Today, there is a full scale assault on women and children in the online gaming community. It comes from teen and adult males who think it's 'okay' to tell women and children to "suck my *ick" or "I'm gonna rape you", since we are playing "M" rated games. Microsoft helps to perpetuate that mentality, by telling we who complain about the abuse that, "there is nothing we can do."
A 9 year-old little girl was called "a little pussy". The kids tell me that they said that I, GR8 Anhialator, was "a pussy too". These guys claimed to be with the clan Fallen Angels, having the [FA] prefix.
On July 12, 2007, PsycheldelicFoe called all the GR8's in the room the "N word" after we beat their team on Neon Graveyard map on Rainbow Six Vegas. He said the word about three times before I could boot him out of the room. The same day someone called "Juror" told our a 9-year-old boy, "You sound like a f***ing douche bag, dude." He said this after he heard (the boy) speak, recognizing instantly that (the boy) was a child.
Final Thoughts from Geek Woman:
The experiences that this clan has had are not unique. These kids have been called every hard bitten curse you can think of. I had a report not long ago from a 14 year old leader of a girls clan that her clan administrator - a married male in his 20's actually called the little girl the 'C word' among other things. There was a small foofarah about it, but because it was only her word against his, nothing was done.
There are a few things that abused gamers can do. It may not bring immediate results. Write to the FCC, several federal communication laws are being broken when swear words are said to little kids, not to mention the threats of rape, murder and use of the "N word". Call your local TV station. Tell them what is happening, raise awareness of the problem locally and it will get picked up around the world as gaming news. Go and talk at local schools about tolerance, racism, sexism and manners online.
Things that you can't say on TV to little kids can't be said to kids legally through other forms of communication. Microsoft has been getting away with this where no one else has been. In the MMO's communication is text based for the most part and the support teams have a log of everything that is typed in, so they can easily ban and block the abusers. Somehow Microsoft, and possibly others have managed to slide through this loophole.
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