Bullying and Harassment Policy

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Spirit of the Policy
• Principles and Rational
• Policy
• Allow

Spirit of the Policy

Bullying and harassment happen in many places and come in many different forms, from making threats to release personally identifiable information (PII), to sending threatening messages and making unwanted malicious contact. We do not tolerate this kind of behavior because it prevents people from feeling safe and respected on Medal.

Context and intent matter and we allow people to share and re-share posts if it is clear that something was shared in order to condemn or draw attention to bullying and harassment. In certain instances, we require self-reporting because it helps us understand that the person targeted feels bullied or harassed. In addition to reporting such behavior and content, we encourage people to use tools available on Medal to help protect against it.

Principles and Rational

Rational

We recognize Medal as a social media platform where people may use many different channels such as our application or Discord to discuss different topics in which bullying and harassment may take place. This can come in many different forms, from making threats to releasing personally identifiable information (PII), making unwanted malicious contact, or verbal abuse. We do not tolerate this type of behavior on our platform, as it prevents users from feeling safe, respected, and inhibits their ability to participate in the friendly discourse.

We remove content that is meant to degrade or shame individuals when reported. We take attempts to shame or degrade individuals such as claims of sexual activity, desire or orientation very seriously and remove them from our platform. We recognize that bullying can have more of an emotional impact on minors, which is why we both take a proactive approach to enforcing our bullying and harassment policies and take reports of bullying and harassment very seriously.

Principles

The goal of our Community Standards is to encourage expression and create a safe environment. We base our policies on input from our community and from experts in fields such as technology and public safety. Our policies are also rooted in the following principles: 

Safety

Safety: Safety is an essential factor in community building. At Medal, we are dedicated to removing content that encourages or causes real-world harm, including (but not limited to) physical, emotional, or financial injury as well as privacy violations that could harm a targeted individual(s). 

Voice:

We embrace the different backgrounds and diverse views of our community. We want to provide a platform and opportunity for users to not only share their gaming experience but build lasting bonds with one another. We err on the side of allowing content, even when some find it objectionable unless removing that content cant prevent real-world harm to the user. We vow to discuss and consider allowing content that otherwise violates our stands if we deem it to be newsworthy, or important to the public interest based on global and national trends. 

Equity:

We recognize the diverse backgrounds of our community from around the world. It's important for us, at Medal, to keep our policies broad in order to apply them consistently and fairly based on an ever-adapting global culture. Because our community standards must transcend cultural, regional, and linguistic barriers, we recognize the need for a broad but consistent standard. Because of the broadness of our policies, in some cases, and when provided with additional context, we will have to make decisions based on the spirit, as opposed to the letter, of the policy.

Policy

This type of content violates our policy and is therefore not allowed on our platform.

1. Target anyone with: 

   1. Repeated contact which is:

      1. Unwanted OR
      2. Sexually harassing

   2. Attacks based on experience of sexual assault, exploitation or domestic abuse.

   3. Calls for self-injury, suicide or disease to a specific individual or group of individuals.

   4. Attacks through derogatory terms related to sexual activity. (i.e 'whore, slut')

   5. Claims that a violent tragedy did not occur.

   6. Claims that individuals are lying about being victims of a violent event.

   7. Threats to release PII (personally identifiable information) of an individual, such as phone number, address, email addresses etc.

   8. Derogatory terms related to female gendered cursing. (i.e; 'bitch, cunt)

   9. Claims about sexually transmitted diseases in regards to the individual.

   10. Comparisons to animals or insects that are perceived to be (culturally) inferior physically or intellectually OR to an inanimate object. (i.e; 'cow,' 'monkey,' cockroach,')

       1. UNLESS context is used to establish that this is being used in a way to compliment the individuals or refers to the game itself, and not the individual. Use market knowledge.

   11. Content of a private individual or non-meme related images manipulated to highlight, circle or draw negative attention to a specific physical characteristic.

   12. Praise, celebration or mocking of an individuals death.

   13. Content ranking individuals based off of physical appearances.

   14. Any content sexualizing a private individual.

   15. Negative character claims

   16. Accounts made with the purpose of self-referential bullying. (See KQ)

   17. Coordination, advocation or promotion of exclusion.

   18. Expression of contempt or disgust of an individual, except in the context of criminal allegations against an adult.

       1. When unsure of adult or minor, default to minor.

   19. Comments that attempt to further degrade an individual that is reported by a user.

   20. Claims about romantic involvement, sexual orientation, or gender identity of an individual or individuals.

   21. Claims of blasphemy of a persons religion.

   22. Claims about lack of sexual activity.

Allow

This type of content does not violate out community standards and is therefore allowed on our platform.

1. Criminal allegations against all adults, including allegations that contain: negative character claims, expressions of contempt and/or expressions of disgust when targeted at private individuals
2. Videos of physical bullying or violence in a fight-sport context (e.g. martial arts, wrestling or boxing.)