Ubisoft Family Accused of Mishandling Sexual Misconduct Claims (bloomberg.com) 59
An anonymous reader shares a report: Five brothers started Ubisoft Entertainment SA in 1986 and since then the video game company has survived seven generations of game consoles, four recessions, a hostile takeover bid from France's largest media conglomerate, and a global pandemic. Ubisoft is one of the world's largest game publishers, the maker of blockbuster series such as Assassin's Creed and Far Cry, and the Guillemot family still maintains effective control. Now they face a new crisis: allegations of widespread sexual misconduct at the company. The situation has shaken up the founders' inner circle and raised major concerns about how the business was managed for well over a decade. More than a dozen people made public claims of sexual harassment and abuse against employees of Ubisoft over the past few weeks.
The outpouring is part of a broader #MeToo movement taking hold in the game industry, and the Paris-based company has been the most frequent target of allegations. Interviews with more than three dozen current or former Ubisoft employees indicate that these claims, and many others that haven't previously come to light, had been gathering dust in company logs for years. In some instances, Ubisoft took action, but for the most part, complaints were ignored, mishandled, or undermined, employees say. The accusations filed to Ubisoft's human resources department range from subtle forms of sexism to sexual assault, according to two people with access to the reports. In interviews with Bloomberg Businessweek, many employees detailed an atmosphere that was hostile toward women, often describing the Paris headquarters as a frat house. Staff openly made misogynist or racist comments across the publisher's various offices, and senior executives took part and escalated the misconduct in the form of inappropriate touching or other sexual advances, current and former employees say. On one occasion before this summer, when Ubisoft sided with an alleged victim, the company removed the woman's boss and rewarded the woman with a gift card, she says.
The outpouring is part of a broader #MeToo movement taking hold in the game industry, and the Paris-based company has been the most frequent target of allegations. Interviews with more than three dozen current or former Ubisoft employees indicate that these claims, and many others that haven't previously come to light, had been gathering dust in company logs for years. In some instances, Ubisoft took action, but for the most part, complaints were ignored, mishandled, or undermined, employees say. The accusations filed to Ubisoft's human resources department range from subtle forms of sexism to sexual assault, according to two people with access to the reports. In interviews with Bloomberg Businessweek, many employees detailed an atmosphere that was hostile toward women, often describing the Paris headquarters as a frat house. Staff openly made misogynist or racist comments across the publisher's various offices, and senior executives took part and escalated the misconduct in the form of inappropriate touching or other sexual advances, current and former employees say. On one occasion before this summer, when Ubisoft sided with an alleged victim, the company removed the woman's boss and rewarded the woman with a gift card, she says.
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Is it too much to ask not to get random unsolicited massages?
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You just need to install a sperm filter, just like you install a spam filter to not get random unsolicited messages.
FTFY
Uh oh (Score:2)
Can't wait to see the comments on this one.
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These men need shorter leashes and better training. Thank the woke that these bastards will be brought to heel.
So easy.. (Score:1, Troll)
..now.
Have a grievance ?
Just include some absolutely innocent, normal, human, cross sex conduct.
He always opened the door for me, like I was too weak to do it myself.
He referred to me as a young lady, instead of a young person.
He told me my perfume smelled lovely.
There's just no end to the idiocy
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In 10 years it will just be "he indicated that he was aware of my sex."
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It won't.
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You're right of course.
It will be 5 years at the very least.
Re:So easy.. (Score:5, Insightful)
It actually is pretty easy to not harass women at the workplace. Don't talk about their looks, what they're wearing, don't touch them, do not mention their perfume. It's all pretty common sense. Fact is women have had to put up with a lot of bullshit from men for decades, it's far more than "opening doors"
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"Get back to work before we write you up for creating a slip hazard from all that oil on your arms."
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Do tell what you think the female equivalent of "oiled arms in a sleeveless shirt at work" is
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In that case I would support the company making it policy against both, but the answer to both is still easy, don't say shit to either person about it. Nothing in your work necessitates commenting on either of those.
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Nothing is necessitated beyond food water and oxygen.
I'm going to keep doing things that aren't necessitated, thanks.
I can't imagine using that dumbfuck argument to support anything ever.
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"Taking away my right to comment on cleavage in my workplace is like taking away my right to breathe!" Way to live Mr Coward.
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Sounds like the person you are describing works at a gym...
You construct odd strawmen. Says something about you.
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Except the touching, none of your examples should even be classified as sexual harassment on their own, and since you bring up the past, no sensible women from the past would have considered those innocent comments to be sexual in nature. You are off your rocker if you think think that complementing the sent of perfume is sexual harassment. That's as benign sexually as saying the flowers on her desk smell great.
Just because a woman complains about something someone said doesn't mean her complaint is valid,
Re:So easy.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't talk about their looks, what they're wearing, don't touch them
Formal Grievance: Jacks smirking reven is ignoring me in the office, refusing to treat me as part of the team. As an example he slaps male colleagues on the back, tells them he digs their t-shirt and discusses their hairstyle and beard with them. He never compliments me on my tops or hair, and when I get close to him he backs off with a look of fright in his eyes. When challenged regarding this behaviour he said it's because I'm a woman, clearly demonstrating that his motives in treating me differently are misogynist and sexist.
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There is so much bad faith and so many assumptions to make this argument invalid on it's face. I know enough not to touch any of my co-workers outside a handshake while in the work environment, a stark distinction between "discusses" and "compliments". If you feel so on edge around women on your workplace then something is already wrong with your world outlook.
If you this scenario regularly plausible I don't know what to tell you. I have never had any co-worker, male or female, approach me about a "lack"
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I find it very plausible. Maybe because it happens.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ne... [dailymail.co.uk]
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She also lost the case later. What's your point? That sometimes people will sue a company for dishonest reasons? That's a much bigger topic across all legal avenues.
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My point is that your approach risks alienating people, causing HR issues to the detriment of everybody involved, including yourself.
Treat women normally. They can handle it.
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That's what everyone is asking for, but the definition of "normal" evolves over time. What was normal in 1965, 1980, etc is not normal today. That's what the Ubisoft complaint is about and what women are asking for in general.
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Referring to a coworker as "young lady" is pretty condescending.
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Not in all cultures. And not if you're a priest.
In certain cultures, when an older man addresses a younger man using "son", they do the young man a great honor.
So let's not americanize everything and hen complain it's wrong.
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It's not wrong in America either unless you're some kind of fruity disgusting piece of pigshit that needs removed from civiliization. Any cunt that gets upset about being addressed as "Young Lady" deserved to addressed as "Dried up pathetic piece of shit cunt".
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You are a complete fucking insane person. You need remove from society and civilization. You are the enemy of everything worthy of even the perception of goodness. You are absolutely garbage. You should kill yourself and stop molesting children.
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Have a grievance ?
Just include some absolutely innocent, normal, human, cross sex conduct.
He always opened the door for me, like I was too weak to do it myself.
He referred to me as a young lady, instead of a young person.
He told me my perfume smelled lovely.
There's just no end to the idiocy
Interesting, you make light of complaints as if they are minor or irrelevant without even looking up what they were. This is 101 level stuff from the playbook of racists and sexist fuckwits. Congratulations on being an arsehole.
I wonder why you never mentioned inappropriate touching? At least the article did.
There's just no end to the idiocy
There will be when we are rid of people like you.
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You do realise that some women do complain about sexism if you hold the door open for them? I've had one complain to me, then act affronted when I made it clear that she isn't special and I hold the door for everybody.
A friend working at a different company had an actual HR grievance raised against him because he held a door open for a woman. Fortunately this was long enough ago that HR dismissed the claim.
Accusations (Score:1)
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Like Courtney Love telling women not to be alone with Harvey Weinstein back in 2005?
Re:Accusations (Score:5, Insightful)
I know its tradition to not RTFA, but maybe you should not voice a strong opinion if you don't know what you're talking about. These accusations are not the word of one person versus the word of another: there are multiple sources and some of the things they described happened at office parties and in meetings where there were multiple witnesses.
But even if there are no other witnesses, HR should investigate accusations, especially if similar accusations are made against the same person over a long period of time. There is a lot of room between "accept at face value" and "nothing".
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At Ubisoft it seems HR did investigate, and did find multiple breaches of employment law (and hopefully also of corporate policy).
Which is good, but also in a way rather weird. Maybe I've led a sheltered career but I've never worked anywhere that sexual assault or harassment is acceptable, in the workplace or otherwise.
I mean, sure, we tolerate some low level stuff, but that's just human nature. You can't sack a guy for admiring the manly builders erecting the new corporate offices in sight of the current o
Re:Accusations (Score:4, Insightful)
...mean nothing
A pattern of accusations however always mean something. That something may be a coordinated effort to get rid of someone everyone hates (not a bad thing to do in a company), or more likely (especially in this industry) actual sexual misconduct.
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What damage are you referring to?
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Remember that the standard of proof in court is going to be balance of probabilities, not beyond reasonable doubt. Workplace stuff is civil courts.
Unsurprisingly Ubisoft doesn't want it to get that far and that expensive.
Ok, that makes sense (Score:1)
often describing the Paris headquarters as a frat house.
Can you really be that surprised, when they're literally surrounded by a culture that glorifies taking equal liberties? I mean, it was *founded* by five brothers. Did you expect they wouldn't support a sense of brotherhood?
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If they weren't forced to hire women, then they wouldn't be there to sexually haraass nor to make false claims of sexual harrassment. Let people have freedom of association and these problems go away.
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I'm very sure that they weren't "forced" to hire women. This may surprise you but women can be very good at games development.
I'm not going to pretend that a woman will be any better than a man at any aspect of games development but I'm also not going to be stupid and pretend that a woman will be any worse either.
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I never said anything about women being worse or better. I'm saying that there are a lot of problems apparently with men and women working together. Blame men. Blame women. Personally, I think both are at fault in the sense there are shit-bags of both genders always causing trouble of some kind. I'm saying, if companies aren't forced to hire in ways that "balance" minorities, women, etc. perhaps they'll choose not to (freedom of association) and this won't be such a problem. Women can form their own compani
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Oh, well done. You missed my point entirely.
They're not forced to hire women. They choose to.
That's a choice they make. Nobody is forcing them. They are using their freedom of association to associate with people of more than one gender.
I'm really not sure why that makes me 'the enemy' but if it helps at all, your advocacy causes me no fears.
Once! (Score:2)
Only once would I want to read about Handling Sexual Misconduct Morally Competent!
Ezio (Score:2)