As someone who belongs to the transgender community, having such a policy for the premier Netrunner tournament scene makes a lot of sense to me. Glad to see it exists, though hopefully it won’t often need to be used.
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I’m glad we have a policy in place. I just hope we never have to use it. 
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Ugh I’m really conflicted here. On one hand, I do agree that it was inappropriate, on the other. I think your being hyper sensitive if you think “what do you do for a living” is weird or overly prying. Hell I’ve had that conversation with pretty much everyone in the group.
The behaviour wasn’t acceptable, on the other hand, it wasn’t dealt with in an immediate fashion. Instead he gets to read a 160 post thread on Stimhack, with people talking about banning him, or making him out to be a predator, rather than a guy who was inappropriate and was in need of correction.
It’s a tough position personally, because ideologically I’m in your camp, but I think your methodology was in a lot of ways counter productive. If the point wasn’t to make a lesson to him, why would you post it in our gaming facebook group page, with identifying characteristics?
At this point I don’t think he has much motivation to talk to you about it at all, simply put he’s concerned that if the conversation doesn’t go how you want it, you’ll post a nasty thing about it in the facebook page, or on stimhack. At this point considering you didn’t raise your legitimate (and I want to be clear, I mean very legitimate complaints) to him, I could see why he’d be nervous about future interactions.
Anyway, the article was well written and I appreciate the points you made in it.
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I think this is a really key and legitimate concern. Being able to deal with these situations with tact on a personal level rather than getting TOs involved is often preferable, but we don’t always do or say the exact right things in the moment. But frankly, “What if I wanted to hit on her?” is way across the line, and up until that point I can see someone thinking it might be better to say nothing and hope the person in question realizes what they did and improves their behavior.
If someone is willing to cross that boundary if no one warns them, he should be somewhat nervous about future interactions. It’s not going to get better for him until he takes a look in the mirror.
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While I certainly agree with policies being in place to protect minorities, it is worth remembering that by far the greatest acts of bullying and oppression have been carried out by authority structures or those acting on their behalf. Let’s make sure that micro infractions are met with micropenalties. Never is authority more dangerous than when it believes itself to be ethically justified in the exercise of its power.
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I agree completely. I don’t want anybody to think I condone the behaviour I just wish this had been nipped in the bud.
It’s certainly made for an interesting conversation about game culture in stimhack though. Which I believe was the real goal of the OP, I just fear for the side effects it may have on my Netrunner group.
While it’s really important this document exists, I hope it never gets called on. I want people to enjoy anr events and have a good time in a relaxed environment.
The code of conduct isn’t an accusation.
We should have an open and welcoming society, which I think we generally do. I’ve not yet met a netrunner player I haven’t enjoyed spending time with. Long may that continue.
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I’m sure we’ll play one day and all of that will be undone.
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While I understand the sentiment behind these “I hope we never need to use it…” posts, codes of conduct are absolutely necessary to build healthy and safe communities. They signal the importance of appropriate behavior and provide a strict reference in place for when incidents happen. And incidents will occur, because some people (some men especially, admit it y’all) are jerks and society is patriarchal. Better to acknowledge that and attempt to counteract it than try to wish it away.
I’m part of a majority-female professional community and this same discussion is ongoing. We still have harassment concerns. There are some institutions that refuse to sponsor events that lack a code of conduct.
Anyways, very encouraged to see this discussion happening and the quick progress we’ve made.
For people who want more info on how to make effective codes of conduct and why they’re necessary, Geek Feminism is great and Ashe Dryden also compiled a great FAQ.
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Ah! I wanted to link this but couldn’t remember where I had seen it. great FAQ that covers a lot of the fears and concerns folks might have about CoCs being “restrictive” or “unnecessary.” Great read for anyone with concerns about this kind of thing.
I, like many of us, am a straight, white, Christian, male.
I’m sorry to say that I have been “that guy” on a few occasions.
For example, in college, I often played magic with a few friends. One night, I saw them playing magic with someone new (female) and stupidly said something to the effect of “Wow, a rare girl playing magic!”. I’m sure it did not make her feel more included or comfortable.
More recently, at last year’s Netrunner Cambridge regionals, I awkwardly made conversation with a girl there about if she was there with anyone. I wasn’t trying to hit on her, but I definitely wouldn’t have asked that if she were male.
I’m sorry to anyone I made feel less included. I knew these things were stupid as I said them and will try to be more thoughtful in the future. I hope we can all work together to make the community more welcoming.
For what it’s worth on Jesus Howard, I am a Christian who is unoffended by it.
@Garld Thank you for posting this, I’m sorry that Amber had a bad experience.
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I think there is an accidental motte-and-bailey going on here
Is this really enough of a part of the common parlance to throw it in here with no explanation? All In All, Another Brick In The Motte | Slate Star Codex is a link for the interested.
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…often against minorities.
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As I’ve repeated, the ‘what do you do for a living’ wasn’t the point. It was a minor annoyance that set the stage for more comments. It wasn’t necessary, but as I’ll state again I’ve seen it done by him and others. Not the point. No one, least of all me, is decrying this part. The comments about ‘what if I hit on you’ because he doesn’t know her relation to me is the tipping point from prying to unacceptable.
It wasn’t dealt with immediately, and again this has been addressed multiple times in multiple ways. Rehashing that isn’t helping. The point now however is this, just because nothing was said or said immediately, does not in any way excuse or lessen the impact. It’s not up to Amber to have to be strong enough to confront a total stranger immediately after being put in that position. It’s not my place to jump all down his throat either, and since I’m not a mind reader I can’t judge just how uncomfortable Amber felt until after, until we discussed it.
Why did I post it in our Facebook group? Same reason I we were discussing this exact topic 10 days ago. Because it needs to be discussed. For the 10-15 people who can identify him out of the 80+ in that facebook group, so be it. Have the conversation. The point was to be specific enough to give context to anyone else reading, without having to name or shame an individual outside our own core group. If you disagree on that level, well then we disagree.
If he doesn’t want to talk to me, fine. I accepted that the moment I committed to typing this up. I had to decide if his friendship was of greater value to me personally than that of not talking about this situation. I’ve also stated I’m open to talking to him about it, forgiving, or just letting it go and moving on with the important task of playing the most Netrunner that we can. At the end of the day however, the story wasn’t about bringing him, that person, down. This is the kind of thing that needs to stop happening in all gaming circles so it was important to talk about (as seen on this thread and others on FB) I hope we can sort it out, we are FB friends as well, but if not then I’m resigned to being poorer for one friend but know I’ll be helping make a place safer for more friends to be welcomed into. I’ll make that trade.
As for any banning or ostracizing. No. I’m not calling for that. I’m not asking anyone else to do this. I know the context, I know the person. I know the situation. I know he’s not a predator. I also know the store owner and talked with him as well. It’s NOT the situation where that has ever been up for debate. Others have suggested it, and it’s as a reaction. I don’t blame them because out of context sometimes that’s just the easiest way to go about it. I don’t blame them, but that’s again not the point of the post or this conversation.
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For what it’s worth, this particular story is not what prompted the ANRPC to draft a CoC (I know nobody out right stated that, but it was implied) @mediohxcore and I had discussed this several weeks ago, and mostly had it in its current form at that time, but then got distracted by Regionals and such. This just brought it back to the fore front.
I don;t bring this up to toot a horn either, I bring it up to counteract some of the “We don’t need a CoC” thought process that some seem to have. We already felt we needed one prior to anything happening, this isn’t a snap reactionary response.
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A “microagression”, if it can include something as simple as looking in someone’s direction (if they subjectively feel uncomfortable with that), presumably would also definitely include finding someone’s gaze uncomfortable just based on their “creepy” appearance (and maybe even their gender)?
Really, the idea of a code of conduct is great but I feel it needs to be split into two parts, bounded by a certain “reasonable expectation”.
If you do something that could be reasonably expected to cause offence, unease, or even fear that should not be tolerated. (e.g. If you asked the average person in the street whether the question about relationship status was okay “in case I want to chat her up” im that context they’d say it was out of order)
Anything else that might make a particular person uncomfortable ought to require an explanation that it’s unwanted behaviour (no-one should ever have to explain why it’s unwanted, just that it is). A failure to respect that request should equally not be tolerated. (e.g. chitchat about who you are and what you do might not reasonably be expected to make someone uneasy, but once it’s been pointed out that you don’t like it, it should be treated the same as asking if you’re ‘free’ for chatting-up during your Netrunner)
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What kind of goon tries to ‘‘hit’’ on people playing netrunner anyway? Way too distracting and I guess would make you more likely to lose. I’ll take wins over relationships anyday #power gaming #cardsareseriousbusiness
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He is right. I have always been afraid of going out and gaming in public because of the way women have been treated. After awhile we finally have two game stores we love and have great people to play with. Netrunner has the best crowd and it has been the best gaming experience in my life. Threads like this make me happy. Thank you awesome influential Netrunner players for bringing this to the attention of the community!
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That’s very nice, sweetie, but we can’t put ALL of them on the fridge.
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This. That was my point 50 posts ago. Not everything that one person may find offensive is actually objectively offensive. If you don’t want to be bothered with small talk, that’s cool - once you let your opponent know that. I don’t show up with the assumption that all of my opponents are anti-social or anti-table talk. If you want it to be all business, no problem, but people don’t read minds, and claiming offense without any explanation to the supposed offending party is dangerous.
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