A female Overwatch Twitch streamer was told to “shut your f***ing mouth” and “make sandwiches” by her teammates, with the players continuing to taunt her by telling her to “mop my floor” along with using a racial slur. Another added: “women have lower IQ.”
Twitch streamer Cupcake shared the clip on Twitter, writing: “in case anyone has forgotten what its like to be a female who plays overwatch (:” The clip has received over 2,000 retweets and 7,000 likes at the time of this writing.
The clip begins with Cupcake telling her teammates: “I feel like I’m the only person shooting this shield.” Taking offense to her criticism, her teammates then launched into a sexist tirade, with one telling her to “shut your f***ing mouth” while another added: “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m the only one who’s gonna say this: can you get on Mercy?”
After the other players in her team laughed at the comment, Cupcake responded: “Not a hahaha situation.”
“So, just out of curiosity, is this how you treat every girl who comes into your comp games?” Cupcake continued. “Shut the f*** up and make us sandwiches,” a teammate replied.
“You know what you can say online? N*****,” another player added.
Cupcake uploaded a clip of the stream to Twitter, which can be viewed below:
CONTENT WARNING: Sexist and racist language
in case anyone has forgotten what its like to be a female who plays overwatch (: pic.twitter.com/PlrdRCapoj
— Aramori (@Aramori_) July 9, 2019
Since posting the clip, Cupcake’s point has been further proven by the replies she has received. One top comment reads: “you’re bad at the game, get flamed. gg” Another told her to “grow some thicker skin.”
Toxicity has been a key issue in the Overwatch community since its inception. In response to the complaints regarding this issue, developer Blizzard introduced an Endorsement system, in which players could endorse teammates or rivals who had been good sports during a game.
During GDC 2019, Blizard explained how it was working to curb toxicity among its community, and how the developer tackled it by addressing three key areas: lack of social consequences, frustration over different play motivations, and frustration of different play styles. As a result, matches with disruptive players dropped by 40%, while there was a 130% increase in reported disruptive behaviors.
