Journalist Finds Best Way to Combat Rape Threats from Gamers

Mephisto Mori/ December 2, 2014/ Video Games/ 0 comments

We’ve all had an immature child ruin our fun in an online game before.  If you play League of Legends you know the exact person I’m talking about.  They probably call Mid-lane or maybe jungle Master Yi.  Whatever they play they auto-lock it after you’ve discussed roles at length with the rest of your team.  They lose a duel early on and immediately blame someone else.  Then they rage and feed intentionally.  All the while they spew racial slurs and other ignorant, chest-thumping bile.  These trolls have become an all-too-familiar fixture of the online gaming landscape.

Many gamers have learned to ignore them and move on. Not me.  I’m an asshole.  A part of the problem.  My patented three step process for dealing with trolls is ultimately self-serving (my own amusement) and has done nothing to make the Internet a better place.

My Technique?  Simple and Ineffective:

1) Insult them back – usually a remark about their youth and immaturity followed by something irreverent like, “I hope you slip in the bathtub and accidentally choke on your rubber ducky you piece of shit.”

2) Then I screen cap their idiocy and report them.

3) Finally after I’ve gotten enough of my own jabs in and my fake anger becomes real anger, I ignore them.

It’s a widely held belief that the average troll is a teenager.  They live in their parent’s basement.  And listen to Insane Clown Posse.  They revel in anonymity and love the audience.

Luckily a gaming journalist from Australia may have found a much better technique than feeding the trolls.  One that actually works.  Alanah Pearce is telling their parents.

As a female gaming journalist, Ms. Pearce has endured the absolute ugliest of internet fuckwaddery – unabashed misogyny and rape threats.  There’s a particular sort of scum that thinks threatening rape is the most original way to insult a woman.  They’re the same kind of genius that does it through social media where they’re not so anonymous.

An article I read on Al Jazeera highlights some of the exchanges on social media. She receives a rape threat from a teenager.  She sends a message to the kid’s mom.  It’s efficient and effective action with immediate, and more importantly, tangible consequences for these gamers.  And it makes an awful lot of sense.  Too much sense.

Video games are becoming more social.  It’s weird, I know.  We stream.  Games pester us to log into FB/Twitter for minor DLC perks or social media bombasting.  The point is a large chunk of the anonymity that sustains trolls is fading.  There’s a logical action to be taken here.  Don’t feed the trolls.  Don’t become one yourself.  And don’t ignore it.  Tell someone.  Tell their parents.  I like it.

It all goes back to one single truth of gaming.  Video games aren’t to blame.  It comes down to parents.  Parents need to be active in a kid’s hobby whether it’s playing Football for their High School or GTA on a console.  For too long people have gone without consequences online and that needs to stop.

Parents take an interest in your kids.  Kids stop being fuckwads.  Alanah Pearce, keep doing what you’re doing.

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