Activision Blizzard Shareholder SOC Letter, Diablo II: Resurrected Early Access

[hydrium]

Meritocracy dies at the hands of equality.

You can have the best or you can have feelings.

Not both.

[deviantcultist]

I don't understand, I thought the issue was women mistreatment + bad employee pay and work life balance
why would a woman do better than a man as a director? why would a man do better? why making a distinction?
so what's all about minorities/diversity? it's the talent which dictates which gets to be hired, not physiological attributes? everyone shall be treated equally

Tell that to the hypocritical woke crowd who preach hollow moral platitudes about inclusivity and diversity, while only advocating the abolishment of "white males" from positions of prestige.

Can politics stay out of the entertainment industry for once? Not everyone is about pretending to be an activist to mask their true issues.

[Yarathir]

I love how some people here will try and claim 'go woke go broke' is the real issue, whilst ignoring the actual internal problems at Blizzard.

Talk about head in sand. 'Nyaah diversity is ruining the company!' Yeah, you're right. Let's not have any minorities and women at Blizzard.

Then the dudes will not be able to sexual harass anyone, and will just turn on each other in the end.

Now there's an idea.

(Though there were already men being harassed, anyway)

[CaptainV]

Meritocracy dies at the hands of equality.

You can have the best or you can have feelings.

Not both.

Debatable, thats the problem.

You can very easily have a meritocracy built around equality of capability, but equality based on race/sex/prefference is very niché and impossible to determine, infact its dangerously naieve to assume equity based on divercity alone is healthy, its been prooven countless times to do more damage than good.

What they need is to hire a female director who has a meritocracy based qualification in business and healthy understanding of business equity not social equity.

[mst3kfan]

Forced equity or diversity is not equity or diversity. It's the current cosmic joke of the millennial generation. They won't be happy until they hire a black woman, who was adopted by lesbians, who is a practicing Muslim, who is "trans", eats paleo, never wears the same pair of socks twice... Wait who am I kidding. They will still whine and complain even if the person is exactly what they wanted. Hell they will whine more because it wasn't them. Then they will complain you are being racist or sexist because they didn't hire you instead.

Best part about the letter from these SOC jokers? I'm pretty sure there is a trash bin around it can promptly be freed into.

[Yarathir]

A white dude will never have the same qualifications as a trans or a woman or anyone from a different culture. That's the whole dam point. Culture.

So many people get triggered over diversity claiming qualifications like all that matters is a sheet of paper. Guess what. People from different backgrounds and faiths THINK differently and see things differently. Maybe this game we all complain about wouldn't be in the position it is in if all the decisions weren't made by a a very similar group of people who are all agreeing how star spangled awesome they are. If there was other ideas and viewpoints to engage an actual discussion about real improvements, the game and the company would be able to move forward instead of assuming that every idea they spew out it s nugget of pure awesome.

Diversity is about bringing in new ideas, shaking up the status quo and preventing stagnation from the kind of mindset that comes from everyone agreeing all the time.

You have a team of 9 men and a woman and the 9 guys think it is an awesome idea to add a quest where you tie up and tickle the farmers daughter. That one woman on the team, possible a victim of assault has 2 choices.
Speak up and get silenced by the overwhelming majority.
Stay quiet knowing that she is there as nothing more than a check in a box.

TLDR, culture and background matter just as much, if not more, than whats written on some piece of paper. A white guy is not entitled to a job just because he has a similar education and crying about it shows just how fragile that privilege is. And before any pearls shatter under the sheer weight of clutching, this goes both ways. You aren't being erased. You are simply being asked to share.

Nice post. In a world where it's actually valid.

When we're talking about "more diverse hiring," it's usually hiring already long westernized groups that really don't have any larger chances to possess a majorly differing or enriching perspective. Nor does every white guy have exactly the same experiences. Not only are you generalizing hard, it's entirely unfounded, which makes it worse. This shit almost sounds like fetishism at this point. "Oh wow, a non-white, non-cis, non-straight person. How exotic! They grew up in America, but surely they have a totally out of this world perspective and take on things."

[DingDongKing]

Now there's an idea.

(Though there were already men being harassed, anyway)

Ergo the problem really is the sexual predators...and not diversity. Ding.

[FelPlague]

Yep, brings bottom to the top, people that achieved top themselves get less and less motivated, whole structure degenerate. You are lucky to live in pretty safe country, but many nations went through this in last century, you wouldn't want to live there.

Don't take me as some libertarian or right wing (although I admit I was there when I was 20) - completely free market end with catastrophe as well, tears apart society and in extreme situations end with bloody revolutions.

I do live in one of those countries, cause we have wellfare. Equtiy.

[Yarathir]

Debatable, thats the problem.

You can very easily have a meritocracy built around equality of capability, but equality based on race/sex/prefference is very niché and impossible to determine, infact its dangerously naieve to assume equity based on divercity alone is healthy, its been prooven countless times to do more damage than good.

What they need is to hire a female director who has a meritocracy based qualification in business and healthy understanding of business equity not social equity.

Equality of opportunity is the important thing, not equality of outcome.

No problem with being open to more surface level diversity (that is, to say, different skin colors, genitals, etc.) but when you make it your mission statement, you're going jump to the conclusion first, then fill the gaps in between later. i.e. you focus first on those characteristics and then on the qualifications, whether the person meshes well with your team and company culture (Okay, I know that part might be laughable considering recent news about Blizzard, but you get what I mean)

- - - Updated - - -

Ergo the problem really is the sexual predators...and not diversity. Ding.

Yes. And the solution isn't diversity either. Ding?

[FelPlague]

As a sharweholder myself, I agree with the SOC Letter. I just wish they also demanded that Bobby step down as well.

Are you sure you are a share holder? cause if you were you would know bobby has done nothing but make YOU loads of money by drastically increasing the share value of the company since he took lead.

[DingDongKing]

Equality of opportunity is the important thing, not equality of outcome.

No problem with being open to more surface level diversity (that is, to say, different skin colors, genitals, etc.) but when you make it your mission statement, you're going jump to the conclusion first, then fill the gaps in between later. i.e. you focus first on those characteristics and then on the qualifications, whether the person meshes well with your team and company culture (Okay, I know that part might be laughable considering recent news about Blizzard, but you get what I mean)

- - - Updated - - -


Yes. And the solution isn't diversity either. Ding?

Diversity alone isn't the solution, that's blatantly obvious to everyone discussing it. But the issue is most people deal with absolutes.

'We have a problem' 'just apply X'. No, understand what the ACTUAL FUCKING PROBLEM at hand is.

[Yarathir]

Diversity alone isn't the solution, that's blatantly obvious to everyone discussing it. But the issue is most people deal with absolutes.

'We have a problem' 'just apply X'. No, understand what the ACTUAL FUCKING PROBLEM at hand is.

My point exactly is that we have an issue here, and we have these goobers throwing "diversity" at the problem, when it's pretty much five moons removed from being an actual solution.

It's about as useful to solving the long-term problem as petitioning to change the definition of "drought" is during a severe drought.

[Oakshana]

progressive/activist types will not allow you to have a "different opinion" you will be accused of sexism or being toxic and so on

have you noticed how ugly all the female characters in shadowlands are
i guess not 1 dev in the whole company thought there should of been nice looking characters added

Fortnight a kids game has better looking characters then WoW

First off, while a lot of kids play Fortnight, it's no more a "kids game" than WoW is. And nice using the example of the race that are specifically supposed to look Nosferatu-esque in appearance to back your argument. While WoW's art style is certainly subjective, citing the example of one race, designed to look a specific way, for a specifically themed zone is not a good argument. Because (and, again, art is subjective) I am not sure how you think the females in Bastion or Ardenweald are "hideous".

[DingDongKing]

My point exactly is that we have an issue here, and we have these goobers throwing "diversity" at the problem, when it's pretty much five moons removed from being an actual solution.

It's about as useful to solving the long-term problem as petitioning to change the definition of "drought" is during a severe drought.

I agree. And the matter gets even more complicated when you then have gamer gate champions going 'NYAAAH GO WOKE GO BROKE'.

It muddies the waters, and prevents actual progress from being made. Because denial isn't helpful either.

[Yarathir]

First off, while a lot of kids play Fortnight, it's no more a "kids game" than WoW is. And nice using the example of the race that are specifically supposed to look Nosferatu-esque in appearance to back your argument. While WoW's art style is certainly subjective, citing the example of one race, designed to look a specific way, for a specifically themed zone is not a good argument. Because (and, again, art is subjective) I am not sure how you think the females in Bastion or Ardenweald are "hideous".

Gonna agree with you here. These Venthyr aren't sexy vampire ladies. They're Nosferatu-people. But Daish doesn't seem to be the only one laboring under that misconception. (see: the elf players making their Venthyr OC which is really just a pretty goth blood elf)

It's strange that it exists, though. That aside, the Winter Queen, the Archon, the kyrians are arguably fairly attractive.

[Dracullus]

I do live in one of those countries, cause we have wellfare. Equtiy.

Again quity does not punish the top, it brings the bottom equal to the top

You have THAT? Cause as far as I know, you still have millionair.. scrap that, you still have people that earn more and ones that earn less. Which is a good thing.

If you understand my previous post you should know I'm not against welfare.

[FelPlague]

You have THAT? Cause as far as I know, you still have millionair.. scrap that, you still have people that earn more and ones that earn less. Which is a good thing.

If you understand my previous post you should know I'm not against welfare.

Oh wait you think equity is 100% absolute? Lol ok then. yeah of fucking course there is outliers...
The whole point of equity is bringing people all equally to a point they can function atleast, and after that who cares, as long as everyone can function its fine if others "function far higher"

[Yarathir]

I agree. And the matter gets even more complicated when you then have gamer gate champions going 'NYAAAH GO WOKE GO BROKE'.

It muddies the waters, and prevents actual progress from being made. Because denial isn't helpful either.

Personally speaking I wouldn't weep if Blizzard went under. I've explained this countless times before, but I hope that the people still working there find others places of employment. The game industry isn't a great place for any human being, but you should at least be able to expect that you don't get verbally abused and sexually harassed at your place of employment. And that is ON TOP of mediocre salaries and crunch culture.

I don't know, I'm just sick of "too big to fail" and "there are innocent people working there so we should continue to keep it on life support."

[Oakshana]

I find it amusing that the ONLY place people want "diversity" and "inclusivity" are tech and office space environments.

You do not see anyone demanding more female and diversity hires for industries such as mining, working the floor of an auto-factory or sewage treatment. I guess apparently, those industries and positions are not requisitely suitable for mandating that more women, trans and diversity hires be positioned.

People don't want representation across the board. Only in places they have specific interest. I kind of find that disgusting and disingenuous.

[El Gucaragua]

Wow racial-equity who saw that coming wow just put a woman on the board for racial diversity who saw that coming.

What a joke of a letter. This entire situation has turned into a witch-hunt for people that really did nothing wrong and a method for further pushing a ridiculous ideology. Fucking laughable.