Activision Blizzard Sued By California Over Widespread Harassment Of Women

BID0 wrote:

jawaX wrote:It can be a tough choice in deciding whether to boycott a company or not. The natural reaction is to want to stop buying from them; but unfortunately this could hurt the careers and finances of the bulk of staff more than the (often wealthier) asses who behaved despicably.

This has been used to defend the indefensible ad nauseam. People who work on games, movies, tv shows, whatever the industry is have came out and said they would rather people don't consume the product.

Hey, would you happen to have any examples? I was saying the same until someone threw the above-mentioned Alanah take at me, and now I'm all out of evidence.

Corazon de Leon wrote:The best way to put pressure on Activision is to hurt their bottom line, Jawa. A company that sells millions of copies of Call of Duty every year isn't going to care a damn thing about picketers or social media rage unless it's followed by direct action. The second they see an impact on their bottom line and equate those lost sales with their corporate image, you'll see a very quick restructure and rebrand.

Tl;dr - do both. Tell everyone you're not going to buy an Activision game while they act so reprehensibly, and then don't buy their products until action is taken.

I wasn't suggesting that not buying wouldn't make any impact, Cora - but so few people will actually stop buying it that Activision probably won't change. As you say, they sell millions of copies of Call of Duty - if a few thousand folk stop buying, it won't make too much difference.

I was trying to make the very point you are saying - more direct action is needed! And, in today's social media-focussed society, that can be a platform for doing so. Not on its own, but it could be handy.

BID0 wrote:People still buy Ubisoft games despite everything that's came out so I can't see this behaviour changing unfortunately

jawaX wrote:It can be a tough choice in deciding whether to boycott a company or not. The natural reaction is to want to stop buying from them; but unfortunately this could hurt the careers and finances of the bulk of staff more than the (often wealthier) asses who behaved despicably.

This has been used to defend the indefensible ad nauseam. People who work on games, movies, tv shows, whatever the industry is have came out and said they would rather people don't consume the product.

I'm not saying this isn't true, BID0, but I would be surprised if many people have said "boycott the company that I work for". Not unless they're very wealthy, anyway.

site23 wrote:...I do feel there's a risk to parsing stories like this one through a narrow lens. We need to change the system which disempowers employees, creating environments where abuse can thrive. One person taking a stand against one abusive company is a show of solidarity, but to effect real change requires contributing to political demands within the wider context of organised rights movements.

I totally agree.

Balladeer wrote:

BID0 wrote:

jawaX wrote:It can be a tough choice in deciding whether to boycott a company or not. The natural reaction is to want to stop buying from them; but unfortunately this could hurt the careers and finances of the bulk of staff more than the (often wealthier) asses who behaved despicably.

This has been used to defend the indefensible ad nauseam. People who work on games, movies, tv shows, whatever the industry is have came out and said they would rather people don't consume the product.

Hey, would you happen to have any examples? I was saying the same until someone threw the above-mentioned Alanah take at me, and now I'm all out of evidence.

There were loads of people coming out on social media recently because of the JK Rowling, Cyberpunk and Ubisoft stuff.

I'll see if I can find any but I'm not even sure what you'd search for to see historical quotes hopefully some ActiBliz employees came out over the next few days when people spout this defence again.

Ubisoft is already trending by the looks of it.

Ubisoft also had other allegations of misconduct brought forward either today or yesterday. Not a legal complaint, so it's not as front page as this is, but good to see ol' Ubi isn't slacking.

BID0 wrote:There were loads of people coming out on social media recently because of the JK Rowling, Cyberpunk and Ubisoft stuff...

They were, and I do see that as a good thing - it helps bring visibility and awareness to the issues.

BID0 wrote:...I'll see if I can find any but I'm not even sure what you'd search for to see historical quotes ...

Don't worry, BID0, I'm not really seeking evidence - I believe the some people will undoubtably have said it. My point was more that we may need a wider, more comprehensive set of actions to combat these incidents in big companies.

BID0 wrote:...when people spout this defence again.

It wasn't the case that I was "spouting a defence"; merely saying that I felt more sets of actions may be needed to ensure that the actual people supporting / committing the bad behaviours are targeted.

I have seen lots of non-Jawa people spouting that defence.

Met wrote:Ubisoft also had other allegations of misconduct brought forward either today or yesterday. Not a legal complaint, so it's not as front page as this is, but good to see ol' Ubi isn't slacking.

Oh goodie. I almost don't want to see... but still, do you have a link?

Balladeer wrote:Anyway you're almost certainly right that negative publicity is the biggest weapon us scrubs have here. If there are better options I'd love to read them!

Boycotting is a fair thing to do but the reliance on boycotting as the solution is pretty much "let the market solve it!". It's a liberal kind of philosophy right? To say the way to solve societal and cultural problems is through the driving motivation of profit, and it relies on collective action from consumers to create that link between profit and morality.

The best weapon we've always had is our vote and treating these problems as symptoms of wider political issues. If we want to stop giant corporations abusing their power we need to be anti-capitalist. I hope activision-blizzard face a huge fine from the californian state winning its case against them - that's hitting the bottom line the same as boycotts try to - but really I wish a company like activision-blizzard didn't exist in the first place.

I boycott some businesses, like Amazon, and I will preach that to others when the opportunity arises, but it's obvious to me my personal action achieves nothing. It makes me feel better but I'm too disillusioned to think I'm making a difference. And you sort of touch on a relevant limitation of boycotts yourself when you say you don't really buy activison-blizzard games anyway. Neither do I, but I still want to oppose their actions. It's nonsensical that the only people with political power over the societal impact of a business should be their customers! (Although I get you're talking about negative publicity too, and that of course does have an impact - it's possibly the more important impact of boycotts because of the impact it can have on investors, but that still relies on investors believing that publicity will effect the profitability of the company.)

And when it comes to like, buying the new Mario Rabbids game, I'm not going to beat myself up over "supporting" Ubisoft because I'd rather derive some enjoyment from a game than deny myself that experience to have a negligible effect on their profits (which is somewhat the tragedy of the commons if lots of people are thinking the same as me, I admit). There are countless daily actions I take or purchases I make that aren't necessary and aren't ethical but I'd be unfair on myself and end up pretty miserable putting the onus on myself to eliminate all of them. This is what government and the law should be for. But of course I understand when particularly egregious examples come up - like this - some people will want to make an effort to do the right thing there, and that is commendable.

Balladeer wrote:I have seen lots of non-Jawa people spouting that defence.

Met wrote:Ubisoft also had other allegations of misconduct brought forward either today or yesterday. Not a legal complaint, so it's not as front page as this is, but good to see ol' Ubi isn't slacking.

Oh goodie. I almost don't want to see... but still, do you have a link?

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/ ... -singapore

The "I will buy X problematic game to support the developers" argument

The long and short of it. Don't use developers as a shield not to boycott shitty people, doubly so when the reason to boycott is precisely treating developers like gooseberry fool.

The weird thing is that people don't use this argument with e.g. Harry Potter; I guess because they've read all the books and seen all the movies, so the cost for them to boycott Rowling and save face is zero.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/the-i- ... t-38491033

Cheers both. By which I mean, 'Fuxache.'

OrangeRKN wrote:Boycotting is a fair thing to do but the reliance on boycotting as the solution is pretty much "let the market solve it!". It's a liberal kind of philosophy right? To say the way to solve societal and cultural problems is through the driving motivation of profit, and it relies on collective action from consumers to create that link between profit and morality.

The best weapon we've always had is our vote and treating these problems as symptoms of wider political issues. If we want to stop giant corporations abusing their power we need to be anti-capitalist. I hope activision-blizzard face a huge fine from the californian state winning its case against them - that's hitting the bottom line the same as boycotts try to - but really I wish a company like activision-blizzard didn't exist in the first place.

I boycott some businesses, like Amazon, and I will preach that to others when the opportunity arises, but it's obvious to me my personal action achieves nothing. It makes me feel better but I'm too disillusioned to think I'm making a difference. And you sort of touch on a relevant limitation of boycotts yourself when you say you don't really buy activison-blizzard games anyway. Neither do I, but I still want to oppose their actions. It's nonsensical that the only people with political power over the societal impact of a business should be their customers! (Although I get you're talking about negative publicity too, and that of course does have an impact - it's possibly the more important impact of boycotts because of the impact it can have on investors, but that still relies on investors believing that publicity will effect the profitability of the company.)

And when it comes to like, buying the new Mario Rabbids game, I'm not going to beat myself up over "supporting" Ubisoft because I'd rather derive some enjoyment from a game than deny myself that experience to have a negligible effect on their profits (which is somewhat the tragedy of the commons if lots of people are thinking the same as me, I admit). There are countless daily actions I take or purchases I make that aren't necessary and aren't ethical but I'd be unfair on myself and end up pretty miserable putting the onus on myself to eliminate all of them. This is what government and the law should be for. But of course I understand when particularly egregious examples come up - like this - some people will want to make an effort to do the right thing there, and that is commendable.

I think it's clear from comments about social media pressure that I'm not relying on boycotts to solve anything on their own. I am however if possible even more disillusioned about politics than boycotts. Living in a Tory society for ten years under FPTP will do that to you. You're of course right (as are Jawa, Karl etc.) that societal change is needed, but that can feel impossible to the outsider. It doesn't get much more outside than looking at an American company!

The one societal thing I can think of doing is standing up when sexism rears its head in everyday life, especially at work. I have work to do there.

Regarding UbiSoft, I can respect seeing the issues, acknowledging that they're gooseberry fool, and making a cost-benefit analysis on the outcome. So long as you're not burying your head in the sand then that's fair, although there is definitely a TotC at work there. I would ask you to think whether you can decry UbiSoft despite buying their thing, that aforementioned negative publicity, assuming that doesn't deprive yourself of happiness in the same way. As Xeno's link shows, they still have major issues.

Balladeer wrote:I would have poohpoohed your first paragraph, Jawa, but Alanah Pearce who has actually been there said much the same. I struggle to understand, as someone who's in a big company, how poor sales hit the ground staff more than the execs whose bonuses are surely dependant on such metrics... and of course Activision seems to lay people off all the time even when they're doing well. Maybe Kotick gives himself the same size of bonus regardless of sales in this case. Wouldn't put it past him.

Anyway you're almost certainly right that negative publicity is the biggest weapon us scrubs have here. If there are better options I'd love to read them!

...beaten by Cora saying the opposite. Both is good though, I agree there.

Didn't people includong blizzard's own staff protest the guy who got banned from Starcraft and the hosts who got sacked? Nothing hapened there. The money is what will hurt them and I think saying it will effect the people developing the games matters little, Activision lay off staff all the time while claiming huge profits year on year and bigger bonuses for the top execs.

Balladeer wrote:I would ask you to think whether you can decry UbiSoft despite buying their thing, that aforementioned negative publicity

Yeah I think this is a key point - accepting that I am buying something that isn't necessary and is to a degree unethical, not (as is the psychological tendency) trying to defend or ignore the problems to avoid feeling any dissonance.

There is no ethical consumption under capitalism.

True, but you can help tilt the scales slightly in the right direction at least

Yes that's all we can do really but no one should feel bad for buying products from an unethical company if they want to. I personally boycott Amazon but I'm quite content using all of Googles stuff for example.

I suppose the best you can do from a video game perspective is to buy the software second hand. Choose your battles! Satisfy your own conscience!

Making the mainstream outlets and news bulletins now: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-57929543

Dual wrote:Yes that's all we can do really but no one should feel bad for buying products from an unethical company if they want to. I personally boycott Amazon but I'm quite content using all of Googles stuff for example.

I suppose the best you can do from a video game perspective is to buy the software second hand. Choose your battles! Satisfy your own conscience!

Yeah, this is spot on. It's impossible to live in a western capitalist society without purchasing items from unethical companies in some way. So yeah, pick your battles.

Here's my train of thought.

In the unlikely event that we damage a major corporation's bottom line to such a degree that evokes meaningful change within said company...what's the reality? The offenders are still admiring the sunset atop their ivory towers and drinking fine wine; we on the other hand lose out on a potential bright spot in our starkly less glamorous lives. I'm not saying it's not worth the effort to prevent abuse and spark conversation around it, I just find it to be an unnecessary exercise on our part.

Why must we subtract from what little we already have when there are people out there - who aren't complete scumbags, believe it or not - capable of accelerating the process, making more of an immediate impact with drastically less effort and who, at the end of the day, will get to not only feel good about themselves but also host a goddamn pool party afterwards.

Tomous wrote:

Dual wrote:Yes that's all we can do really but no one should feel bad for buying products from an unethical company if they want to. I personally boycott Amazon but I'm quite content using all of Googles stuff for example.

I suppose the best you can do from a video game perspective is to buy the software second hand. Choose your battles! Satisfy your own conscience!

Yeah, this is spot on. It's impossible to live in a western capitalist society without purchasing items from unethical companies in some way. So yeah, pick your battles.

This is valid. At the same time, Activision does all the bullshit you'd expect from major companies and has a sexual harassment culture that allegedly drove an employee to suicide and let's face it sells completely optional goods. Is this not a battle to pick?

'There is no ethical consumption under capitalism' should be a rallying cry against capitalism, not a reason to pretend all consumption is equally unethical. In a sea of murky shades of grey, on which spectrum is this not almost black?