Black Girl Gamers Announces Legal Action Against Entertainment News Outlet That Park Place Over Recent Report Suggesting Video Game Diversity Consultant Company Engages In Discriminatory Hiring Practices
In the latest escalation of the ongoing Sweet Baby Inc. discourse, video game diversity consultation company Black Girl Gamers has announced their intent to seek legal action against entertainment news outlet That Park Place over a recent report alleging that they engage in racially discriminatory hiring practices.
[Disclaimer: This article’s author holds a personal friendship with a number of That Park Place staff members and contributors.]
This latest development was kicked off when, on March 15th, That Park Place editor-in-chief John F. Trent published a report entitled ‘Forspoken’ Consultant Black Girl Gamers Appears To Discriminate In Their Hiring Practices While Claiming They Are Being Harassed.
In support of his headline’s suggestion, Trent cited a sole February 2024 tweet wherein Black Girl Gamers put out a public call for “Black Women Content Creators that make Dungeons * Dragons (DND) content for some potential brand work”.
Addressing the report roughly two weeks later, Black Girl Gamers took to their official company Twitter account on March 26th to declare, “We’re addressing the recent allegations published on http://thatparkplace.com about discriminatory hiring practices within Black Girl Gamers. These claims are false and were made without prior fact-checking or verification from us or our representatives.”
“Black Girl Gamers operates as a contracting organization that collaborates with both freelancers and content creators from all backgrounds to work on various projects and initiatives to amplify underrepresented voices in gaming and make the community more inclusive,” they continued.
“Contrary to the allegations in the article, Black Girl Gamers has contracted freelancers of all races, genders, sexual orientations, religions, and ethnic backgrounds,” Black Girl Gamers next stated.
“We have also included representation of all genders and backgrounds in our content, at our events, and in our marketing, consultation, and research projects, some of which are not publicly disclosed due to NDAs,” added the company.
To this end, they alleged “evidence demonstrating our commitment to diversity and inclusion, including our non-discriminatory hiring practices, is readily available and easily searchable,” though they did not provide any specific links or references as to where individuals could find this information.
At this point, Black Girl Gamers then ultimately announced that “Upon discovering these false and defamatory allegations, we have taken steps to obtain legal counsel to take action against the publication and journalist, as well as subsequent content creators who have reshared the false allegations about our organization.”
“We will continue to pursue further action against anyone who persists in spreading false and defamatory information about Black Girl Gamers, its founder, and its contractors and partners,” said the company.
“We value the talent and contributions of all our collaborators and we are committed to continuing to do so. Thank you to our community for the ongoing support,” they concluded.
Addressing the legal threat in his own coverage of its announcement, Trent provided a disclaimer asserting “That Park Place has written about this public interest story involving public entities as part of good-faith journalistic efforts. That Park Place, at time of publication and to the best of our knowledge, has never received any request for edit, redaction, modification or deletion of articles mentioned in this piece. We strive for accuracy within our coverage, even when we are opining in public appearance perceptions.”
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