The State of California is suing Activision Blizzard over allegations of workplace discrimination

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Activision Blizzard is facing a lawsuit from the State of California regarding claims of inequality in pay and workplace discrimination against women working for the company. California's Department of Fair Employment and Housing agency (DFEH) has filed a 29-page legal document against Activision, which is headquartered in California, alleging that there is a "rampant frat boy workplace culture" that has lead to harassment, dismissal of complaints made to human resources regarding discrimination, and more, with even evidence to prove such, following the conclusion to a two-year-long investigation.

The DFEH found that women employed at Activision Blizzard made less money than male employees with the same job title or for the same amount of work, in addition to finding that women were fired on a much more frequent basis compared to men, despite the former only making up around 20% of the company's workforce. Other claims include that Activision's higher-ups are complicit in and take part in disrespectful "cube crawl" events, where male employees will, "drink copious amounts of alcohol as they "crawl" their way through various cubicles in the office and often engage in inappropriate behavior toward female employees".

The goal of the lawsuit is to make Activision Blizzard comply with California's labor code, and adhere to equal pay laws within the state via an injunction, as well as seeking relief payments for unpaid wages and damages for the affected women defendants who have worked for or still work for Activision Blizzard.

Following the filing of the suit, an official statement from Activision was sent to media outlets, claiming that the allegations were "distorted, and in many cases, false descriptions of Blizzard's past", adding that they have been cooperative with the DFEH throughout the past two year's worth of their investigation. From Blizzard's perspective, the company has, supposedly, "made significant" changes in recent years and have implemented "anti-harassment training", among other preventions.

We value diversity and strive to foster a workplace that offers inclusivity for everyone. There is no place in our company or industry, or any industry, for sexual misconduct or harassment of any kind. We take every allegation seriously and investigate all claims. In cases related to misconduct, action was taken to address the issue.

The DFEH includes distorted, and in many cases false, descriptions of Blizzard’s past. We have been extremely cooperative with the DFEH throughout their investigation, including providing them with extensive data and ample documentation, but they refused to inform us what issues they perceived. They were required by law to adequately investigate and to have good faith discussions with us to better understand and to resolve any claims or concerns before going to litigation, but they failed to do so. Instead, they rushed to file an inaccurate complaint, as we will demonstrate in court. We are sickened by the reprehensible conduct of the DFEH to drag into the complaint the tragic suicide of an employee whose passing has no bearing whatsoever on this case and with no regard for her grieving family. While we find this behavior to be disgraceful and unprofessional, it is unfortunately an example of how they have conducted themselves throughout the course of their investigation. It is this type of irresponsible behavior from unaccountable State bureaucrats that are driving many of the State’s best businesses out of California.

The picture the DFEH paints is not the Blizzard workplace of today. Over the past several years and continuing since the initial investigation started, we’ve made significant changes to address company culture and reflect more diversity within our leadership teams. We’ve amplified internal programs and channels for employees to report violations, including the “ASK List” with a confidential integrity hotline, and introduced an Employee Relations team dedicated to investigating employee concerns. We have strengthened our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion and combined our Employee Networks at a global level, to provide additional support. Employees must also undergo regular anti-harassment training and have done so for many years.

We put tremendous effort in creating fair and rewarding compensation packages and policies that reflect our culture and business, and we strive to pay all employees fairly for equal or substantially similar work. We take a variety of proactive steps to ensure that pay is driven by non-discriminatory factors. For example, we reward and compensate employees based on their performance, and we conduct extensive anti-discrimination trainings including for those who are part of the compensation process.

We are confident in our ability to demonstrate our practices as an equal opportunity employer that fosters a supportive, diverse, and inclusive workplace for our people, and we are committed to continuing this effort in the years to come. It is a shame that the DFEH did not want to engage with us on what they thought they were seeing in their investigation.

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Xzi

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It'd be a real shame if people review bombed their games and/or pirated their games :creep:


Companies such as shitbrained Activision deserve it
Never gonna happen unfortunately. Last time CoD was "boycotted," the next iteration to release sold as well as ever. And on the Blizzard side, even people who hate their recent work are probably gonna buy D2R, because it's clear VV put in the work on that one.
 
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mspy

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I really don't think them buying lots of companies up is really any worse than American companies doing it. It's shitty nickle and diming their players that makes Tencent and subsidiaries like Riot bad, as well as their rootkit anti-cheat. The CCP is bad because they either have a hand in or turn a blind eye to human rights violations and animal cruelty and oppress their people. There's a reason so many Chinese emigrate to live in the US and Canada. (hell, they're probably 5% of the Canadian population at this point) The one good thing the Chinese government does is fine companies for monopolistic behaviour which should be a thing elsewhere too.
Companies also have to play by the CCP rule book, meaning that they have to censor themselves and avoid references such as showing the Taiwan flag, not to mention games like WoW have to have new models especially made for things like skeletons just to appeal to the CCP. The movie industry is also suffering from this, they are making movies already with the idea of releasing them in china and so many things that the writers/directors had planned are just scrubbed and the west audience has to stick with it because nowadays they don't even bother to make different releases for the west and chinese markets.
 
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Vine-gar

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And here I'd thought I'd stop lurking tomorrow. Anyone being rude here needs to take a breath and re-read what they're saying before they post it. If you're playing devil's advocate don't forget to run it both ways instead of just one side.

This Reddit post has a list of current and former employees backing up what is said in the lawsuit. None of these are anonymous. From what I've read so far there's one person identifying their own story in the lawsuit, multiple people saying that they've witnessed some of the abuse mentioned first-hand, and multiple people who are still uncomfortable naming names about who did what. If you're skeptical about how true all this is then take a read through it.

EDIT: AW MAN. I never made enough posts to post a link. Can someone else put up the Reddit link? Fastest way to it is to go to r/wow and look at the pinned joined moderator response post. It's the last link in the OP there.
 
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Xzi

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Yep, leftist corporation
https://archive.is/4hXnb
Literally every corporation on the planet provides empty platitudes in "support" of civil rights, gay rights, etc. You think behind closed doors they aren't donating to both political parties? Not that it matters, because the Democratic party is a center-right, capitalist party; and the Republican party is a far-right, capitalist party. The only way to effectively support socialism/communism in America would be to raise wages of employees substantially and/or give them at least a 50% stake in the company, as well as lower executive wages substantially. Activision isn't about to do any of these things.
 

ChaosEternal

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And here I'd thought I'd stop lurking tomorrow. Anyone being rude here needs to take a breath and re-read what they're saying before they post it. If you're playing devil's advocate don't forget to run it both ways instead of just one side.
Why worry either way? If the allegations can be substantiated, then the lawsuit should confirm them. If not, then the lawsuit should reflect that. All that's left is to wait for the process to be worked through. I'll be awaiting their conclusion before making my own final judgement.
 
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Haloman800

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Literally every corporation on the planet provides empty platitudes in "support" of civil rights, gay rights, etc. You think behind closed doors they aren't donating to both political parties? Not that it matters, because the Democratic party is a center-right, capitalist party; and the Republican party is a far-right, capitalist party. The only way to effectively support socialism/communism in America would be to raise wages of employees substantially and/or give them at least a 50% stake in the company, as well as lower executive wages substantially. Activision isn't about to do any of these things.
>democrats
>center right


Also. There's plenty of companies who don't cowtow to the current political trends
 

Xzi

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>democrats
>center right
Now you're starting to get it. When was the last time a liberal Democrat proposed nationalizing a bank or corporation and giving the profits to the lower/middle class? The US has no leftist party.

Also. There's plenty of companies who don't cowtow to the current political trends
But they're still donating to both parties behind the scenes, because why the hell not. That way you have some leverage no matter who gets elected.
 

Vine-gar

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Why worry either way? If the allegations can be substantiated, then the lawsuit should confirm them. If not, then the lawsuit should reflect that. All that's left is to wait for the process to be worked through. I'll be awaiting their conclusion before making my own final judgement.
I agree with you that waiting for the verdict is wise. What really grabs my attention in all this are the details about the situations where this happened and the people saying that similar or identical stuff has happened to them. I start to imagine myself in their shoes or someone nearby. "What's the best course of action?" is a tough question on it's own and a harder question when you're really there. I mean that rhetorically, I don't want to get in a long conversation about it.

It sounds like it won't be possible for Activision-Blizzard to settle out of court. I'm glad this will be getting a proper conclusion instead of being hidden away behind NDAs.
 
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Blaze163

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I caught Zepla's video on this over lunch, and if what's being asserted is true, Activision Blizzard deserve to die in a hole. How is this kind of crap still going? The girls in my social group don't feel safe going out for a few drinks without an escort to make sure nobody spikes them or drags them down an alley. I don't agree with the way a lot of third wave feminism acts (basically assuming all men are evil until proven otherwise) but I have to agree this is a problem that needs obliterating. Like castrate these people with a brick.
 

MetoMeto

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"discrimination" and "woman paygap" in one sentence..... its clear now whats this all about.

Now we just need some gay in there and black man discrimination and we have a modern, popular dramma.

jesus....
 
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Lastairbend

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"discrimination" and "woman paygap" in one sentence..... its clear now whats this all about.

Now we just need some gay in there and black man discrimination and we have a modern, popular dramma.

jesus....

It's exactly clear what this is about and it says so in the pages upon pages of legal work to back it up. The discrimination is clear and evident enough and has had 2 years of evidence gathering and proving attached. Why are you playing this like it's some elaborate scam to drama bait news for a company widely known for treating its employees and women like shit
 

BitMasterPlus

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It's exactly clear what this is about and it says so in the pages upon pages of legal work to back it up. The discrimination is clear and evident enough and has had 2 years of evidence gathering and proving attached. Why are you playing this like it's some elaborate scam to drama bait news for a company widely known for treating its employees and women like shit
Because the metoo movement and shit like Projared has made it more scrutinized and turned into a weapon for women to get ahead in life. Some have abused it, but not all. It seems like in this case Activision Blizzard is guilty in this case, and sexual harassment, especially to the point of suicide, is never, EVER, right, and major consequences should be dealt out, but it's always better to wait and make sure the allegations are true instead of just believing a person's claims with no evidence. And to be crystal clear once again, it seems like in this case Activision Blizzard is guilty here and I do hope the proper repercussions take place, but always be careful and never jump the gun.
 

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