The Coven S4E11: Bullyhunters

We're back witches, with another magical episode of the Coven Podcast. This week, we're looking at Bullyhunters. So it's no secret that gaming online can be a really toxic, and playing online as a woman or a person of color comes with the hazard of ten year olds targeting you for that. There's plenty of evidence of this kind of griefing online, but what can be done? Systemic overhaul of the problematic culture around gaming? Turning off voicechat? No... clearly the only effective solution is hunting the bullies down. Bully Hunters was a failed venture launched earlier this month that claimed to shut down "bullies" is CS:GO via an elite hit squad of vigilante female gamers. During an error-ridden, cringe-y livestream, Bully Hunters showed off how they'd shut down bullies "at their own game" by targeting and taking them down in-game. Bully Hunters has since shut down after a relentless onslaught of criticism: fighting fire with fire is dumb, the campaign used inaccurate and misleading statistics and it did more harm than good to female gamers. Where do we go from here? Was there a right way to do bully hunting? How can gaming be made less toxic? Is this cyber bullying? What can be done to avoid/shut down cyber bullying? Let's gather around the cauldron and talk on this week's episode of The Coven. Hosted by: Daley Wilhelm, Matthew Yapp, Tyler Wheatley Edited by: Phil Akin Graphic by: Daley Wilhelm Graphic by: Isabella Torres