dividing line here. People will tell me I’m overreacting when I comment on the latter, based on an example of the former. So what to do?
Dealing with it
I think it’s very clear to most folk the difference here. I think a lot of people would also recognize that the former case makes the latter case possible, in these online social situations. From the perspective of dealing with, the problem is there’s a huge grey area which people often oversimplify. Generally, I’ve found trying to complain to clan admins/forum admins/tourney admins about it goes one of two ways:
Complaining about homophobia as a general clan issue. Generally this ends up with someone telling you “that’s just how people talk” (completely ignoring the huge range of hate speech I just outlined), and that I don’t have a right to be upset about it, it’s just words, etc.
Being personally upset about something directed at you. In every case here I’ve been told that I’m too sensitive that [the perpetrator] isn’t homophobic because of X reason, that it’s personal and I need to get over it.
Usually once a public accusation of homophobia has been made, it gets followed up by the perpetrator going into defensive mode, casting accusations, telling you about their gay friends and how offensive I am, or how I should be educating people rather than having a go. Most of the times in my experience the admins think you’re the one that’s overreacted. The few times I do lose my calm (god forbid!) over something that was (arguably) an overreaction, this is used as evidence every time I do have a point.
Finally I’d like to note that the written and spoken word are very different things. I think while a degree of spoken homophobia probably needs to be tolerated for the anti-homophobia lobby to not come across as mad, when it comes to forum posts and the like there’s no reason for the same leniency.
What can you do as an LGBT ally?
If you’re a clan admin, tournament or LAN organiser or forum admin there’s actually a lot you can do about it. Firstly remember that your clan, tournament or forum already has LGBT users who don’t talk about it because they know the abuse they will get.
Set a clear, simple rule about what’s allowed, or not. These can be different between speech and chat. Then, most importantly, stick to it.
If you run a tournament, have sanctions for hate speech as any other professional game would. For example, there’s several Heroes of Newerth top-level games I’ve seen which actually have homophobia and racism in the in game chat during casts with thousands of people watching. In every single case, the commentators didn’t even bat an eyelid or mention it at all, which is especially marked when S2 games, the publishers of Heroes of Newerth run most of these casts themselves. In my opinion at this level of play, this should be an instant game forfeit or fine for the perpetrator’s team as it would be in any other professional game.
If you run a forum, have a very clear and simple rule about what speech isn’t allowed. If you run a vent, again have a rule. And make sure you stick to it! Take complaints about LGBT-phobia seriously and don’t dismiss them out of hand.
If you run a LAN event, acknowledge homophobia as an issue and set up someone to deal with it if and when abuse happens. I actually had my forum post deleted from the i-Series forum when I asked to meet up with other LGBT gamers due to “complaints from parents”. Of course, I had zero solidarity or support from my “not-homophobic” clan at the time. The incredibly patronizing forum admin told me that of course they had a lot of LGBT gamers there and it would be obvious who they were when I was there. Of course, it wasn’t in the slightest, and I was by far the most obviously genderqueer person there. Needless to say I’ve not been since!
If you’re a games developer, get writers who are worth a damn and they should put in LGBT characters anyway because, you know, they’re good at writing. This is a whole other post, though, perhaps one for the future.
Finally, if you’re just a regular user, then call people on their homophobia. Just because you’re straight doesn’t mean you can’t pick up on it – this is as little as it takes to be an ally. Be supportive of LGBT gamers when they report abuse such as my story above. It takes pressure from both sides though, and gaming organisations really, really need to start doing something about it.
Over to you
Do you run a clan, tournament, LAN event or forum that deals with homophobia well? Are you an LGBT ally but struggle with knowing what to do about it? Do you want to have a policy in place but lack support or experience? Have you experienced a good example of any of these things? Post a link to your website or VOIP in the comments!
I joined Gay Gamers [an online primarily LGB group] to get away from some of it. And it’s worked, to various extents. But one transsexual woman was trolling the forums [she really was; it was unnecessary etc], provoking the other members. Someone in the vent channel asked “Why is she so angry?” To which another responded “Because she cut her dick off.”
As a transsexual person, too, that’s hard. I thought about saying something, but outing myself [further] as a transsexual person is likely to get me considered less of a woman than some of them see me now. And it’s just frustrating that even in LGB [maybe T?] spaces, that kind of thing still goes on.
I am pretty unforgiving on “gay” as a negative word, even if they don’t mean it “like that”. I don’t buy, “I didn’t mean that gay people are bad, just that ‘gay’ means ‘bad’!” I know that some people may be in the habit, but it’s not a habit I’m willing to tolerate, and I’ve watched several people break themselves of it after discovering that it actually hurts people they care about. I certainly grew up around it being used without absorbing the practice, and it’s not going to stop unless people complain.
I find calling people out to be far easier in person, though I don’t know that my approach generalizes particularly well. I’ll usually make a super-sexually-explicit comparison between whatever it is they’ve just called “gay” and my personal skills at certain acts. It has the advantage of making actual homophobes uncomfortable because I’m boasting about gay sex and it has always made my point clear. This wouldn’t be an appropriate approach everywhere, clearly, or for everyone, but I happen to hang out in mostly-R-rated groups that happen to be mostly-non-offensively R-rated.
I’m not really comfortable doing that on the internet, though, since I can’t read people’s comfort levels or tell if they actually are homophobic. Mostly I’ve just chosen to avoid public forums rather than deal with homophobia.
My current internet approach in the non-public spaces I hang out in is to assume that “calm, reasonable” is simply going to provoke that defensive reaction and make me feel terrible. Instead I jump straight to “contemptuous”, focus on behavior rather than intent and use short, declarative sentence (I’ve used “Wow, that was incredibly homophobic”, “That was out of line”, “Holy misogyny/homophobia/racism, Batman!”, “Don’t say that [expletive] in front of me.” or “What are you, an [expletive]?”) I’m always prepared for the fact that the group might decide I’m wrong and kick me out, but I’m also no longer willing to prioritize gaming over my mental health.
The most common reaction, after an insincere apology, is to call me the PC police or complain about having to pay attention to what they say. I’ll respond once to accusations of PC-dom (typically with something dismissive, like, “what you call ‘political correctness’ the rest of us call ‘not being an [expletive].’” I prefer giving people something to be legitimately defensive about, as half the time they’ll accept my premise even if they take offense at what I’m saying.)
As for complaints about how hard it is, luckily WoW (my most common game) has the /violin emote.
I agree with Blake. I don’t tolerate the use of the word “gay” as a slur whether it’s directed at a thing or a person. Although, I can see how one could be considered worse than the other.
Any kind of derogatory language or slur makes me uncomfortable to the point where even if I am just listening, I feel like a contributor. Most of the time, I’ll choose to leave the room, website or /ignore. But if it’s happening in my space (my apartment for instance), I’ve straight up told people that if they want to speak like that, they can do so outside.
Agreed with Blake
“probably an overreaction, and to an extent thought-policing.” is so often used to dismiss objections to slurs, be they ableist, homophobic or transphobic that I don’t feel it is productive to mark one slur as ‘okay’ or not worth going after simply because of the ubiquity of it’s use in certain environments.
I’m interested that people have taken issue with the “gay” thing out of context with the rest of the article. I’m saying that, in my experience of gaming, calling people (in any number of ways, which I do) on saying “gay” as a pejorative leaves you blue in the face and frustrated. Homophobia is so institutional at LAN events and in clans that you don’t really have the option of being so on top of it without sending yourself mad. And actually, I do notice people keeping down on the gay insults when I’m about actually, and it is kinda sweet especially for the younger members. I guess part of it is simply that I know people are working on it, and I can feel them trying, so that’s good with me.
Secondly, to me there’s so many words that are used as insults that are offensive to some minority group that people use – retard, cretin, idiot, pikey, bitch, etc etc etc. I don’t think that everyone who uses “retard” as a insult is attacking all people with learning difficulties, for instance. It’s a learned behavior. I’m arguing that it’s the meaning behind the word that’s important, not the word itself, although they 95% correlate. I feel like the commentators have fundamentally missed my point thus far that it’s about picking your fights!
However I do think that England is a lot more swear-y than the US in a lot of cases I’ve experienced with regard to gaming. There could be cultural factors here.
Oh, and the written is TOTALLY different to the spoken. People have no excuse when it comes to writing, but speaking is a lot harder to reprogram.
Sorry, Kim, but I don’t agree either. Good intentions do not excuse evil acts. Calling something/someone ‘gay’ meaning ‘bad’ is at best misused privilege. People need to be told that they’re hurting others (not just some hypothetic person out there, but me personally) by using ‘gay’ in that way or it’ll never stop.
The same goes for ‘rape’ for any kind of unpleasant behavior btw. Another pet peeve of mine.
OK, so you tell someone 5-6 times. They carry on. What do you do?
I love how thorough and practical this post is, this will definitely be a great resource in the future. Thanks for writing it, kimadactyl.
I feel like the commentators have fundamentally missed my point thus far that it’s about picking your fights!
I definitely agree that this is a concession we sometimes have to make. I’ve felt like I’ve had to let people go on saying stuff like “bitch” and “gay” in non-safe-space gaming communities (such as a guild or message board), otherwise I become “that bitch who complains ALL THE TIME” =/ I had to save up social capital for the “bigger” things (the f-word, for example, which people seemed to be more likely to agree is wrong). It’s unfortunate, but it’s true. And it’s also the thing that eventually led me to stop participating in those sorts of groups at all.
I should add that I think it is a lot easier to tackle the language issue if you are the leader of the guild or the organizer of the event or whatever; I was talking about my experience as a member of a group. When you’re just a member you don’t have as much clout; when you’re the leader or one of the leaders, you can set the rules and hold people to them.
I agree that it’s the meaning behind the word that’s important, but that’s the problem. When someone says “bitch” people think of females, when someone says “retard” people think of the mentally disabled, and when someone says “gay” people think of homosexuals. The context of the word doesn’t matter. A word’s definition does not get erased simply because someone didn’t intend it that way and a word’s meaning is not only defined by the speaker. It is defined by the listeners as well.
I get what you’re saying about picking your fights. After all, how we each decide to live our lives and enjoy our hobbies in this oppressive and unjust world is ultimately a personal decision. And I would never judge someone for choosing to draw the line in a different place than I do in order to pursue their own happiness.
But for me, if I join an online group, or forum and use of these words as pejoratives is common, I will choose not to participate at all. And to those in leadership positions who run tournaments, forums and game events, I would advise that although it may make some feel more comfortable to speak freely if they are allowed to use these terms in certain contexts, you may be alienating others like me who may not speak up, but will quietly step out the back door to find a group that has no tolerance for it.
I recently felt compelled to email a gaming community admin after faggot and dyke were bandied about in totally unacceptable ways. It’s so hard to explain to a straight, white male how harmful slurs like that can be. He wasn’t rude or outright dismissive, but basically told me that he didn’t believe that language should be given power and was going to use slurs for comedic effect in line with that belief. It’s somehow extra disheartening when I can’t explain what the problem is to someone I know isn’t a hateful, bad person. Of course, after I sent the email, I found a few articles like this one that may have been useful. Of course.
@Alex – Thanks. You put your finger on exactly how I feel – like “a raging bitch”. I think when I wrote this I didn’t really talk about my own feelings in that sense, and I think maybe setting my personal bar has been for exactly this reason, just to avoid getting ostracised.
Anecdotally, again, I’ve been a very senior member in more than one clan through time and commitment, but always got passed over when said clans were looking for new admins. This is despite me being very public about wanting to be made senior admin, and objectively being the only one with server admin skills (I’m a hacker for a living). I have no doubt a lot of this was down to my “complaining”.
@toscca: I don’t know of any clans that have that kind of tolerance. To be involved in gaming where I live, you just have to put up with it. In the end, I have left more than one clan due to overt racism or homophobia, but I’m not happier for it. I’m pretty ill and really need people to talk to on voicechat.
Do any commenters here have a nice clan? I really really get people’s idealism, I do. It would be great if it were possible to challenge people and get taken seriously, but in my experience that’s not how it is. I’d just like to hear examples of people dealing with clan homophobia as I’m pretty clueless too, and at the moment I don’t have a choice to join a clan where these things won’t be issues.
It’d not really my place to say, but would people join a Borderhouse clan if there were one?
I’m kind of surprised that homophobia at LANs is seen as common. I’ve been going to LANs in the USA for years and I can’t remember any instances of ever using “gay” as an insult or anything even more offensive.
I’m writing my dissertation on LANs so I’m actually looking out for the kinds of language used. I rarely even hear anyone dropping the f-word. Maybe as kimadactyl suggested there are cultural issues at play.
I do hear and see people occasionally using homophobic language when playing online. If someone says “That’s gay” I usually try to confront them in a humorous way by saying something like “No, I think gay is when someone likes someone of the same sex as them.” On the servers I usually play on if anyone says anything racist or any homophobic insult other than “gay” they almost always get kicked pretty quickly.
I know X-Box live is pretty notorious for the high level of hate speech on it but I would be curious if anyone else in the USA has experienced homophobia or racism at LAN parties.
I love this article, very practical “tips n tricks” for people to use when they hear homophobic comments.
I am often astonished by the hypocrisy of gamers. On the one hand if we are confronted with “games are for kids” we say “no most gamers are adults”
Yet we don’t speak out when we hear or see sexism racism or homophobia. We say its just a game
Can’t have it both ways.