To quote Chris Matthews, “Oh, God.” It seems a woman was recently banned from Xbox Live because her sexual orientation—she’s a lesbian—has been deemed “offensive” by Microsoft. Let’s see how long it takes for Microsoft to “reconsider” this ban.
It’s like this: a woman, Teresa, had in her Xbox Live profile that she was a lesbian. Of course, the Xbox Live community, being the immature jerks that they are (I stopped using a headset while playing on XBL years ago), seized upon this, and immediately began harassing her in-game. At one point, she received a message from a fellow gamer containing a slur. That’s a hell of a way to treat another human being.
It gets worse. When Teresa went to Microsoft to complain, she was told that other players found her orientation “offensive,” so she was banned. Banned! What a foolish policy on Microsoft’s part. (Never mind the offensiveness and anti-socialness of half the games on Xbox Live: using “bodies as shields,” blowing cars up in the middle of a fictional New York City, etc.)
Let this news hit more “mainstream” news outlets, or Drudge or something, then we’ll see how long it takes before Teresa is reinstated.
Update: It should be mentioned that Microsoft has clarified their position on this issue. The actual offense was that her sexual orientation was part of her name, and they have a blanket ban on that. This wasn’t part of the original reporting. So, as I saw mentioned elsewhere, all the Gaylords and such are going to be out of luck too.