When do jokes and banter become bullying and harassment?

Community General Discussion
22

From a psychological standpoint, I have to disagree. There’s a lot within the studies of psychology to suggest that your environment and circumstances have a very powerful influence in shaping you to be how you are.

However, philosophically you then have to ask whether someone is responsible for something outside of their own hands - to which you might agree with me in saying that maybe they’re not responsible for themselves, but you can very much still say that they’re accountable for themselves, in the same way that a parent isn’t considered responsible for a crime of their young child’s, but they are accountable for it.

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23

I think that’s where the line is drawn tbh.
obviously I agree that if someoen wants to hurt someone else they’re . but at the same time, if 2 people are joking inbetween each other, without affecting the 3rd party directly, they can go ahead and do so.
at least that’s where i draw the line. you can call me “n” word or “f” word or “r” word or “a” word or and I wont really be bothered and if someone else is thta’s on them imo,

24

I agree with others - it becomes bullying when such is the intent.
However, I also see it for what it is - People use the term “Autistic” to badmouth others, or point out how “Bad something/someone is”…
That in turn leads your intent to use Autism as Bad, derogatory, generally to put someone down.

The moment you use something like this to describe something bad, you’re frankly just picking the wrong words and should probably take a look at your vocabulary, use better - more fitting words - that do not intentionally pick on X group of people.

I say people are brainless poopheads (sorry for swears!) - cause it actually isn’t putting any living soul down beyond the people I am targeting.
I’m also known for swearing in an odd way where I can be super angry and scream “FISHBUTT”.

shrug
Some people don’t want to take responsibility for the words that come out of their mouths / fingers, and they will say we’re SJWs or whatever else that apparently makes us the bad guys cause we think about the whole picture.

I can joke about very inappropriate things - With my friends and family.
If I at any point blurt out something that is offensive, obviously, but ment it as a joke - I have NO issue saying “Oh I am sorry, I was just joking.” rather than go “STOP BEING OFFENDED, GROW A THICKER SKIN”.

The world is actually crumbling into itself due to these kinds of things, not cause of "SJW"s or “Bullies”, but because the overall behaviour is just uncared for.
"SJW"s go way out of their way to be inclusive, so much so that it gets pushed down peoples throats in a unnatural manner.
“Bullies” on the other hand defend poor behaviour and vocabulary.

It’s just an endless circle, one which I actually see having somewhat of a positive-rise lately as I see more and more people dislike the use of “Retard” / “Autistic” as insults, much like we hardly ever see “Gay” being used as a derogatory term anymore.

You either grow, learn, and take responsibility - have an adult discussion to understand eachother.
Or you hide behind “Stop being offensive” / “Stop offending”. - We can’t force people to see these things, or feel like it’s a bad thing, either.

I had someone defend the use of “Retard” by saying South Park did it.
… Woop-de-doo?

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25

I totally understand where you are coming from, and for the most part I agree with it. However, at the same time there are certain things, such as racial slurs, that I would never say even as a joke. I said this in the other thread and I’ll say it again here, by your logic you should have no problem with me going around calling African-Americans “filthy ni.g.gers” as long as I say “it’s only a joke” afterwards.

Let’s look at a more relatable example, one I’m sure everyone on here can identify with. A lot of times when players get angry they say things like “go get cancer and die”. Now maybe I’m being naive here but I don’t think the person saying this actually wants anyone to get cancer and die, yet they say it anyway. Should we just ignore this kind of behaviour because “they didn’t mean it”?

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26

This !

The same applies to the other side, on the internet, people typing the jokes can’t know the mood that the people recieving it are in, not like in real life when you can know that just by looking at the person, and not make a clown of yourself.

Also on the internet, and games in general, you have to take in considiration the culture shock, not all countries, or sometimes even regions in the same country, have the same way of telling jokes, or taking them, some countries just don’t understand memes or sarcasm, and would take everything of this kind as offensive, and you can say the same thing about generations.

And then there is straight up trolls who do that on purpose, you should be able to identify them by how absurd they sound and with some experience on the internet, just ignore those and don’t feed them.

In other words, don’t apply real life social behavior rules to the internet, and don’t take anything on the internet as serious, the way you would do it in real life, it’s just a completly different world.

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27

There is an old saying:
“It takes a village to raise a child”. - sadly this village is now so large due to the internet, which contains a heckload of Trolling - Bullies-behind-screens (Since they can’t get hit in the face for saying the things they say) - and the anti-SJW vs extreme-SJW people.

It’s… hard to decipher what is “right or wrong”, always have been, but I like to believe that most people are capable of figuring this out if they choose to do so.

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28

Im brainless and I feel attacked… what’s this supposed to mean? -.-!!

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29

I’m fascinated by your very existance. :open_mouth:
Can I use you for scientific study?.. insert face of an insane person here

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30

am I going to be Grong volume 2? :monkey_face:

31

Did you see the episode of Darkwing Duck where Siggie McQuack was going to “Ummpthy” (marry in Alien language) with this random Alien girl?
Darkwing gets his brain pulled out from his body and put in a jar.

This episode always stuck with me… I can’t for the life of me understand why!
continue to insert insane-face here

32

I agree 100%, unfortunately I don’t think a lot of people understand the effect they have on others, and I’m not just talking about the people they are speaking to directly. I teach a lot of children, some as young as 7 years old, and the majority of them (the boys anyway) play Fortnite and other online games.

Every time they see another player type something in the chat, it influences what the way they see the world. And the problem is that at that age, the child hasn’t developed enough social skills to tell if someone is joking or being truly offensive, just from looking at a chat box.

EDIT: I know a lot of people will say something like “it’s the parent’s job to teach them right from wrong” but the sad fact is that we are in an odd period of time where there is a clear divide between the generations. A lot of parents didn’t grow up playing games and therefore haven’t been exposed to the internet the way their children are. This makes it very hard for the parents to understand what goes on and to reinforce good behaviour online.

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33

For me banter is when you have a willing recipient of your jokes / comments directed at them and bullying is when you do not have a willing recipient.

What is more of a grey area for me is people being offended on behalf of other people or they don’t like the general conversation. This in my view is a moving target and changes depending on the situation.

The use of dungeon finder gives people no choice on who they are put with unless they queue as a group so you should be respectful to everyone’s wishes in that situation.

The flip side of that is if you see a few of us out doing stuff and ask you join our group and we let you, then if the banter or conversation between us is not acceptable to you then you leave the group instead of asking us to stop.

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34

that sounds totally like something I’d do. here comes Darkwing B U K A C H U~

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35

Why do you find it ok to insult someone on any other attribute but not race?

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36

Interpretation of what you say & its’ affect on others requires a degree of social spatial awareness… if you are discussing someone & they walk into your vicinity & you notice that who you’re talking to changes their facial expression, it’s a sure sign that the topic of conversation needs to end… quick. If you get to the “They’re behind me, aren’t they?”, you f… dropped the ball.

Same if you see someone around you with a social difference of any kind & divert the topic of discussion to them - that is a conscious choice & deserves reprimand.

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37

Soooo if somebody doesn’t like the way I look at him even if it was accidental that my gaze fell upon him that can be seen as harassment by him? Extremely leftist PoV I’d say. Intent is what matters.

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38

I don’t find it ok to insult anyone regardless of the situation. The racial slur was just an extreme example. But let’s look at something a bit less extreme. In the UK it’s very common to make a joke saying “blo.ody women drivers!” which is undoubtedly sexist since it implies that women are worse drivers than men.

I know quite a few women who if you said that would just shrug or make some off-hand comment knowing it was a joke. However, those same women would take offence if you made a joke that women should stay in the kitchen and leave work to the men. Both are jokes, not intended to cause offence, so do the women have the right to be offended by the second joke?

And as for taking offence at things said to other people, if I’m at a party with my wife and someone said (agan, as a joke) that my wife should just stay at home where she “belongs”, do I not have the right to be angry at that? After all, it wasn’t directed at me specifically and it was intended as a joke. Am I being a “White Knight” or a SJW for being angry and standing up for my wife when she is insulted?

39

But the point is that ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are subjective terms. What one person decides is ‘right’ will also fall under someone else’s vision of what is ‘wrong’. For example, for such a long time both extreme authoritarianism and anarchism have been seen as the most obviously-only-supported-by-evil-cartoon-characters political systems around (though admitedly pockets of support have always existed), but in recent years some circles have considered one of either of them as cool and the support for both has grown exponentially. Both sides, even though complete opposites, both believe they are right and the other wrong. And even if you sit in the middle (as most people do), you have to ask yourself to which exact degree on an axis between the two would be acceptable.

It’s the same with knowing what actions are morally acceptable. How can people agree to what words are acceptable when and where when they can’t agree on a moral framework to begin with? Even this thread is a testament to that. The truth is that an authority (in this case, blizzard) just has to pick something and go with it.

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40

looking and talking isnt the same.
if you tell me something that offends me, ill warn you. I wont name you every single word that offends me but ill warn you that the word you used offended me. so you gotta try to not to offend me again, at least with the same word, how i react after that depends on circumstancese tho, and how objective/subjective the subject of my offense is.

for example - if we’re friends and you joke about my mom dying or something of that sort, i wont warn you and ill act because its objectively offensive. if you’ll call me tomato and its hurts me, ill warn you because its subjectively offensive.

intent is what would matter if we could see the clear intent of someone, but everyone can lie about their intent and there’s no actual way to clarify how honest they are.

41

You are a SJW and impeding on other people’s freedom of speech when making jokes.

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