I don’t know if retaining WilmerHale is actually ‘concerning’ or if Kotaku is just looking for something else to be concerned about, but anyhoo:
In a public statement addressed to employees earlier this week, Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick said the company was reviewing policies and procedures to help promote a more respectful and inclusive workplace. To help accomplish that, the company has retained the services of prestigious law firm WilmerHale, which is the same law firm helping Amazon keep its workers from unionizing. Considering ongoing efforts to unionize game workers, the partnership is a little concerning.
In an industry that’s constantly under fire for discriminatory practices, sexual harassment, grueling crunch conditions, and frequent mass layoffs, unionizing is a hot-button issue. As the state of California’s lawsuit against Activision Blizzard demonstrates, video game companies have a well-earned reputation for creating work environments that are at best uncomfortable, at worst downright hostile. That’s exactly why the game workers unionization movement has been gaining traction over the past several years.
So when Activision Blizzard, a company currently under fire for its discriminatory practices and rampant sexual harassment issues, hires WilmerHale, a law firm with a reputation for union-busting, heads turn and brows furrow.
A woman formerly in one of Blizzard’s hourly service roles talked about the agonizing process of trying to get time off approved by her manager in order to go to the doctor. When an ultrasound raised the possibility of serious medical complications for her unborn child, she was told she had to return in two weeks to check again, only to be told by her manager that she couldn’t. As a last ditch effort, she convinced her doctor to let her schedule all of her appointments in advance to make it easier for management to find fill-ins, only to be told she couldn’t schedule out her hours that far in advance. She said she remembers “crying in the waiting room” trying to explain that Blizzard wouldn’t let her go to the appointments even though she had paid time off available.
“I was forced to get on [the Family Medical Leave Act] in order to go to my appointments," she told me. "Blizzard made that as difficult as possible, and the doctor’s office couldn’t figure out how to approve it when these were appointments every pregnant person would have. My contact at my insurance company finally got fed up and pushed everything through. If I hadn’t had a benevolent insurance contact, I likely would have been dropped.”
Holy cow, this is a hot take. “She was clearly pushing the limits”? What limits would that be? Is there apparel that would entitle those dudes to say what she said to her? If so, could you describe, in detail please, what is OK for women to wear so they don’t get sexually harassed by company employees at a work convention?
Wearing the shirt means you’re in on the joke. It’s bad form indeed to complain about it. The press is doing such a poor job reporting on this stuff. I’m embarrassed for them.
I think there’s room for some nuance in all the allegations and situations coming to light. I still think the Blizzard reps acted like a bunch of disgusting creeps that wouldn’t fly at any professional event I’ve ever fucking been to. If they worked for me, they’d be fired. If they worked for my company, they’d be fired by my boss.
We’re talking about a job fair where company representatives are asking things like this. I can’t imagine any company I’ve ever worked for being okay with stuff like this, t-shirt or no.
The shirt does set up and invite the joke, though. It’s not exactly subtle. It wasn’t clear when I skimmed the article if she was an employee of SecureState and had to wear the shirt, or if she wasn’t affiliated and just found the shirt funny or what.
Did the shirt say “Ask me if I like being penetrated?” or “Ask me how often I’m penetrated?” Did the shirt say “ask me if I’m lost or here with my boyfriend?” What if - and again, this is hard I know - they’d just treated her professionally?
I think if you’re representing your company in a professional setting, you can see the shirt, smirk at the shirt/joke… and not ask the potential employee if she likes being penetrated or how often she is penetrated or if she’s there with a boyfriend.
You can read the shirt and not be a creepy asshole. That’s the point. Women shouldn’t have to police their bodies, their apparel, their hair, their demeanor or their makeup to just be treated like human beings worthy of respect. If you can’t see that…
Edit to add that I know the list of things women shouldn’t have to police is insufficient.
Definitely creepy, IMO. The shirt can be funny but in my opinion, in a professional setting they went over the line. By quite a bit.
I think it’s worthy of a news article because a lot of the allegations are about the culture that Blizzard fostered. And when you have customer-facing representatives of the company behaving in that way? How do they act when they’re not in a public setting? I think it’s newsworthy, but the information regarding the shirt is important to provide some context. They didn’t randomly say these things but they still went well over the line. Again, I can’t imagine any business I’ve ever worked for not terminating me on the spot if I behaved that way while repping the company.
All this discussion of individual allegations kind of misses the forest for the trees IMO. The case for an overall pattern of a hostile work environment, in a business context, at a multi-billion dollar company, seems pretty strong.
Also, Activision’s share price dropped about 10% this week and that has held steady for a few days. If I were Activision, I would be worried about shareholder investigations and lawsuits as well as (if not more so than) the state of CA.
Not just that, but their initial denial/pounding of fists reaction just dared people to come out of the woodwork like they are with more allegations. This is just the beginning.
