Employee Response to Bobby Kotick, Additional Information on Cosby Suite

[Linkedblade]

Someone is mistreated in 2013. When it was made known to the company, 7 years after the fact, they terminate the employee. A year later CA files a suit against the company for things that happened years in the past and about employees that no longer work there.

And then they want the company to hire another company to audit them.

All this is is a money grab.

[jellmoo]

I'm the butt of the joke because I'm Free, White, Male, and over 21.
Here's an even better idea.. Grow. The Fuck. Up.

Yeah. All those workplace jokes about white dudes. However do you get through the day? Always.. You know... Being so incredibly marginalized with all of your power and privilege?

Dude, you're the one coming in here with all the empathy of a potato and spouting the latest talking points you saw on late night Fox news. Maybe you should consider expanding your horizons to more than your sheer alphaness and try growing up yourself.

[Schmittay]

Stop being dramatic. Nobody has used the word "rape" in conjunction with any of this, and if it were, this would be a criminal case, not a civil lawsuit. I'm not aware of any criminal charges for anything in the state's lawsuit. Could happen, but right now, there's none.

You equating someone complaining to HR for some dweeby dude being creepy as the same as a rape case says a lot about you, though. And it's not a good look, dude.

"Biography:I'm that awesome.Location: MichiganInterests: W.o.W., Girls, Dro.Occupation: Being AWESOME! "


All I need to see, along with your previous comments, you have nothing of value to me, welcome to ignore.

[TheRevenantHero]

What? You DARE to DOUBT the VICTIM?????
Don't you have a soul?
Clearly nobody would ever say anything but the 100% undiluted truth on everything, ever, when accusing a giant billion-worth company.
No, no, no need for anything else, the mere accusation is enough, clearly they're guilty. Off to jail they go, I say, but don't forget to sign my check while on your way out. You monster.

Considering this isn't a criminal case, all you're doing is making seem like victims should continue to just stay silent.

[Gadzooks]

"Biography:I'm that awesome.Location: MichiganInterests: W.o.W., Girls, Dro.Occupation: Being AWESOME! "


All I need to see, along with your previous comments, you have nothing of value to me, welcome to ignore.

I'm assuming you're talking to the other guy, my profile is blank...

[MoanaLisa]

I'm sure that someone at Blizzard knows this but they are missing a trick if they don't take this opportunity, especially since most office personnel have been away for a very long time, to remake their culture and be a leader in this. Remaking a corporate culture is hard but not impossible. It often requires that some who refuse to change be fired but the effect over the long run is to have a better, more focused workforce.

By all accounts this specific workforce is anything but focused except during crunch. They might be able to improve that as well if they start doing their work as professionals instead of engaging in the activities that have not been a secret for a long time.

It's easy to shut down the frat. It's harder to replace it but they can if they choose. They'll need leadership. I don't know that they have that sort of leadership right now. There's some evidence that all of this promotion from within the company has done more harm than good. If they truly are going to replace a bunch of supervisor/managers (as they certainly should given what we've seen and now know) bringing in some people with new perspectives, paying them appropriately and working to drop the arrogant attitude about how much better they are than everyone else would be welcome. That's not been true for a long time (ever since the abject failure of the Titan project). They aren't better. The company is fat, slow and unable to release product in any sort of timeframe that makes sense.

[Nimin]

Considering this isn't a criminal case, all you're doing is making seem like victims should continue to just stay silent.

Never! All victims should always come out and be instantly believed, 100% of the time, and don't you DARE question anything about their story, don't you know how OFFENSIVE and TRAUMATIC that is?
Surely you don't wanna be offensive and cause trauma to poor victims, right? Right. Never question, just bend the knee, agree and shut up.
Oh and don't forget to sign that check.

[Malrune]

All employees are equal.
But some employees are more equal than others.

[TheRevenantHero]

Never! All victims should always come out and be instantly believed, 100% of the time, and don't you DARE question anything about their story, don't you know how OFFENSIVE and TRAUMATIC that is?
Surely you don't wanna be offensive and cause trauma to poor victims, right? Right. Never question, just bend the knee, agree and shut up.
Oh and don't forget to sign that check.

Ok we get it, dude. You think that victims should just keep their head down and accept that this is just how the world works. They're being harassed at their workplace? Toughen up, buttercup, and get that project done so we can make the shareholders happy.

[AriochIV]

The end of forced arbitration for all employees.
Worker participation in oversight of hiring and promotion policies.
The need for greater pay transparency to ensure equality.
Employee selection of a third party to audit HR and other company processes.

Activision-Blizzard is a company, not a socialist commune.

If there have been real problems with sexual harassment at Blizzard, then it's a good thing that it is being addressed. But the above is woke intersectional Marxist bullshit that has nothing to do with the sexual harassment allegation.

[Nimin]

Yeah I don't believe you even for one moment. I've encountered people like you in the past. You'll lie and say you're a victim of something then say "I'm allowed to say these toxic things because it's happened to me so therefore I get a free pass." Nobody who has been through that trauma makes the kind of insensitive comments that you have been spewing all over the place. Maybe instead of doing everything you can to trivialize a serious case, you get some empathy or at the very least just not be so loud about your negative mindset.

Hold on. Are you doubting a victim now?
How despicable.

[TheRevenantHero]

Activision-Blizzard is a company, not a socialist commune.

If there have been real problems with sexual harassment at Blizzard, then it's a good thing that it is being addressed. But the above is woke intersectional Marxist bullshit that has nothing to do with the sexual harassment allegation.

Tell me you don't know what socialism is without telling me you don't know what socialism is.

[Berndorf]

Oh man this shit-storm just keeps on getting bigger. Cosby also wasn’t accused until 2014, and that picture is apparently from 2013, so that raises some eyebrows.

That's not entirely true. There had been accusations made about him prior to that going back to many years earlier that simply weren't prosecuted and there were rumors about him partaking in that sort of behavior for quite a while as well. Thus why you had comedians calling him out for it on stage. More so in certain circles. It is quite possible that the devs who gathered in the Cosby suite were fully aware of those rumors.

[Explosivo]

Activision-Blizzard is a company, not a socialist commune.

If there have been real problems with sexual harassment at Blizzard, then it's a good thing that it is being addressed. But the above is woke intersectional Marxist bullshit that has nothing to do with the sexual harassment allegation.

..do...do you realize what marxism is? or are you one of those throws hot buzz words around? in which of those points do they request collective ownership of the company? go on, specifically say what about it is is Marxist. Detail the parts that align with public ownership, i.e. communism. i'll wait, although i already know you have zero idea about the terms you use because first you say "socialist commune" then "marxist" despite them believing in different things.

[Schmittay]

I'm assuming you're talking to the other guy, my profile is blank...

Correct, that was Violent's profile biography. There's simply nothing I can think of I want that kind of person's opinion on.

[Kevyne-Shandris]

And yes, dudes engage in locker room talk.

Like the professional athletes have come out to say: they don't engage in that behavior (women in pro locker rooms have been there since the 1970s -- any athlete that engages in that sexist behaviors, will get called on the carpet -- it's bad for the game's image and tarnishes the want of pros that their sports are FAMILY appropriate. That they're not pariahs wanting to hit on underage kids and more).

Don't use that excuse to justify a woman committing SUICIDE over being trapped in a CULTure that demeaning and ugly.

All the women are coming out to express what they're experiencing under the corporate policies and CULTure there. It does NOT paint a pretty picture and goes miuch further than just "locker room talk".

THIS is very appalling and shows brainwashing occurred -- https://twitter.com/DaniBat/status/1419156967038271490...

[Gadzooks]

I'm sure that someone at Blizzard knows this but they are missing a trick if they don't take this opportunity, especially since most office personnel have been away for a very long time, to remake their culture and be a leader in this. Remaking a corporate culture is hard but not impossible. It often requires that some who refuse to change be fired but the effect over the long run is to have a better, more focused workforce.

By all accounts this specific workforce is anything but focused except during crunch. They might be able to improve that as well if they start doing their work as professionals instead of engaging in the activities that have not been a secret for a long time.

It's easy to shut down the frat. It's harder to replace it but they can if they choose. They'll need leadership. I don't know that they have that sort of leadership right now. There's some evidence that all of this promotion from within the company has done more harm than good. If they truly are going to replace a bunch of supervisor/managers (as they certainly should given what we've seen and now know) bringing in some people with new perspectives, paying them appropriately and working to drop the arrogant attitude about how much better they are than everyone else would be welcome. That's not been true for a long time (ever since the abject failure of the Titan project). They aren't better. The company is fat, slow and unable to release product in any sort of timeframe that makes sense.

One of the good things to come out of this might be forcing their hands to do something about Ion's failure with his leadership and management of the game, and the stagnation of the company as a whole. This was a huge issue anyway, before all this lawsuit stuff broke. Watching Preach's video on why he's dropping coverage of WoW sums it up nicely - why be miserable for 8 or 9 months, when they don't care what the players say anyway?
People have been saying for a while now, new blood is needed for the leadership of the wow team. Ion I'm sure has a place at Blizzard somewhere, he's not without merit, he was just a bad promotion. And, he's not the only one making decisions that have been driving off customers. Overall I think the company needs fresh ideas and faces - if for anything to get new IPs going. They're basking on their reputation and cash shop whales. Well, were.

They have an opportunity here. We'll see if they take it.

[jellmoo]

Activision-Blizzard is a company, not a socialist commune.

If there have been real problems with sexual harassment at Blizzard, then it's a good thing that it is being addressed. But the above is woke intersectional Marxist bullshit that has nothing to do with the sexual harassment allegation.

Literally none of what you quoted is either 'Marxist' or 'Socialist'. It's the end result of a collective bargaining agreement.

[xblubbx]

The bigger picture here is these guys demonstrably took it way, way out of the locker room.

No. Either it was okay and only up to them what they were doing in their spare time, or not (and I don't know if this is to be classified as normal spare time as it was apparently during an event they were working at.) But if it was okay then it's got NOTHING to do with accusations in regards of their workplace.

[Berndorf]

A few weeks ago, I saw Morhaime and Metzen as paragons of Old Blizzard, the "Good" Blizzard...

Then this news broke and I thought... no, Morhaime, Metzen, Ghostcrawler, they couldn't have known...

Then the news keeps coming... and it's pretty clear everyone I held in high regard at Blizzard was in some way either turning a blind eye to this terrible behavior or outright participated in it.

I'm not sure if I'm more sad or more angry, they're about equal now.

I suppose Terran Gregory is still a good egg? His early work kindled my very, very short leap into machinima. Please say I can at least put him down as Not a Ghoul.

Or Samwise. Although now that I've said it, watch something break about him. Ugh.

I would never assume any of them were great guys in the first place. All of the Blizcon panels I ever saw involving these guys gave me creep vibes.