There was a lot of assumptions on why he left or if he was fired, so here's his own words. I wish Mattias the best of luck and hope he finds something that he loves and can be proud to be apart of.
Edit: May not agree with everything, but happy this discussion is peaceful and civil. Was hesitant to post but it turned out ok. Still think Riot needs to get their shit together though.
I'm affronted that he seems to be a "justice" for diversity but has no idea what diversity really is. Its not having more minorities than majorities. I'm also frustrated that he seems to have no idea what equality really means. Equality means that everyone gets the same thing, regardless of gender, race, sexuality, etc. I'm pretty sure that Riot has the same opportunities for minorities as they do majorities. The fact that it is largely made up of men isn't their fault; they should be hiring the most qualified people, not the people they don't have one of. Tokenism is something that is considered deeply offensive and I have no idea why anyone would support it.
He wasn't malicious but he was devastatingly stupid and misaligned and should take this time to really think about his ideals.
I'm actually feeling like he sold himself short there.
While I disagreed with many of his tweets regarding DZK and PAX, I can tell that he wasn't trying to do anything in maliciousness.
But that's the bigger problem with this entire event, from PAX to now. We know it wasn't done with malevolence in mind but the action itself was malevolent. It's not unlike executing someone who committed murder. You've killed to show that killing is wrong. Which translates a little too well with what many of us have said: "You can't use sexism to solve sexism."
I'm also more than a little sick of anyone who decides that sexism/racism can only go one way. All it does is force the punishment on someone who doesn't deserve it. If you wanna punish someone for racism, punish the guy who is actually being racist. Don't lump in everyone just because they happened to share his skin color and/or gender.
shamelessly promoting his patreon at the end of the article
Speaking of Lehmen, have you guys read his previous article? That's an interesting take on current events....
[sg-ahri-3]
So I'm reading through this all and I've got to say, he's coming off like quite the drama queen.
There was a lot more weight in the other topics I've seen over the Bro Culture and how there was plenty of sexism, but I'm seeing one instance of "ni**a" being dropped and him constantly blasting about how awful Riot is on Twitter and blaming his job insecurity over his blackness, at least on this first article he linked to.
https://medium.com/@Mattias.Lehman/riot-games-must-be-better-abb7619d6374
Also I keep seeing references to GamerGate and how it's a harassment campaign yet not once do I read an experience from him related to sexism or racism, he just blindly calls out gamers for supporting toxic masculinity just because some guys are very competitive assholes. It literally was a conversation about ethics in journalism that got blown up by the news and became a flame war from both sides, and given every major article at the time was "GAMERS ARE DEAD" or "GAMERS ARE SEXIST" as a whole its no surprise it turned into a flamewar. At no point though was this organized harassment campaign described ever a reality.
https://medium.com/@Mattias.Lehman/the-curious-misogyny-of-gamer-culture-bc47a6fdd23b
He also defends the clearly at least somewhat sexist policy of the trans/women only room, but its not in the respectful tone that most of his writing is in. He's literally retweeting that anyone who disagrees with it is an idiot and he's making the claim that DanielZKlein was harassed when he made that post telling people to fuck off, which is an outright lie because any harassment that did occur went immediately after Daniel made his inflammatory post. You can't flame people then call it harassment when you're flamed back.
https://twitter.com/MattiasLehman/status/1037081928879366144 https://twitter.com/MattiasLehman/status/1037220632973504512
So far screaming of SJW and there's multiple lies and I'm barely into the article. "Somewhere in there, I found time to call some people “manbabies” on reddit, which has apparently become the worst slur in the history of mankind in the last week." I don't know if you should find that appropriate when you're literally conflating comments like Aggressive or Intimidating to be racist.
"More painful were the friends at Riot who would corner me in the kitchen or some thoroughfare where everybody could see as they scolded me about how they were sympathetic to my viewpoint but that they just didn’t think my approach was appropriate. That I was too aggressive. That I needed to win people over with love, not criticism.
I’ve been described as “aggressive” and “intimidating” my whole life at my slight frame of 5’7”, and after a while, it’s hard not to view that as influenced by general perception of black men." - from the Riot games must be better article.
The dude was already on thin ice and then he goes and defends obviously aggressive comments, makes his own aggressive comments, and he wonders why the hell he gets called aggressive by people he considers friends. Like this screams of virtue signaling close to the level of that Guild Wars 2 writer who crashed her career by being an ass on social media. It's not quite as blatant, but its pretty much the same thing. The dude was sabotaging his image with the community and his coworkers by being abrasive, and even if he had a point on Riot's culture being racist he didn't demonstrate it at all and basically turned his ultimatum - which was not unreasonable given everything that went down - into an opportunity to go on about how he's oppressed and a martyr for diversity. Blech.
I spent like an hour going through this shit and I don't think I'm going to miss him. The only things he mentioned caring about when it came to the game in all of this stuff I read was that Rek'Sai was a butch female, Ekko was black, and Kindred had a non-binary identity. If that's all you can say about a game you're supposed to be writing for then you probably weren't adding much to it.
Good riddance to bad rubbish!
The fewer Neo Liberals at Riot the lower odds a travesty like PAX 2018 will happen again.
How can I -- a unapologetic dudesmoocher -- possibly survive in the digital wasteland that is the internet without some self-appointed spergvirg'_ pink-knighting_ for "LGBT"
NOBODY. ASKED. YOU.
"The problem is that while the great parts about Riot define the experience for many people, for too many marginalized people they are either inaccessible or overshadowed by alienation. Not just women, either, but also racial minorities and the LGBT community."
"HOW CAN MINORITIES POSSIBLY MAKE IT IN THIS EVIL HU-WHYTE MAJORITY WORLD (and Rito James™) WITHOUT SOMEBODY LIKE ME TO STAND UP FOR THEM" - M. Lehman, basically
Mattias Lehman is an idealogue, pure and simple.
When asked to keep his trap shut to avoid inflaming the situation he wilfully disobeyed, inflamed the situation, and was called to task.
He then quit rather than agreeing to reel his neck in.
Zero sympathy.
Im glad to see that the SJW groups are thinning out at Rito. We don't need soy boys ruining our League!
There was a lot of assumptions on why he left or if he was fired, so here's his own words. I wish Mattias the best of luck and hope he finds something that he loves and can be proud to be apart of.
What a tool. I'm glad he's gone, though it does make me sad because I'm sure there are many more like him at Riot (and I know it's not just a Riot issue).
A lot of lead up for a TLDR of "I was asked not to talk about DZK, I talked about DZK anyway. PR wanted me not to do this again in the future. I didn't think I hold myself to that, so I decided to leave."
I think Riot treated him a bit extreme to be honest, but at least we now know.
