Toxicity, Racism and why I'm leaving the game

Several days ago I had a game of competitive, it wasn’t going super well but that sort of thing happens. People were misplaying, enemy was playing better, that sort of thing. And no one had said a word the entire first half. Second half starts and its going pretty well on first hold. I get kills on both dps and a supp but die. Then it begins. Someone on my team yells at me for throwing, and I defend myself saying that I’ll be back soon and, though it was a misplay, it wasn’t a fatal one for the point. I get told to shut up because the cant stand my voice. I think okay, that hurts and is rude, but okay I’ve gotten worse. “The world would be a better place if you ******* didn’t exist”. For the rest of the game until I muted them it was nonstop racial and sexist slurs in voice and in chat. “Wish I could genocide you all”, “I hate **** and you should too”, etc. After the game ends I report the three stack of the offenders after telling everyone in game to do so and why (they said it in match chat so they should know why) and call it a night. That kind of killed my motivation to keep playing that night so I log off. I come back today and see that not one of them has been banned. With copious amounts of evidence given in detailed reports. I don’t trust the team behind banning people for obviously toxic behavior and cant in good faith keep supporting the game. Which is a shame because I was looking forward to OWL. But I have to stick to my guns and not support a game whos devs tolerate that kind of behavior.

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Yeah the player base can be very toxic. My gamer tag used to have “gaymer” in it but every single round I’d be barraged with homophobic comments, some people would literally throw, and I even had someone solo target me the entire time during one game and then sent me homophobic messages after I won.

Sadly the gaming world isn’t mature enough to include minorities. It happens way too often. Hell, talk about making a character gay in a game and half the community loses their minds.

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Pathetic that so many players are able to get away with stuff like this. I rarely play comp and when I do I don’t use my mic cause I know there’s like a 1/3 chance I’m gonna be told to get back in the kitchen or be begged for my snapchat or get any of the other stupid sexist remarks girls always get. It’s so messed up that people who get these remarks thrown at them just have to get used to it or hide their true identity to even enjoy games. Wish players would just grow up and realize everyone can play these games, and I wish more companies would actually put their foots down and deal with these kind of players

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Sorry to break it to you, but racism and toxicity is in every game you play (minus single player games for obvious reason) so I dont see the reasoning behind this post. I am sure the devs dont support bigotry either so that claim is really premature of you to say.

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they should instantly ban players who use racial slurs, no warning or 2 week ban but straight to perma ban

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This really does suck mate. I really hope that blizzard bans these fools. I also don’t know why typing a slur into the chat isn’t an auto-ban.

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I feel like silencing the person would work better.

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silence should be for toxic players who can reform their behaviour but a racist player doesnt even deserve to play the game

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If they repeat it then yea but at first they should just get silenced.

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How do you prove it unless they’re using text chat, though? It’d be too easy to just say somebody said whatever slur for a free instant ban. And it’s not realistic to have Blizzard listen to voice chat logs. They’d need a dedicated department for that and it would be way too much even then.

And OP, obviously they don’t “tolerate” that behavior. There’s just nothing they can do about it unless people consistently report the offenders. Just one report won’t do it. Blizzard is actually more restrictive than most when it comes to chat.

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You’d hate playing WoW and League. Lol

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Any PvP game in existence, really.

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Are voice chats recorded by the game, unless they use some sort of voice recognition filters i doubt they will be able to verify and take action.

Right now it just relies on the other members in your team to report, enemy team doubt they would have reported cause it’s a common thing used by gamers to say, someone called me n word in vc in my team to enemy team.

Its sad that you have to experience this and hope action is taken against them, but there’s not a proper system for this.

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See you in a week

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They aren’t since personal info could be leaked.

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Sometimes reports do take a couple days to go through – I’ve reported people for obviously racist Battletags and didn’t get a notification for like a week – but yeah, I totally understand. Nobody should have to hear/read such horrible things in a game, and taking quick action on it should be a top priority for the companies who make them. Insta-bans for people who type slurs in chat seems like an easy way to cut down on this, but for some reason nobody ever does this.

As for the “it’s the internet and every game is like this lol” excuses: just because something happens a lot doesn’t mean it’s right or acceptable. People who harass others and use racist/homophobic/sexist/transphobic/etc. language are in the wrong, full stop. Don’t let them use anonymity to get away with it.

Best of luck out there, OP.

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The daily toxicity a bastion main must stand.

This game’s community can be a toxic cesspool.
I’m sorry that happened to you, OP.
This game’s reporting system needs some definite improvement.
Gonna need to where a hazmat suit soon.

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I’ve said this before, but I think it’s also important for us players to speak up when we see this sort of behavior in games. If someone on your team is being harassed due to their voice, gender, age, sexuality, race, etc…You should speak up and say something in their defense. No, it’s not going to stop the toxic person from being toxic…But it can help that other person feel less alone.

Whats worse than being targeted and harassed for these things, is watching the rest of your team sit by silently and just ignore it.

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I agree with what you are saying and I have seen it happen! I report and record voice if I have to. I never ever ever stay quiet when I see this type of thing in the game from enemy team to my team or vice versa.

Just because this is a game doesn’t mean that it should go unmentioned when this abuse happens. I can even read some people in these comments treating your issue like is nothing. I can’t believe some people are okay with this.

For the rest of you who are not… if you see this type of thing happening please report and never stay quiet. Speak up, because these type of abusive people really don’t deserve a chance to play a game if they are going to humiliate and insult people from the same community.

Im sorry this happened to you. But if you ever come back you can add me. Im looking for non toxic people to play but Im still learning!

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