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from the harrassed-turtles-all-the-way-down dept.
As the March kickoff for the weeks-long 2016 South By Southwest (SXSW) festival approaches, its disparate sections—music, film, and interactive—have begun announcing confirmed panels, speakers, and showcases. SXSW Interactive appeared prepared to host a panel about the hot-button topic of online harassment and abuse, but that plan changed on Monday when a festival director officially announced that the panel, along with another tangentially related panel, had been canceled due to allegations of "numerous threats of on-site violence."
SXSW Interactive director Hugh Forrest posted the news at the festival's official blog, though Forrest didn't confirm whether the threats were linked to both panels that he confirmed received the axe: "SavePoint: A Discussion on the Gaming Community" and "Level Up: Overcoming Harassment in Games." After describing SXSW as a home for "diverse ideas," Forrest also described a desire to maintain "civil and respectful" dialogue.
"If people can not agree, disagree, and embrace new ways of thinking in a safe and secure place that is free of online and offline harassment, then this marketplace of ideas is inevitably compromised," Forrest wrote. "Maintaining civil and respectful dialogue within the big tent is more important than any particular session."
And then, just a few days later, we have this report that the panels were restored:
South by Southwest's organizers reversed course Friday and scheduled a summit about gaming-related Internet harassment, after criticism for canceling similar sessions at next year's event due to threats of violence at the festival.
"Earlier this week we made a mistake," Hugh Forrest, director of the SXSW Interactive Festival, said in a statement on its website. "By canceling two sessions we sent an unintended message that SXSW not only tolerates online harassment but condones it, and for that we are truly sorry."
[...] "While we made the decision in the interest of safety for all of our attendees, canceling sessions was not an appropriate response," SXSW's Forrest said, adding the organizers had worked with authorities and security experts. "Online harassment is a serious matter and we stand firmly against hate speech and cyberbullying."
(Score: 2) by Vanderhoth on Monday November 02 2015, @05:26PM
This is blatantly wrong http://deepfreeze.it/. [deepfreeze.it]
What you think for a year all we've done is sat around and fumed over some dev no one cared about in the first place? No, that would be people looking to put down any chance consumers had finally had enough of how corrupt the industry was and finally decided to call out the journalists that were enabling it.
Dude, I've had people threaten to burn down my house and rape me and my wife over the dumbest internet crap. There are crazy people out there, but on the internet all they have is threats. You give them power by letting them have power over you. The media also loves to play this up because it's not stop clickbait headlines for them so of course they have little interest in talking about the ethical issues, but all the incentives to keep pushing "cyber violence".
Trolls love this stuff because now they get to stir shit up and watch as these "SJW" go around screaming sexism and calling for censorship while fingers get pointed at everyone except them.
"Now we know", "And knowing is half the battle". -G.I. Joooooe