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[desertdroog]

Regarding the "Same Idea" presented to the group from the woman first and a man second; the man getting positive results vs. the woman who was the originator. It is possible that one is a better salesman than the other. Some people can sell ideas, and while that could very well be due to a culture in the company that is more receptive to a male offering up the idea vs. a woman, I would need to see more details on the idea, how the woman presented it vs. how the man presented it.

The message being the same can come across different ways based on the messenger.

 

[Fuz]

I just read the Steve Jobs bio the other week and that dude was madly infamous at declaring someone's idea shitty, only to proclaim it as his own a few weeks later. If you don't believe me, read the book.

Yeah, well, it's a well-known fact. And no need to read the book, just look at his products.

 

[Rhysser]

Regarding the "Same Idea" presented to the group from the woman first and a man second; the man getting positive results vs. the woman who was the originator. It is possible that one is a better salesman than the other. Some people can sell ideas, and while that could very well be due to a culture in the company that is more receptive to a male offering up the idea vs. a woman, I would need to see more details on the idea, how the woman presented it vs. how the man presented it.

The message being the same can come across different ways based on the messenger.

Almost any instance of anything can be explained away (except maybe the dick picks). The problem that Riot has is that it becomes harder to explain away any given instance when it's part of a collective of many, many other such instances.

 

[Clear]

That Meagan Marie blog is absolutely hilarious, its a classic example of naivete and the massive culture shock that's inevitable when a progressive young woman from America encounters a workplace in Ireland.

Its presented as this "bro' culture" when its obviously just a straight-up different culture and worldview. Just because people speak (more or less) the same language as in America, that isn't to say we all share the same sensitivities and social mores.

The water is somewhat muddied as she freely mixes anecdotes from the L.A and Dublin offices, but it seems to me a classic example of someone discovering that the world isn't one big liberal college campus safe-space.

 

[Rhysser]

That Meagan Marie blog is absolutely hilarious, its a classic example of naivete and the massive culture shock that's inevitable when a progressive young woman from America encounters a workplace in Ireland.

Its presented as this "bro' culture" when its obviously just a straight-up different culture and worldview. Just because people speak (more or less) the same language as in America, that isn't to say we all share the same sensitivities and social mores.

The water is somewhat muddied as she freely mixes anecdotes from the L.A and Dublin offices, but it seems to me a classic example of someone discovering that the world isn't one big liberal college campus safe-space.

Riot is going to be judged by US standards since it is primarily a US company. For example, if it's customary in another country to name teams "The Bros and Ho", or for a boss to ask the GF of a new employee if she is "DTF" as a joke, and Riot exposes its employees to that, they can and should get backlash. Also, these blog posts and exposes are not from 'naive' people discovering things. Women already know the reputation of the gaming and tech industry around this stuff so they are not naive about it. It's from people who, when they finally run into it, decide to work to change things so that the world does become more to their liking - even if it is a more equitable, 'safe-space' type of world that they prefer.

It's important too - I personally know women in tech who have had things like dick picks sent to them from their upper management and they are not so brave to expose it because they do fear for their careers. These are real things that happen more often than you'd think - and definitely more often than *I* thought. So that's why they are posting these blog posts, not just to complain, or because it's somehow a new unexpected reality about the world, but to shine a light on it.

 

[EDMIX]

Its presented as this "bro' culture" when its obviously just a straight-up different culture and worldview.

But a " different culture and worldview." can still be bro culture....

This is wrong man, no matter how you slice it, its wrong. Whats being reported here very much should bring shame to the developer and a spot light needs to be put on them.

it seems to me a classic example of someone discovering that the world isn't one big liberal college campus safe-space.

OH I see, so it means sexual harassment is ok and justified?

So...it seems to me a classic example of sexual harassment and folks trying to normalize it by blaming the victim as if knowing it exist is a job requirement or something. I mean even if they didn't "discover" this and already knew such things happened, what on earth does that have to do with the actions of that developer?

 

[Clear]

But a " different culture and worldview." can still be bro culture....

This is wrong man, no matter how you slice it, its wrong. Whats being reported here very much should bring shame to the developer and a spot light needs to be put on them.



OH I see, so it means sexual harassment is ok and justified?

So...it seems to me a classic example of sexual harassment and folks trying to normalize it by blaming the victim as if knowing it exist is a job requirement or something. I mean even if they didn't "discover" this and already knew such things happened, what on earth does that have to do with the actions of that developer?

First of all calling something "bro' culture" brings to mind a very specific sort of image, one of a kind of locker-room macho mentality. It conflates a very specific sort of testosterone-fuelled aggressiveness with people simply not obeying the strictures of PC culture because that's simply not the social norms they are familiar with.

How can you have a "frat party" atmosphere in a country where college fraternities simply do not exist?

Secondly, I don't recall anything in that blog reporting anything that in my opinion fits the term "sexual harassment". The nearest thing being the "DTF" incident, but frankly when a person specifies their hyper-vigilance to micro-aggressions and gendered insults I'm automatically skeptical of their perception of events because its evident that they view the world through a very specific lens.

The bottom line is that I don't believe that PC culture is a better way, in the same way that I don't think puritanism or some other abstemious or ascetic lifestyle is a superior. Its an intolerant outlook that is every bit as oppressive as the forces it pretends to stand against.

 

[Gargus]

I have a hard time believing anything kotaku writes about aside from snacks, game reviews, or some quirky toy/gadget. Anything beyond that I feel is extremely biased and opinion based but displayed as investigative journalism.

Every day I go there I see some article written about how women are mistreated, how women are represented poorly in games, how a man at some game event has harassed a woman, how gays arent properly portrayed in games, something game related about how racism is an issue, pro gay this, pro woman that, pro trans people, how yet another publisher or developer abuses their employees, etc. They seem to often times try really hard to find some kind of social or political hot button and dig deep to piece together what they want to find even if it means connecting dots that arent really there. It is a constant barrage of that kind of shit to the point where it seems like all they want to do is prop up women, condemn men, and only want to usually talk positive about gays and trans and so on. Everything they write just feels very agenda driven is all.

Most of their writers seem to be 20 something kids that have an absolute stance and narrow view of everything and write in a very alarmist fashion. Pretty much just like a college kid that thinks they know everything about the world and the only way things are is what they and the people around them who share the view as well. They see what they want to see.

I miss the site before all the political agenda bullshit and constant preaching. They used to be a fun site that wrote about gaming culture in fun and unique ways and covered all kinds of cool shit. Now its all just preachy junk, advertisements veiled as "articles" you see on the main page every day, bumps of old topics constantly back to the front page as if they were new, articles they just link from their sister sites, complaints about like amazon in one article stressing how bad they are and in the next article is another fake article thats actually an advertisement for something on sale at amazon. They always want to forcibly find the negative in who they want so they raise up the ones they want.

And as far as riot games goes, kotaku doesnt know a thing except what they were told by people who were involved in it and as we all know people involved in something are rarely honest and say what they need to in order to support the side they are on or to try and protect themselves from trouble. You have 3 sides to a story one side, the other side, and what really happened and what really happened rarely comes out. I have an opinion on riot because I was not there nor was I personally involved. What really happened is between the people directly involved and thats it.

 

[Ten_Fold]

I’ve heard stories of this happening at blizzard as well, to women and the very few black people. You really have to look at this issue because this shit isn’t cool, true Some people are just using #metoo because it’s the thing, but at a lot of these video game companies this happens way to often unfortunately, like do gaming men not like women at the job? I wouldn’t want to design a female character without a female.

 

[Rhysser]

I have a hard time believing anything kotaku writes about aside from snacks, game reviews, or some quirky toy/gadget. Anything beyond that I feel is extremely biased and opinion based but displayed as investigative journalism.

[snip]

And as far as riot games goes, kotaku doesnt know a thing except what they were told by people who were involved in it and as we all know people involved in something are rarely honest and say what they need to in order to support the side they are on or to try and protect themselves from trouble. You have 3 sides to a story one side, the other side, and what really happened and what really happened rarely comes out. I have an opinion on riot because I was not there nor was I personally involved. What really happened is between the people directly involved and thats it.

I think it's a bit disingenuous to portray this as "A thing kotaku has said" in order to dismiss it. A few things.

1. This is common in the tech and gaming industry and people in the industry know this already regardless of Kotaku saying it or not, because many have seen it first hand.

2. As you correctly say, "What really happened" in any given instance is hard to know, but these pieces are not about prosecuting specific instances. When your company has many more instances of this being reported than other gaming companies , and when many of those instances are corroborated by third parties, that confirms that there is a systemic problem within said company, regardless of your personal perception about any given instance. It's definitely the case that there is a larger amount of this going on within Riot than other tech companies - and maybe even other gaming companies.

3. Regardless of what you personally believe, the article a year ago about Riot has seriously given Riot a black eye in the Esports and gaming industries over this, because it was (like this article) corroborated by many people at Riot, both male and female. I can tell you that even a year later, Riot is used as an example of what not to do, specifically because of that article. Don't get me wrong, Riot is, overall, seen as a great company, and a respected company, despite some issues that it needs to fix. And Riot itself may not care about the reputational hit either. But smaller companies throughout the industry that can't absorb the reputation hit as well as Riot have become more vigilant about these issues because they "don't want to end up like Riot." This has also resonated in the Esports world within teams, because teams are not yet profitable behemoths, and these types of reputational hits can cost them dearly in the form of investment money if investors, who are already losing money on the teams, perceive an increased risk to success due to controversy. So while this may not have as big of an impact on Riot today, the Riots of tomorrow that are currently being built, are already being built differently from the ground up as a result of these things coming to light.

 

[Jon Neu]

I wouldn’t want to design a female character without a female.

That's ridiculous.

You don't need a female to design a female character.

 

[IbizaPocholo]

Riot Games reaches agreement in principle to settle class action gender discrimination lawsuit

Riot Games reaches agreement in principle to settle class action gender discrimination lawsuit

www.riotgames.com

 

[IbizaPocholo]

Riot Games will pay $10 million to settle gender discrimination suit

'League of Legends' maker Riot Games has agreed to pay $10 million to settle a gender discrimination suit. Every woman who has worked at the company since 2014 will get a payout.

www.latimes.com

 

[Jon Neu]

Riot Games will pay $10 million to settle gender discrimination suit

'League of Legends' maker Riot Games has agreed to pay $10 million to settle a gender discrimination suit. Every woman who has worked at the company since 2014 will get a payout.

www.latimes.com

I'm sure companies are thinking: moral of the story; don't hire women.

 

[EightBit Man]

Ugh... "the fight is far from over"....the choice of words alone.

 

[xrnzaaas]

This is going to be the best advertisement to avoid hiring women and especially the ones open about being feminists.

 

[Screamer-RSA]

Must be fun place to work at now!

 

[Shrap]

Making riot more inclusive

Making the games industry a more diverse and welcoming place

Great word choice there. No better way to make a place more "inclusive" and "welcoming" than through force.

 

[lukilladog]

"One day, Lacy conducted an experiment: After an idea she really believed in fell flat during a meeting, she asked a male colleague to present the same idea to the same group of people days later. He was skeptical, but she insisted that he give it a shot. “Lo and behold, the week after that, [he] went in, presented exactly as I did and the whole room was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is amazing.’ [His] face turned beet red and he had tears in his eyes,” said Lacy. “They just didn’t respect women.”

Pffff, lol. There are so many factors that could have caused her idea to be ignored, it´s just less painful at a psychological level to assume "they don´t respect women" over "they don´t respect me", or "probably I didn´t chose the right time" . Same thing could happen any day if this exercise is conducted with inverted genders.

 

[MacReady13]

A few years ago I applied for a manger's position where I work. We got in a new boss and I was supposedly the next in line to get 1 of these positions. All the managers pumped up my tires and said it's mine. I went for the interview and a few weeks later our new boss told me I was unsuccessful. Now, a few of the managers were upset and told me the reason I didn't get the job was because our new boss was racist against people with Italian/European backrounds! They wanted me to take it further and really go after this guy. I didn't because I realized it was all horse shit. He did eventually hire people with European backrounds and I just needed to interview better. It wasn't due to discrimination, it was just that I wasn't good enough.

 

[Ravix]

I'm pretty sure "Kotaku" and "investigative reporting" is an oxymoron.

 

[IbizaPocholo]

Riot Games CEO Sued for Sexual Harassment By His Former Assistant

A former employee is suing the ‘League of Legends’ developer, alleging CEO Nicolo Laurent asked her to "'cum' over to his house while his wife was away."

www.vice.com

 

[Orta]

Riot Games CEO Sued for Sexual Harassment By His Former Assistant

A former employee is suing the ‘League of Legends’ developer, alleging CEO Nicolo Laurent asked her to "'cum' over to his house while his wife was away."

www.vice.com

"discussed his underwear size with her"

Hey baby, I'm wearing a pair of black boxers. 32" elasticated waist. Short thigh drop and 70% cotton. Oh yeah.

Wanna fuck?

The old devil!

 

[royox]

"discussed his underwear size with her"

"Are you ok?"
"Man, the boxers I'm wearing today are super unconfy"

Pervert.

 

[supernova8]

Hoo boy, I know I'm stepping on several land mines here. But I'm gonna trust you guys to be civil and reasonable. I believe in you!

Cecilia D'Anastasio of Kotaku has spent months investigating reports from current and former Riot Games employees -- male and female, on the record and off -- about a culture of sexim at Riot Games and the ramifications for its female employees.

Inside The Culture Of Sexism At Riot Games

This report is, in my humble opinion, really good reporting, which is why I'm braving this thread at all. Please read the whole article with an open mind.

Some of the accounts are fairly heartbreaking.







BTW I really appreciate getting anyone to speak on the record about these things, it adds a lot of credibility in my eyes (and I realize the potential for blowback makes it difficult). So, props to Jes Negrón.

I have minor quibbles with the article. D'Anastasio points out that insisting on gamer creds for hires in the areas of "office managers [and] finance specialists" is unnecessary; but it's pretty clear the author's real concern is with female game devs. For those, it seems reasonable to me to expect some gaming experience. You could argue, as the author does, that Riot takes even this too far and defines "gaming experience" along very narrow lines, and I can see that argument.

I know a woman who used to work at Riot Games -- she loved her time there, but doesn't find these stories hard to believe -- so my interest in the article is not 100% objective.

Anyway, if you'd like to discuss any of this, I humbly suggest you read the whole article first. Again, it seems like solid journalism.

Thanks...

First two you quoted seemed like neither here nor there (first one seems like it could be open to interpretation, second one seems weird she mentioned she was fired but didn't elaborate on why) but the third sounds like a dickmove by management so I guess if the third could happen then the other two are not out of the realms of possibility.