Blizzard's Actions to Support the Black Community, Colleagues, and Partners

[Lumy]

Blizzard's Actions to Support the Black Community, Colleagues, and Partners
J. Allen Brack, the president of Blizzard Entertainment, has published an article in which he shares more about their actions to support the Black Community, Colleagues, and Partners.

Blizzard community,

Our world has a long history of racism. Humans create groups, and then create divisions between groups unlike themselves. Ironic how we need each other as social creatures, yet we developed the practice to ‘other’ humans who at first glance don’t look like what we see in the mirror.

I have made it a personal obligation to educate myself about trauma others endure, and to work to change those experiences for them. Many within Blizzard come from a place of strong purpose, with a will to do in order to help society.

Last year at BlizzCon, I made a commitment for Blizzard to do better. We pride ourselves on learning and growing, and doing something now that reflects our company and community values. I also said that our actions would matter more than our words—we have been publicly silent until now because action is the important part.

Let me be clear: Blizzard stands in solidarity with those fighting against racism, because racism is as dangerous as any pandemic for those affected. We stand with those fighting against social and institutional structures that promote inequality among people of color.

Last week, AB announced donations to the Equal Justice Initiative, the United Negro College Fund, and the Management Leaders of Tomorrow (MLT) to fight systemic racial inequality. At Blizzard, we are working on initiatives for our community and our workplace.

In our games: For many years, we’ve had teams working with A.I. and machine learning to reduce toxicity and hate speech, as well as to help improve the overall gaming experience. Since January 1 this year, we’ve banned over 30,000 accounts for these reasons, as well as issued more than three million total hours of player suspensions. These penalties have notably improved our game environments: over the last two years, we’ve seen a 43% reduction in poor behavior reports, and a 59% reduction in the re-offense rate. And while this is progress, we’ve identified other places where we can use this technology and have more work to continue to do toward this effort.

In our relationships: We are also reviewing our partnerships to identify opportunities to support Black-owned and diverse businesses, and to amplify the voices of Black content creators and influencers.

Juneteenth: Today at Blizzard, we are observing Juneteenth with the goal of encouraging employees to take the time to be educated. We hosted a virtual session with a leader in our home city of Irvine, California, so employees can learn more about implicit bias, implications for law and policy, and how they can get involved in local efforts to drive change. We have also provided a list of resources to help coworkers self-educate, and shared ways to get involved in advocacy.

Ongoing: We are stronger with more diverse views and experiences. We are committed to being a more equitable workplace, including how and where we recruit, our HR practices, and employee support. We will also put an ongoing employee education program into place. This program will include more training and education (with the materials purchased from Black and minority-owned businesses), and Blizzard-wide town halls with experts on allyship, advocacy, and racism.

All of this work will continue to make Blizzard better, and play some small part in a larger, positive shift.

To our Black community, colleagues, and partners, Blizzard stands with you.

Black lives matter, today and always.

- J. Allen Brack, president of Blizzard Entertainment

[Dasn]

Well that's it, racism is solved

[kevincuomo]

Kind of sad company's are forced to do this or face back lash.. it's not genuine at all and its so obvious.

[jediknight12]

getting sick of these companies needing to make public statements rather than organically happening.

[Nightstalker]

One can only hope that they hire who is best suited for a job and just ignore the quota nonsense.

[Magnagarde]

Corpspeak. Totally unnecessary for Blizzard to score brownie points in this regard.

Diversity is not strenght in an industry where quality is most sought after. Quality, imagination and the ability to bring amazing projects running is the true strenght. If it means having a company comprised only out of black people because they provide the aforementioned, then so be it. Otherwise, if you make diversity hires for the sake of just making them, then the quality of what Blizzard is about is only going to fall under the question mark even further than it already has.

[Codah]

No one cares.

[Denso]

" over the last two years, we’ve seen a 43% reduction in poor behavior reports, and a 59% reduction in the re-offense rate."

Can't believe they've managed this with their steady player base, unbelievable achievement!

[Logwyn]

getting sick of these companies needing to make public statements rather than organically happening.

I just wished they'd get the facts right about Juneteenth.

Slavery didn't end in the US until Dec. 6th with the adoption of the 13th amendment. The Emancipation Proclamation just ended slavery in the areas in rebellion, but not the entire US.

[Puupi]

*rolls eyes*

Companies doing political virtue signaling is god damn pathetic.

[Trenbolone]

Seriously? World first problems, honestly.

[Thalassian Bob]

Silence, brand!

Shut the fuck up and get back to making games. We don't need lessons in morality from corporations. Especially corporations that bend over backwards for genocidal communist regimes.

[Gnomesized]

If you listen to fools, the mob rules.

[Zylos]

Wish companies would realize bragging about how charitable and virtuous they are completely diminishes any notion that the act was in fact charitable or virtuous. How about you just donate and stfu about it instead of trying to find a way to profit from the tragedy and human suffering.

[ONCHEhap]

if they actually cared,they wouldn't need a tragedy and a national outrage to start talking about it.

All these fucking corporates don't give a shit about any of this stuff,it's all about PR stunts

[Galathir]

I'll just leave that here...



And this one from last week too since it also deals with the hypocrisy shown by Actiblizzard.

[lonely zergling]

I'm sure hiring more black people will fix all of blizzards problems with their games.

[Flevor]

lmao,ya'll are crazy people bashing blizzard for doing this or making fun of it are as toxic as anyone else....they did good leave it at that and move on

[kevincuomo]

lmao,ya'll are crazy people bashing blizzard for doing this or making fun of it are as toxic as anyone else....they did good leave it at that and move on

Yikes... imagine buying into this and thinking it was actually genuine, how small brained can someone be.

[Elevenmad]

Hmm, All these things they say they are going to do, they should'v been doing anyway, if they were not then there is issues inside the company itself. There is only one race, the Human race.

Terribly bad PR stunt to release this statement imo,