XBox's online game community showed a homophobic hand last week.
Gay player Ryan Grant received a not-so-nice missive from Microsoft saying he had to change his screen name, "theGayergamer," because other XBox Live members found it offensive.
From a note sent to The Consumerist:
I assumed that once i called Microsoft they would straighten things out. I talked to a supervisor there, Roxy, who told me that she didn't personally find the fact that my gamer tag had gay in the name offensive, but that the greater Xbox community did, so I would have to change it.
This should earn Microsoft some points in arch nemesis activist Ken Hutcherson's book, huh?
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I would think that rather than it being a case of homophobia, it is a case of Microsoft not wanting to offend GAY players. If I were a player, I would feel uncomfortable with the name in case it were a homphobic player simply "having a laugh".
I'm going to assume you don't follow gaming news, 'cause this is missing a big chunk of Microsoft's response (including an answer to consumerist's own question of "Would "theHETEROgamer" also be banned?" that was on Kotaku on the 14th.
From, http://www.stepto.com/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=434
"We recieved a complaint on the Gamertag and determined that it did indeed contain sexual innuendo. Now granted, there could be an argument that the text is not pejorative to homosexuality and should therefore be allowed. But there is no context to explain that. Gamertags are visible to everyone and it would be hard for me to defend to a parent of a young child who saw it that the name did not contain content of a sexual nature.
We view these situations objectively during our review under the terms of use. To answer the question another way, yes "TheStraighterGamer" or "TheHeterosexualgamer" would have gotten the same treatment and would have been found to be in violation and forced to be changed. We've actually done that to tags like that before."
The word 'gay' is a sexual innuendo? Yet another reason to dislike Microsoft.
Why do people continue to equate "gay" with fucking? It has nothing directly to do with fucking. Neither does straight for that matter. If people see the word gay attached to someone and automatically think of fucking then those people have a problem with their fucking habits.
It's sheer stupidity and in this case it's also being turned into a bullshit political correctness argument just to excuse the action taken.
What's odd is that Microsoft is supposed to be gay-friendly and has ignored the boycotts by the nut jobs who object to Microsoft's employment and benefit policies.
The problem is that this world is so P.C. that we have to make sure not to offend any one because they're feelings will get hurt.
Just like its almost a crime to be a bully in a school its a crime to hurt some one feelings.
IMHO. our world has gotten to a point where everything has to be hypoallergenic, even the way we talk because some one some where belives there kids feelings were hurt.
That's racist.
My dear friend has a gamertag with the word 'gay' in it, but I'm never going to tell! He's never had any complaints against him, and we always have fun when we play with other people online. We're really funny and we always have a good time chatting. If people have a paranoid problem with it – that's their perrogative.. It's good we open people's minds, that gay people love video games too!! And xbox live isn't controlled by the hetero masses.