G+OHH.

It started with a conversation.

Our work with Games and Online Harassment Hotline began as a conversation. Christopher Vu Gandin Le and Anita Sarkeesian were spending time at Gencon, conceiving of a resource to support victims of online harassment and a place for gamers to access mental health resources.

Eight months later, the hotline helped its first user. Working as launch director, Gandin Le found hotline partners, advised on technology needs and conducted the first hotline agent cohort trainings. Games Hotline isn’t as big as some of our other hotline work, but it’s one of the most exciting.

This is often how we work; identify a need, find partners in the space, and bring the solution into existence. Then we step aside and let the program grow, becoming advisors and board members to make sure we support the product even after our main contracts are complete.

GODOT + VU.

GODOT.

The Games and Online Harassment Hotline is a free, text message-based, confidential emotional support hotline.

In 2019, video games had their own #MeToo moment, as many brave individuals came forward with stories that made it impossible to any longer ignore a shameful truth: The video game industry, like so many others, has long been a place where sexism has run rampant, where privileged men have utilized imbalances in power to take advantage of female employees, to harass and abuse them, and then to protect themselves from any consequences for their actions. We won’t let it be that way anymore.

One factor that has enabled abusers to get away with such behavior is that for far too long, the targets of their abuse have often felt isolated, as if they had nowhere to turn. The Games and Online Harassment Hotline was started to ensure that anyone who experiences such abuse can reach out to us to get whatever support they might need, whether it’s just someone to talk to about what they’re going through or referrals to other resources to help them protect themselves or take legal action.