Banter or bullying, research says ‘trash talk’ is ingrained in esports
Esports, the collective term for global online video game challenges, has embraced ‘trash talk’ as an integral part of competition, according to CQUniversity research.
While esports has become a professional activity, growing to a global $US4.3 billion industry in 2024, the new study found that a range of attempts to promote 'sportsmanlike' behaviour, failed.
In fact, esports participants consider trash talk as crucial to player connection and esports culture.
CQUniversity PhD graduate Sidney Irwin led the research in a bid to discover competitive norms and boundaries between acceptable trash talk and online harassment.
Her study heard from 521 esports participants, including professional players, spectators and employees of the industry.
It follows esports trash talk controversies around the world, including death threats against players, players using their avatar to sexually humiliate opponents and even teammates and failed attempts by gaming companies to sanitise aggressive conversations.
Dr Irwin said most trash talk appeared in the online chat function of games, where unique language has developed.
For instance, the post-game message 'GGEZ' is a common 'roast', code for “good game – easy win for me”.
She said that particular phrase created controversy when developers of the first-person team-shooter game Overwatch tried to sanitise the statement.
“They designed the chat function, so if someone typed ‘GGEZ’, it would automatically alter the text to a more positive comment, like ‘great game everyone’!” Dr Irwin explained.
“Respondents said that intervention was really unwelcome in the community, and that trash talk is actually a motivator to compete harder.
“GGEZ highlights that there’s no simple line to draw between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour.”
Dr Irwin's thesis also explored the fall-out when, in 2022, Apex Legends professional competitor Dilly was disqualified for ‘tea-bagging’ a teammate – that is, using an avatar to crouch over another injured or killed player, simulating a sexual act.
The demeaning move was made popular in the early 2000s in Halo and Call of Duty – “I still remember having to explain it to my PhD supervisors, it was extremely awkward,” says Dr Irwin.
In the Dilly case, esports players and fans were widely supportive of Dilly, because the context of the act, with a teammate, was deemed not aggressive.
“It’s difficult, because what would be anti-social behaviours in the real world has been normalised for so long in video games, where players do feel like they’re ‘in character’ – now it’s a public, professional sport, the audience also feels entitled to it too,” she said.
“So far, the industry and community hasn’t been successful at drawing the lines and establishing that what you say in a video game, isn’t acceptable in real life.”
The Adelaide-based academic is a gamer herself, and Dr Irwin said she personally felt “immune” to trash talk after growing up with online gaming.
“You hear it so much it doesn’t affect you, although it’s frustrating that female players are still targeted in sexist ways,” she said.
“Often the moment I speak, I’ll hear other players say ‘get back to the kitchen’ – I just roll my eyes, because I’m judging their quality of trash talk, and that is not quality!”
But she warned that very young spectators and players were not immune from the culture.
“You play games like Fortnite, and it’s confronting to hear a 12-year-old voice saying something really vulgar or toxic, and you know they’re modelling their behaviour on what they’ve heard adult players say,” she said.
While different esports leagues set their own age limits at in-person tournaments, usually in line with the age rating on the game, the industry admits that online audiences are more difficult to regulate.
Australia is already home to hundreds of professional esports players, but the local scene is still underground compared to Asia, Europe and the Americas.
“In Denmark for instance, there’s a national esports strategy, and their prime minister met with players and played Counter-Strike with them,” Dr Irwin said.
“More mainstream attention on esports is also likely to shift expectations around how players and audiences behave, and how individual (and community), social and emotional wellbeing can be protected.”
Dr Irwin’s PhD supervisors were Professor Anjum Naweed and Dr Michele Lastella, and she’s continuing her research at CQUniversity’s Appleton Institute for health behaviours.