I love that svb touched on how weaponized these sorta incidents have become and I'd love for more discussion on that because it's so fucked that that's where our moral compass falls to not come forward immediately when given knowledge like this and that it was clearly timed to catch the most eyes when it would disrupt what could've been just another normal match day for other people who would've filled those positions if they had came forward sooner and we wouldn't have had the fiasco that that day was. Here's hoping there's no next time on overwatch esports player says bigoted thing and if there is we find out from people who come forward immediately and not when its to disrupt and complicate match and event schedules. Also as glad as I am to always see svb speak up on topics like this I'm glad and hope that there is more discussion from other ends too and not just from svb. I'm sure svb has made that clear also in the past he doesn't want to be the sole voice in any time stuff like this happens and I hope others make it clear too that racism can not be tolerated nor given the luxury of silence.
Yeah they should have clowned on him immediately in discord to shut that down. I'm glad svb has the courage and fire to bring this up. The reason not a lot of voices chime in is prob because the largest streamers are cauc and this doesn't show up in their streams bec they have a good solid modded community to punish this and so it's largely out of sight for them, and good on them for cultivating a community like that who doesn't engage in this. It's tough to see our pros don't have that mindset. Please continue to support svb and lift him up as a voice to make this better.
Why it is so hard to not take this in that way, though? Were you born when it took actual sense of racism or something? I guess not. Do you have a master that says what to do these days? You went insane out there with this sh*t, guys.
@FXtrtzor Why does it matter when someone was born? I have family members that are still here that dealt with that shit. Not to mention we are still dealing with the fallout of racism...
I feel like it's because there is no gray area with conversations like these, there is no separation between racism and being politically insensitive, so it is all bundled as racism
@@FXtrtzor you're trying a little too hard my guy. racism is racism. you don't have to personally experience it to know when someone is being that way believe it or not.
ok, there's a difference between edgy racism and genuine racism, s9mm was being corny edgy, people who are genuine racist use dog whistles and passive aggressive language like nazis will call jews gnomes as a dog whistle. also people say fucked up things in private dms (which s9mms was) all the time
@@callmeacutekitten8106stop. Just stop. You’re doing exactly what SVB is calling out, excusing racist language and actions. Why are you so quick to tolerate it?
@@callmeacutekitten8106 yeah you jumped to defend this kid so quick it's like you didn't even watch the first 5 minutes of the video. I never specifically called Sam out
Can't express how much I appreciate someone in the gaming space saying things like this. We need more people with influence like yourself to highlight these kinds of things.
no we dont - this is how we end up with sweet baby inc and other woke companies trying to lecture the consumers. Leave politics and ideology out of video games
Thank you SVB. I barely play OW2 anymore, I decided to have a few games a couple of weeks ago. First game I said one thing in match chat, I got called a monkey, a N word, homophobic slurs. I had a few games and I had more where someone said something racist or just discriminatory then I didn't. Sad state and honestly much happier not actively playing the game anymore. I have played since early OW1 and never had experiences like I did coming back recently.
You saying racism isn’t a things that black and brown people do while they are growing up is absolutely disgusting dude. I’m an autistic white male who’s only ever wanted to be kind to people and have people be kind to me but constantly while I was growing and and 10x more now I have had black and brown people say absolutely heinous racist comments toward me because of the color of my skin. I’ve been completely innocent and done nothing to these people and just because I’m white theyll say things like how I deserve to die. Like it’s actually so fucked up that you would say black and brown people don’t participate in this same behavior because it’s factually not true.
Does it feel different to you if it's a private DM that was leaked vs. a public display of racism? How is it different? Obviously, I don't condone this behavior, and I won't make excuses for them. I ask because I hope to hear from people who are colored what their perspective is (I'm white).
I think this is a good discussion to have and I appreciate you asking this question. Me personally, like many commenters here have said already, racism is racism. To me, just because someone said something racist in private doesn't negate the fact that it's still bad and it's perpetuating harmful ways of thinking that could lead to real life harm towards the groups being discriminated against. To put it simply, being racist in private still makes you racist imo.
Racism is racism. The only difference the two make is communicating your stance & character. Someone who is bigoted enough to do grand public displays of racism/sexism/homophobia has basically told me enough about them. Perhaps they're looking for a fight, believe they're surrounded by peers, or have such a mentality dyed in the wool that they're not even aware of it anymore. Either way, you're telling us off the bat you're too far gone. Someone using such language in private only has demonstrated a full understanding of how bad what they're saying is and that they don't want to be publicly associated with such an act, but for whatever reason still feels inclined to say it anyway. I can only assume you truly believe the hateful rhetoric you spout behind closed doors, or you have such a negative view of said marginalized groups that you're willing to risk your own life/career for more cheap laughs at their expense. Either way, you knew and just decided not to care.
0:02, I don't see time stamps, just fyi SVB edit, just watched the video, and i appreciate your commitment to the overwatch community with calling this shit out. i hope this doesn't just blow over and get forgotten like we've seen before, but i don't have much hope. :/ also let's gooooooo eskay haha i love eskay
Only part I disagreed with was the racism not being a phase or some common part of black/brown life. I know in India they have colorism, same as with American black colorism treating lightskin black boys poorly, African and Caribbean colorism but treating lightskin boys very well (These are the two communities I am a part of personally and have seen), I know there is significant racial tensions amongst Asian communities from colorism to Han supremacy to issues with Koreans and Japanese... in other words, we're all guilty of having racism within our communities and cultures. You may not be a bigot yourself but ALL of our cultures are flawed in this regard
A lot of the colorism indians deal with was born out of colonialism. No one was classifying themselves on skin color before the brits came - it was only occupation.
thanks for making this video and for talking about how racism is so easily dismissed in gaming in your tweet. while it feels like there's been some progress in recent years in combating the crazy racism and other bigotry in gaming spheres, its only because people like you have been making the conscious, daily effort to fight it. i think the way people dismiss the use of slurs - even people who agree that saying slurs are bad, but who believe that the people saying them arent doing "real" harm by saying them - shows how poorly racism is understood. a word is only considered a slur when it has a history of the word being accompanied by violence - words like the n word are slurs because thats a word that has been used, over and over and over again for decades, for centuries, when someone wanted someone discriminated against, assaulted, or murdered on the basis of race (or gender or sexuality or etc.). thats the difference between a regular "mean" word and a slur. slurs are accompanied by real, measurable violence, and the people who made these words and LIKE these words are people who use them to try to convince other people that whatever demographic theyve chosen to hate doesn't deserve to be treated like humans. thanks again for speaking out - i think youre doing something really important by doing so
Thank you! I never use comms anymore because of these losers and their enablers + those that ignore and “it’s not my problem” but still think they’re on the right side.
Honestly, the content of Overwatch is so diverse and wholesome that you would really hope it would rub off on the players. At least you would HOPE. I mean, hell, when I was a little bit more ignorant, Overwatch did inspire me to learn more about people that are different than me.
i don't usually care if someone in game chat curse me or said ggez or support diff or anything simillar, but i do hate it when people become racist whether it's against my race or any other race, i instatnly report them, i don't know if overwatch support care about racists or not but i do my part and report
Thank you for talking about this. As a black overwatch player myself, this stuff definitely drives me friends away from playing the game and giving it a chance. I love your thread and how to the point you were on it. This and the monetization vid have definitely got me to sub.
Im from south america and i always play NA because of the amount of racist comments i see in chat from (mostly) argentinean people in the SA servers. Its really enfuriating and idk how they arent banned yet
I don't know, but I can tell you as an Argentinian and as any Spanish-speaking person (ask a Peruvian, Chilean, etc.) that the most racist are the Brazilians. I deactivated the voice chat because there was almost always a Brazilian shouting and insulting like crazy; curious because with TF2 it doesn't happen
I don’t believe that a lot of people that say racist things are actually a racist, especially in competition. It seems like insecure people will try to make other insecure people feel worse by saying the thing they think will hurt them the most. “Hurt people hurt people”. I don’t believe some of them are actually a racist, they’re just an asshole.
If you use racist language to “hurt” somebody, YOU ARE RACIST. If you know the effect of the words, and you dgaf and decide to use them anyway? That’s racism
i’d ask you to go ahead and re-read those screenshots. pages of them saying the n word despite none of them being black is racism. you do not have to say “i hate black people” to be racist. willful ignorance is also just as bad in its own way, and using these racial slurs (seriously, go read those texts.) if you have to use those slurs to calm your insecurities, you are still being racist.
No he's right, People say it to get a reaction. Not because they're inherently racist. The Overwatch community especially doesn't understand this. Doesn't make it ok, if you're racist you should be banned and removed, but doesn't exactly make it racist. Think of the 13 year old COD players in MW2, saying the N word was for shock value, doesn't mean they actually hate a certain group. Grow up people.
i’m going to be honest the “bro i’m black and this doesn’t bother me” argument for racism is really outplayed. just because you personally would excuse racism doesn’t really matter when these things affect POC in the gaming space as a whole
@@kill4oj it affects POC in ALL environments. Gamers have jobs, gamers are interacting with others in many different environments not just in gaming, so excusing this kind of behaviour will negatively influence society in ways beyond just the gaming space. I know you're on the right side of this so I'm not criticising your comment, just adding to it.
I remember the first time a 10 year old kid called me the N word over xbox live and I was just in shock. Since then I've become pretty desensitized to it because of exactly what you described as a culture of ignorance. I won't claim to be 100% faultless as you brought up sexism and I have definitely participated in that behind closed doors. Even though I could get on my high horse about being black and just getting used to it but also women have to put up with the same shit and so with that thought in mind I apologize to them for my part in it.
Context is king. Being held accountable is completely within everyone's rights. We just have to work on having it be both ways. Racism, as it is, seems to be a one-way street, and that also should not be okay. The amount of bigotry I have seen white people receive Throughout my childhood Is about on par With how it was the other way around. I just wish people realized. It should be a 2 way street even though it's not portrayed as such. No it's not acceptable, But it shouldn't be not acceptable by only one group. That inherently is also racist. If we want to make over encompassing Guidelines, then it needs to be overEncompassing and not exclude a certain set group of people. It's quite concerning that It seems a large majority of people within this argument do not see it this way.
Do you remember the OWPD server with all the pros and high ranked players back in the day? FILLED WITH SLURS the head guy of it got a proper esport job as well. Im not shocked that its still racist af. Like it was genuinely the norm, ppl think these racist pros are the rare ones but no its actually the majority.
SVB, not sure if you read comments but I'm in awe of your mastery of language in situations like this. I have a technical job and I'm quite proud of how eloquently I can write about those topics, but I could never articulate my own thoughts as well, fairly, and clearly as you do in those tweets on the racist DMs. We're very lucky to have you, keep it up.
Well done SVB proud of you man. The worst thing is that the kids these guys have will continue this behaviour. It's important that from a very young age kids are taught that this is 100% unacceptable. I deliberately send my kid to a highly diverse school so that he learns about about cultures.
Yeah I don’t fuck with Ajax anymore after this, I know that’s random but who tf touts about having MB of Racist/Damaging proof from OW Pros but doesn’t act on any of that shit? Who just holds it in a folder if they’re not going to share or use it for something someday…think about that. If you find GB of Severed body pics on someone’s laptop, obvious assumptions are made - apply that logic here and I think he’s guilty asf. Report it to staff, Blizzard, heck just release the Folder
I kinda also get tired of being told I am not upset enough all the time, everyday, about everything. Worrying about gamers on discord is not high on my list of concerns but that doesnt excuse the behavior. The mob got their pound of flesh for private chats. Take the win.
It seems that especially in NA, a bunch of players have dirt on one another and have this "gentleman's agreement" to not tell on each other. Mikeyy, one of the players that got outed, also knew about Aspire's situation with his underage girlfriend and kept shut about it. One of the comments Ojee made was made directly in response to something SirMajed posted (Majed did not say anything racist) but then Majed just responds to the hard R with...a "The Boys" meme? And to the timing of the leak, rumor is that Nicogdh was the one that got access to the original messages, but waited until just before OWCS started just...out of spite? to watch OWCS teams scramble last minute? Whatever the reason it wasn't done in good faith. Just hold your friends and acquaintances to higher standards. It's really disheartening seeing so many players over the years being outed as racists and creeps.
The whole problem isn't the fact that the players were saying racist/stupid remarks in DM's, it's that the french players took these screenshots in Dec(?) and sat on them until moments before roster lock. If the players were mad about the racist remarks, they would have leaked it immediately. Rather, they sat on them and put them out at the worst time. I am NOT condoning the things the players said, but the french players did this maliciously and very specifically. You could say all parties are the a-hole.
Yeah I'm a white guy and I've said dumb shit before. Nowhere in my life was I constantly saying slurs, racial or otherwise. I wouldn't even use the "R slur" but I'll admit... I was bigoted towards trans people when I was younger through ignorance and reinforcement from shitty people on the internet. I would never miss-gender people on purpose but I constantly would say that people that are not medicalized are not trans and I would talk about how the already have equal rights and don't need to advocate for better treatment. I took the stance on minority groups in general and it was a really ignorant and shitty take. So my ignorance of one minority group definitely spread to others and I looked down on people of color for advocating for themselves. I'm really disgusted by how I used to philosophize this stuff. I learned a lot over time by listening to people from all sorts of minority groups of course, including many people of color. I know people can change but to act like this behavior is some right of passage is quite ridiculous. Anyways after spending years, reforming myself and learning intersectional feminism and liberation for all, I've learned so much. Obviously, a bad stray joke is one thing, but a pattern of harmful jokes is essentially stating a position. A pattern of this is ABSOLUTELY reinforcement of bigotry end of story. I totally apologize for my own contribution to some of this attitude in my youth and I'm sorry that so many white people tend to make excuses for it because they are insulated by their privilege
How much do you want to bet that there's plenty of overlap between the racists in the Overwatch community and the people that are outwardly purposefully misgendering Venture and insulting Ventured non-binary voice actor in the process. It's absolutely disgusting, but there are a lot of people out there that either secretly or openly are absolutely fine with bigotry and belittling marginalized people.
I stand by, opportunistically digging in someone else's DMs and then cancelling them on Twitter is infinitely worse than saying dumb shit to friends in DMs. The French World cup team is just as cancerous as the American.
i hate the “they said that a long time ago” argument. people know it’s not okay to say that but continue to say it. there honestly is NO excuse for saying slurs and there never will be. i understand people that slurs were used towards using them but if you’re not black why are you saying it? if you’re not gay why are you saying the f slur? it drives me crazy. it’s not a hard concept. and i bet the people excusing this aren’t even black
I’m a person of color. If someone feels to need to speak out against you because of how you look who cares? You shouldn’t be defined by what others think of you. I don’t know. I don’t care what anyone says about me. Your worthless opinion of me means nothing. I don’t care. You aren’t worth a damn if you do that shit. It really doesn’t matter.
Whenever there is a confrontation (even if it is a video game) between people from other countries and even more so a game like Overwatch that relies too much on team play is going to be very common. Unfortunately that goes beyond the game and is something that must be dealt with in real life.
I mean, they care more about something someone does in private than the fact that a professional player went to sabotage the rival team? It doesn't look like the new professional league will last long...
To me i think i the n word should be totaly banned from sites like twitch ect. Because we do look up to some of these black streamers ect. And they say it alot and it influences others to say it. Hot take?
Im not gonna lie as a non social media user its very rare i gotta see direct racism in games. If i load up csgo or val, itll probably be easy to find. I enjoy using my time on games for fun tho so i dont play those games.
Who tf cares?.. Like bro people are honestly weird for looking for this in someone's account... People say horrible, crazy, and antagonistic things behind closed doors all the time... Black people say the N word with the hard R in private as banter...
Honestly on all of this racism stuff it’s the same as the sexism/homophobia/transphobia in the gaming community, but has had so much less pushback, honestly just disgusting and frustrating… the normalisation is really the words that I was looking for this. The excuse “just mute chat, just block them, just don’t play the game” isn’t okay, I shouldn’t have to not enjoy something because you can’t act like an adult or tell your friends that they’re being a prick.
I remember 4 years ago when everybody acted like I was mean for saying that the more casual and less skillbased direction they were so proud of going in wasn't going to make OW more popular, it was just going to make our game more of a chud zone along with being less fun and unique. Been feeling vindicated ever since.
It feels like the more variants of social media that spring up, the more comfortable kids are getting using the N-word online. I grew up in the 90s; people were more likely to be racist to your face then, but that was usually from the adults not the teens/kids. It is not, and never was, some racist phase that we all go through. I'm glad someone with social media presence finally pushed back on this trend and called it what it is - renormalizing the dehumanization of minorities.
I don’t condone genuine racism, but stuff like this being used in private dms between people who don’t mind a little dark humor is perfectly fine to me and i do not understand why people are getting worked up over it, people need to understand that just because people say slurs doesn’t automatically make them racist, context is a defining factor in this subject and a lot of people decide to just ignore it just because it’s a slur word, i can imagine most of the people who get worked up over this kind of stuff is not even a person that should get offended by it, for the example black people, and i’ve even seen black people use those words in a joking manner in dms or in private servers with other white people as well and no one got offended, why do people get so worked up over it i don’t get it, as long as it’s done in private then what is the issue? is it their fault the dms got leaked on the internet? if anything i’d be attacking the leaker
what you are saying about context is true but it's not like the context in this situation is any good, the context in this situation is them saying n word in private as an inside joke but there is no nuance to the joke, when the "joke" is just them saying slurs, that's not what dark humor is also pocs aren't a monolith, just because you know some that is comfortable with this behavior it doesn't mean everyone is, we grow up in the same culture as you and we learn these things from our peers without even realizing how it is harmful
There is kind of a complexity because, yes it is a dumb joke, but also this kind of cultural sensitivity around the concept of using specific words too often is BLATANTLY something that you just haven't matured into a lot of the time as a teenager. When the topic is as nuanced as it is, instilling that reasoning into the culture of young people is very difficult. Younger people as a whole are much better at internalizing simpler concepts so they will always see slurs and think "I know I'm not racist" or "it's just a word so it's fine" without seeing the bigger picture.
It isn't some "white teen" problem. People of all sorts of colors and backgrounds are racist towards all sorts of other people all over the world. Even within white groups of people there is bitter hatred towards other groups of whites all over the world and the same goes for all races. Humans are very tribal creatures and historically do not like outsiders. I 100% agree as a society we need to continue working towards being a unified people regardless of who you are or where you are from, but ostracizing and vilifying people generally only makes them dig in more to their beliefs. I highly recommend people look up Daryl Davis and the work he has done over the course of his life. He understands how to have real world impact on changing the hearts and minds of racists.
thanks for calling out succinctly and boldly on twitter. thanks for giving the fuller nuanced stuff on yt. this hits everything: accountability, forgiveness, what's normal for white teens, systemic and leadership failings, etc.
call me racist but I think saying the n word in private as a joke is not a big deal epically if you know that person isn't racist or acting racist in the real world then he is hurting no one. yet no one speaks up about the fact that this person went through his things and leaked his things without consent. to be honest I don't ever say the N word unless im singing a song but I don't understand why its so taboo to say it in the american culture yet when people use other words to offend someone its ok like what's the difference. like maybe its the same thing like calling autistic as an offence which might hurt people that did nothing to you because you used a thing as an offence . I get it but why is it wrong if its used in private then
Racism is such a tricky topic since the Venn diagrams of edginess, tiltedness, stupidity, immaturity and dozens of others along with straight up racism overlap in the gaming space. Someone who's being toxic with racist jokes doesn't feel they are actually racist so telling them to not be racist is a bit pointless.
Yeah, it is one of those arguments where people criticize others in a way that is ineffective in actually changing their perspective because it doesn't actually tackle the root of the argument
The more you speak about this, the more it will occur. You just show that this is your weak spot. Try to reset your mental, think outside the box, make no meaning to the n-word. I am not trolling, just in case. I genuinely think, that making content of that "issue" just complements the issue.
I don’t think a lot of the people that say the n word on the internet and in private dms actually think “AHHH I HATE BLACK PEOPLE THEY ARE THE WORST”. It’s definitely extremely racist to say it, but a lot of people think it’s just a funny silly word to use. I mean if you look on the internet a lot of black people think it is a funny word. LET ME BE CLEAR, I don’t agree with it just being a silly word. The history of the word and how charged it is makes it where you CAN NOT and SHOULD NOT say that word. That stuff I said earlier would only be true though, if he wasn’t dropping the hard r over and over and over again. That’s literally WILD. I think he’s actually racist for that. He doesn’t see that word as something funny. He’s just actually racist. (Again, I see that word being extremely serious. I don’t believe it’s a joke of a word at all. I’m just point out, there are people of all kinds that see it as a joke).
None of that is the point. The discussion isn't about an individual's moral compass and whether they're using the word to joke or not, it's about the consequences to POC of normalising and excusing racist language/behaviour.
Showing screenshots of private conversations of people, I am never watching your videos again. It doesn't matter what they say or how bad they are, this is just wrong. I used to like your content, but this...
That is a great sentiment, but we don't live in a perfect world where words don't have horrible origins and horrible meanings that need to be called out when used by those who perpetrate those horrible meanings of those words on minorities and others. Great sentiment but NOT for gamers in 2024, come back in 2050 maybe. This video shows us that gamers still need to be policed on this shit and I feel like it goes beyond just this community but let's just leave that there. Also, "People who want to condemn words are the problem" is such a great way to leave a sour taste in any persons' mouth. Without identifying and "condemning" as you say, we can never enter a world where we can trust JUST intent.
@@JamalFreeman I would have to disagree. Word choice does matter because in choosing slurs to talk about any marginalised group conveys the fact you see them as less than human in some regard. There is a libertarian argument to be made in support of your position, and that is how slurs are used currently. No one stops you from saying any slurs. At the same time though, most people would face some degree of consequence for using such slurs. Freedom of speech doesn't equal freedom from consequences.
So if black people started whooping your ass for being racist to them like we used to before people started using freedom of speech to be racist, don't call the cops since Na is so soft.
Grow thicker skin, People have the right to say what they want, even if it is "offensive" or we don't agree with, thats what America was founded. " I may not like with what you say, but I'm I'll fight for your right to say it"
God this worm is trying with every fiber of his being to look self-righteous. That kind of behavior is gross and disingenuous. Idk why people believe anyone is actually like this.
