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Riot Games suspended an executive over his “abhorrent” Facebook post about George Floyd [update: he’s gone]Gross
Gross
Mere days after Riot Games publicly declared a commitment to combating racism and injustice, they’ve needed to launch an investigation into one of their own executives for posting some real iffy garbage about the police killing of George Floyd on Facebook. It’s not the best look for a company still trying to recover from revelations ofa rotten workplace culture of discrimination and harrassment. The League Of Legends andValorantdevelopers have tried to clean up their act and image since 2018’s revelations but progress has been stuttering and here we are again.
Update:Riot now tell us that “Ron Johnson is no longer employed at Riot Games.”
Vice reportthat Ron Johnson, Riot’s global head of consumer products, shared a loathsome image on his personal Facebook. You can go to Vice to see it if you really want.
“The media and the left have made George Floyd into a martyr, but who was he really?” asks the image, going on to list his criminal record then suggest it’s “too bad” Floyd wasn’t shot years ago. It’s an image which has been doing the rounds, and Johnsonisn’t the only onein trouble for sharing it.
“We’ve been made aware of the social media post and have launched an investigation,” Riot told Vice in response. “We’ll say firmly that the sentiment in that image is abhorrent, against our values, and directly counter to our belief that addressing systemic racism requires immediate societal change, which we detailed in the commitments we made Friday. While we don’t discuss the details of our investigations or their outcomes, we’re following our disciplinary process closely and have placed him on leave pending its conclusion.”
Riot’s disciplinary track record is not the best. In 2018, after the furore, they investigated chief operating officer Scott Gelb for allegedly farting on employees, tapping their testicles, and humping them.Kotaku reportedthat his punishment was training and two months' unpaid suspension. Riot also onlysettled a gender discrimination lawsuitafter over 150 employeesstaged a walkoutprotesting forced arbitration policies. Their sense of doing the right thing is not strong.
“In order for progress against prejudice and hate to be a reality, we have to have honest and difficult conversations in our households, classrooms, and workplaces,” Jadeja said. Yep.
Update:As well as announcing that Johnson was gone and repeating that the image was “abhorrent”, the statement from a Riot spokesperson this morning added:
“We know there is much work to be done, and we vow to do our part.”
