Gaming’s #MeToo Moment: A List of High-Profile Accusations (And What They Mean for the Gaming Industry)

The original #MeToo movement created waves throughout the entire film industry. And it all started on October 15, 2017. That was when actress Alyssa Milano tweeted, “If all the women who have been sexually harassed or assaulted wrote ‘Me too’ as a status, we might give people a sense of the magnitude of the problem.”

This movement helped the world see that Harvey Weinstein was not the sole predator in Hollywood. Moreover, some of the world’s favorite celebrities had been victims of sexual abuse throughout the years.

Now, gaming is having its own reckoning with the #MeToo movement. As with the original #MeToo movement, this started small and quickly gained momentum. And it is changing the gaming community from the top down.

Gaming’s #MeToo movement

Everything kicked off with a tweet from Destiny 2 streamer @Hollowtide on June 19. He tweeted out the following message. “Everyone memes Lucky but theirs [sic] someone else at the top of the d2 directory who is a a [sic] bigger scum lord and people don’t even know the awful things they’ve done.”

Everyone memes Lucky but theirs someone else at the top of the d2 directory who is a a bigger scum lord and people don’t even know the awful things they’ve done
— ʜᴏʟʟᴏᴡᴛɪᴅᴇ (@Hollowtide) June 19, 2020

It turns out @Hollowtide was talking about a streamer known by the handles SayNoToRage and Lono. And while HollowTide didn’t offer up a name, the tweet gave many other streamers an opportunity to chime in about their negative experiences with the player in question.

As this gained momentum, more streamers started speaking out against other alleged abusers they have dealt with. Pretty soon, people were dropping allegations about game developers and game journalists as well.

We’ve got a brief look at some of the accused people below and details about the allegations. If you would like to research the larger list of allegations and the accused, check out the online spreadsheet created by the streamer Jessica Richey (better known as JessyQuil).

What it means for the industry

Despite how recent this movement is, it has created some major short-term effects across different gaming sectors.

Twitch and other streaming platforms have already banned certain players based on these accusations. And as more streamers see serious consequences, other streamers have come forward with allegations against their alleged abusers.

Several high-profile game developers have lost their jobs over these allegations. In some cases, this has reduced the number of clients willing to work with certain publishers.

What will the longterm effects of this be? The best example of this may be the gaming website IGN.

Several current and former employees made allegations against some of IGN’s previous administrators. But many were quick to point out that the current work environment is much more supportive now that the alleged abusers no longer work for the site.

Now that you know more about the movement, here is a selected list of abusers and the related allegations.