Reminder: This post, like all the others on this blog, is written by me, at home. Consequently, the words and views stated here are not those of my employer.

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This post has been updated! Make sure you read until the end for the update.

Up until tonight, I had never been called a spook.

That memorable milestone happened while playing a game of Halo, courtesy of one JBlues2k.

My younger brother and I were playing Halo 3 together and I was enduring the typical “a female playing Halo must be fat/ugly/lesbian” litany when JBlues2k decided that I “sounded black.” I planned on ignoring that bait but my brother instantly responded “So what if she is?”

…Aaaand we were off. JBlues2k wasn’t alone in his show of hatred. Not to be outdone, our other teammate, x HEADSHOT 82 x, joined in. I won’t give the blow by blow but there was plenty of racism to be had. Not limiting themselves to “spook” our teammates ran the full I-hate-black-people gamut with “monkey” “cotton picker” and “pubic hair*” thrown around. They also started calling me “Kizzy” for good measure.

When the game finally completed, not content to go on to another game to harass someone else, JBlues2k decided he needed to send me a message to drive the point home. Have a listen:

Lovely, innit?

Of course I did the needful and filed a complaint against the 2 players with XBL. For once, I’m going to keep track of what happens

Kizzy...how clever.

to this complaint (you’d be surprised how often I make them because of racist remarks). Normally, I file the complaint and assume that nothing is going to come of it. This time I want to see what Microsoft is going to do.

See, this week I learned that Microsoft has a policy to suspend any player for stating their sexual preference on Live. That seemed ridiculous to me, what with all the other crap that gets said on Live (full disclosure, I play in the Underground zone because I curse like a sailor while I’m playing). However, in the process of reiterating this policy to the Consumerist, they also said this:

“Harassment of any kind is not condoned and is taken very seriously; we strongly encourage Xbox Live members to immediately report inappropriate behavior through the compliant tools in the service so that it can be investigated and the appropriate action taken.”

Well, Microsoft, here’s a report of harassment, now what?

*Pubic hair bit throw you off? Yeah apparently God hates me so he put pubic hair on my head.

Update! Stepto, he who leads the brave souls that wield the banhammer on Xbox Live, made sure these guys got handled. A 2 week suspension was their fate and if they keep up the behavior after their timeout, a permaban awaits. Read the comments for more information. Thanks for keeping XBL a fun place to play Stepto.

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