How far is too far when it comes to gaming trash talk? And how do you go about confronting a friend, or a stranger, for some seriously uncool comments in chat? On this weekâs episode of Kotaku Splitscreen, we brought in Kotaku senior reporter and trash talk aficionado Cecilia DâAnastasio to discuss gaming etiquette.
First, Kirk and I talk about games weâre playing; Iâve been playing Madden NFL 20‘s new Franchise mode, and Kirk beat Dishonored: Death of the Outsider. He also started up Fire Emblem: Three Houses and Wolfenstein: Youngblood, and Iâm still playing Outer Wilds, now with the benefit of a brand new gaming monitor. After that rundown, we bring in Cecilia (35:06) to discuss her article âFor Men Who Hate Talking On The Phone, Games Keep Friendships Alive,â and then get her thoughts on gaming etiquette. We close out with off-topic discussion (1:11:32) about our respective Veronica Mars rewatches and Kirkâs music pick of the week.
Get the MP3 here, or read an excerpt below.
Cecilia: I think itâs really important, first and foremost, to remember that you are gaming socially in order for everybody to have fun. If you are trash talking anybody, itâs only to wrap narrative and drama around the situation and increase the fun and canonize a moment. If youâre playing a cooperative game, I think trash talking is almost uniformly a really bad idea. I think it clouds the mood, it can just make people feel needlessly antagonistic, and also it can make you play worse…
Maddy: I would definitely agree about trash talk from your own teammates, unless theyâre your best friends and itâs an ongoing joke that you haveâthatâs the only scenario I can even imagine where that would work out.
Cecilia: Even then!
Maddy: Even then, itâs really rough. Because youâre all supposed to be working together on something. Trash talk should be reserved for people who you are competing with.
Kirk: Iâve found sometimes in competitive Destiny, which I donât play a ton, but there can be some good trash talk where youâre trash talking the other people who you are not in chat with, to the people that you are in chat with. And youâre like, âHa ha ha, I just wrecked that guy! I got him back for you!â Like, after he killed you.
This is just a broader thought that I thought of earlier: It can be really healthy when somebody just gets you, even if youâre not in chat with them, to marvel at how well they just owned you. Itâs sort of like what you were saying earlier Cecilia, with your Overwatch group, like âOh, you totally wrecked me. Wow, nicely played.â It can actually be helpful just to be like, âHoly cow, that guy is amazing,â even if itâs a guy on the other team who is crushing you and your teammates, to just marvel at someoneâs skill.
Also, I just want to highlight that you said âcanonize a moment,â and I think thatâs a really cool concept that Iâve never heard before. When a group of friends are like, âthat amazing thing happened!â And everyone celebrates it and points out that it happened in order to make it a thing that you then refer to in your group canon. Thatâs a cool concept.
Cecilia: Yeah, like if youâre playing Mario Party and you steal three stars from someone, you know? You can comment on that.
Kirk: It can be the infamous moment when so-and-so stole the three stars from so-and-so.
Cecilia: Thatâs a thing to hype up, and your friend might remember that in 10 years, like for example, at your wedding, when theyâre giving a speech in front of your whole family…
Maddy: Hypothetically.
Kirk: Just as a totally random for-instance.
Cecilia: While insisting theyâre not mad!
Kirk: One other thing I wanted to ask about that I think is interesting, or at least something thatâs come up for me from time to time and that I know various people that Iâve played games with would probably appreciate advice on, or at least to hear what you think about it. So when youâre in a chatâthis is like, what do you do? Youâre in a chat with a group of friends and also some people who you donât really know. Thereâs people you know, and people you donât knowâa couple of strangers, maybe, whoâve come in who are like friends of friends. And someone says something shittyâmaybe something sexist, something kinda racist. Or theyâre just using the word âbitchâ over and over again. Thatâs a good example. Or they make a rape comment or something. Something that is the kind of chat that happens. It definitely happens more in groups of old dudes, or at least that kind of thing does. This comes up sometimes in groups that Iâm in, and Iâve got a few thoughts on how to handle that kind of thing, but Iâm sort of curious if either of you have any thoughtsâor if Cecilia, if youâve put any thought into this, given that youâve been thinking about etiquette in general.
Cecilia: Yeah, this is a really hard question and something that Iâve had a lot of experience with, especially if Iâm playing an online shooter. Itâs pretty often that someone will make a comment that, if they made that comment to me in person or if they were speaking that way in person, Iâd be like, âThatâs fucked up. Donât talk like that.â But if itâs online, and youâre just in a mood to have fun, it can be really stressfulâthe notion of calling someone out, I guess is the term, for something theyâre saying. There are a lot of instances where someone will call female Overwatch characters weird sexist terms, which is really weird. I wrote a blog about this a couple years ago when I quit Overwatch briefly after a series of harassing incidents I had. I wrote a blog basically just about how important it is to stand up for people who are being harassed or are around language that might hurt their feelings, or that they might be sensitive to. I think that generally it can cause conflict if youâre the person offended by something and you are standing up for yourself. I think thatâs a great bar to hit, but itâs really high in the gaming context, and I think that the ideal situation a lot of the time is if someone else who doesnât have as much of a stake in it as you do steps in and is like, âHey dude, we donât talk like that.â Ideally, privately.
Kirk: The private thing is big, right? Usually, when itâs come up in Destiny chat with people I donât really know, itâs not like theyâre attacking someone or theyâre saying something about a group or a person in the group that they donât know may be feeling hurt, or like I would be actually standing up for someone who is standing right next to me. Itâs more generalized. The kind of thing youâre sayingâthatâs a great example, saying weird sexual stuff about female characters over and over again in a weird way that I can tell is making people uncomfortable. You donât know what to say. The private thing, Iâve found anyway, when itâs a friend of a friend I think my approach has generally been to go to the friend who knows that person, offline, through text, and be like, âHey, that dude you brought in wasnât cool.â
Maddy: You guys are so much more polite than me, is what this conversation is teaching me. I do not do this!
Kirk: Do you go for it in chat?
Cecilia: What do you do? Tell us!!
Maddy: [Laughs.] In the moment, I just go ahead and say something. You guys are all like, âI really carefully weigh my options.â Thatâs probably the better idea. But I just canât help it. Iâm just that person. If somebodyâs saying some shit, Iâm just like, âWhat are you doing?â Or Iâll gently mock them and be like, âWhat are you even saying? Thatâs not even funny. Like, who are you?â
Cecilia: In real life?
Maddy: Like online, on mic or whatever. But itâs also usually, if Iâm playing a multiplayer game online, Iâm usually with friends who I know will back me up, which is a luxury. If Iâm not with friends, I will admit I donât do that. If Iâm by myself and the entire group is strangers and a stranger is being a dick, Iâll probably just leave the game or Iâll sit it out and block that person. If Iâm with at least one other friend, Iâll be like, âwe can take this guy.â Iâm gonna go ahead and say something. And I have also been known to get into stupid fights at parties with friends of friends who say some shit that I think is bigoted. I will admit I can, at times, be an impolite party guest if somebody says something bigoted.
Cecilia: No, but thatâs legit. Itâs good to stand up for yourself. I think sometimes I get caught up about whether my friend is gonna have a really bad time if I say something. Iâm not saying thatâs the best way to feelâ
Maddy: Iâm not even saying Iâm doing it well or correctly, and the fact that I have this personality is, at times, a problem for me and possibly my friends.
Kirk: Well, thereâs no one solution for this, right? Thereâs no one piece of advice that will work for a situation. There have definitely been times where you want to say something, and there are times where escalating a confrontation in front of everybody would actually be really stressful and mess up the vibe or bum people out.
Maddy: For sure, yeah.
Cecilia: My approach to this definitely stems from a lot of cynicism around how people are going to respond to getting called out. My experience of this is, 100 percent of the time that I call out a friend of a friend over an online game, theyâve just blown up and raged and made a huge thing about it. Iâm not always trying to deal with that after a nine-hour work day.
Kirk: And itâs all about the thing they said. There have been times when Iâll be playing with a younger player, and definitely with friends like you were just describing, Maddy, where I know there are people that I know really well and weâve talked and they get it. And then someone will say something kind of messed up, like theyâll be talking about âbitchesâ or âkill that bitchâ or something like that. That can be a really good opportunity to super gently turn it into a teachable moment, which is possible if youâre in the right circumstance. Itâs definitely a case-by-case thing.
Maddy: Itâs also a personality thing. I totally get that not everybody is that person. Some people are me. Some people would rather DM the person after the fact and be like, âHey, that wasnât cool.â I donât think thereâs a right or wrong way to approach that. I will say that I think that not ever saying anything is not great and leads to long-held resentments in your gaming group, where youâre like, âThereâs this guy that we all canât stand.â Maybe itâs not a guyâthis person we all canât stand, and they say things that we hate, and weâre just not going to say anything. Donât let it get to that point. You can approach it in a few different ways, but definitely find some way to talk to the person, because they might not even know you feel that way, and I feel like itâs more respectful to them to at least get over that hurdle somehow. Tap your bravest friend and be like, âSomebodyâs gotta talk to this person and make sure that they know theyâre making us uncomfortable.â And then, what happens after thatâwho knows?
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