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Xbox Live Gamer Banned For Living in Fort Gay

- By - Source : Tom's Guide US

Welcome to modern society.

We've heard stories about Microsoft suspending gamers for using names that have the word "gay" in them, even if that is their real name. This latest suspension, however, is definitely meant for the "oh come ON" pile.

26-year-old Josh Moore resides in Fort Gay, West Virginia and he listed his location like many others do on Xbox Live.

Some other Xbox Live gamer spotted his location and somehow got offended enough to report Moore to the Xbox Live cops. This resulted in a suspension of Moore's account, blocking him from playing online and causing him to miss a Search and Destroy competition.

“I'm frustrated that this would be an issue. I'm proud of where I live and this makes no sense,” said Moore.

Moore even got the help of Fort Gay mayor David Thompson to contact Microsoft, but those on the other end of the phone wouldn't lift the ban even when suggested to Google the town's zip code.

“I'm amazed that in this day and age they would flag the word gay," said Thompson. "It's the name of this town, other gamers have had the accounts closed and up front money taken.”

Moore's plight eventually caught the attention of Xbox Live director of policy and enforcement Stephen Toulouse, who admitted that Microsoft made a mistake here in its policies and reversed the suspension on Moore's account.

The odd part in all of this is that earlier this year Microsoft revised its policies to allow words Lesbian; Gay; Bi; Transgender; Straight in profile and gamertag.

(Source: Switched.)

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Furylicious 09/09/2010 1:11 PM
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-20+

Just another reason why I don't care for the XBOX 360. In steam, I've seen far worse, and even those people don't get banned, much less even approached about it.

Gigahertz20 09/09/2010 1:11 PM
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Oh come on, why is Microsoft acting so gay?

back_by_demand 09/09/2010 1:32 PM
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Could be a lot worse, he could live in England where there are towns called Cockermouth or Scunthorpe

Mikeadelic 09/09/2010 1:35 PM
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Gigahertz20 :
Oh come on, why is Microsoft acting so gay?


Wicked burn! OoooooOooOooOOooohhhhhh

atk0309 09/09/2010 1:45 PM
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-7+

Oh come on ! For the love of god this is OVER-restricting

lakelucid 09/09/2010 1:47 PM
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-18+

I bet you can find an employee named gay at MFST.

cronik93 09/09/2010 1:49 PM
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This is why I refuse to use any "Pay to Play".

swamprat 09/09/2010 1:52 PM
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back_by_demand :
...or Scunthorpe


Ok, living in Scunthorpe would be fairly horrid - but how is the name rude?

Dandalf 09/09/2010 1:56 PM
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-10+

Reason to remain a PC gamer. I'll never understand the motivation to put your entire gaming experience in the hands of ONE company. Especially Microsoft.

flaminggerbil 09/09/2010 1:57 PM
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-4+

swamprat :
Ok, living in Scunthorpe would be fairly horrid - but how is the name rude?


Remove the S.

The moderation on XBL is pretty rediculous, yet in chat you can get away with anything.

isamuelson 09/09/2010 2:00 PM
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back_by_demand :
Could be a lot worse, he could live in England where there are towns called Cockermouth or ScunthorpeWhat about livii



Or Dildo Newfoundland. Or Sugar Tit, Alabama!

braxis john 09/09/2010 2:00 PM
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-1+

That's why i don't get any console.

Imagine that, i've been fooling around and playing and just because a name, or a moron who go to live cops and tell that i've cheated to win i lost all my acess to live and my account only works off-line.

Now go to Steam, before they ban anyone they contact you and search for proofs and, only if you're really a cheater they ban you.


Keep trolling, Microsoft

RaZZ3R 09/09/2010 2:04 PM
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Really? On Steam i use the nickname RaZZ3R Sanavabiciu and I still didn't got any complaints from anyone. Looks like George Carlin was right: The people are f*** !

nebun 09/09/2010 2:04 PM
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back_by_demand 09/09/2010 2:08 PM
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-3+

http://www.i-r-genius.com/rudeplaces.html

That's a LOT of banned XBL gamers
Wet Beaver Creek, Australia is DEF my favourite

MU_Engineer 09/09/2010 2:09 PM
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-12+

The all-time champ for "city most likely to get you in trouble for saying you live there" has to be Fucking, Austria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fucking,_Austria)

greghome 09/09/2010 2:14 PM
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back_by_demand :
Could be a lot worse, he could live in England where there are towns called Cockermouth or Scunthorpe


What about Middlesex ?

sincreator 09/09/2010 2:31 PM
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I had a couple friends banned for the motto "snipers get more head". They had that motto for the last 2/3 years and only recently got banned for it. 3 day ban was the punishment. To make matters worse, their xb live account and GFWL account are the same so they were banned for both. At least they could still play on the PC in ranked matches with a new silver account, but xb live requires a gold membership to play ranked. So if the ban had been permanent they would of had to make a new account and pay all over again for the new gold membership. Just another way to boost account sales M$?

whysobluepandabear 09/09/2010 2:34 PM
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-3+

The problem is too many people on XBL are immature to being with.


When you have people running amok, you have to lay down the law, and sometimes unjust and unfairly to those who haven't done a thing wrong.


With that said, certain things really are just beyond pathetic. Society needs to stop being a bunch of sissies and understand unless it's crude and sexually perverse, that words like "Gay", "Lesbian" and "Bi" are just the facts of life.


By all means, pretend those words don't exist and it's all made up, but once you're out of your bubble you'll realize it means literally nothing. Just another common word that doesn't really stick out too much in my vocabulary.


If someone had the "C" word that rhymes with "Punt" in their name, then yeah lay down the law on them; that word virtually has no use except insulting or offending.

back_by_demand 09/09/2010 2:43 PM
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WhySoBluePandaBear :
words like "Gay", "Lesbian" and "Bi" are just the facts of life


WhySoBluePandaBear :
If someone had the "C" word that rhymes with "Punt" in their name, then yeah lay down the law on them


Living in Scunthorpe is a fact of life

TheCapulet 09/09/2010 2:46 PM
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isamuelson :
Or Dildo Newfoundland. Or Sugar Tit, Alabama!


How could living in sugar tit, Alabama be worse? That would kick so much ass that you'd go blind.

rantoc 09/09/2010 3:05 PM
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The benefits of signing up on console services, if you get banned on them your screwed big times... PC on the other hand...

ssddx 09/09/2010 3:07 PM
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The only reason this is an issue is that MSFT fails to contact the users in order to question such things and that people on the internet will report others for just about anything. If an awkward sounding town name offends a person i'd love to see how they deal with the real world.

That said, immaturity is rampant on any online game. If MSFT (or other) wants to do something proactive they should stop all the useless trolling & flaming that goes on daily.

jellico 09/09/2010 3:26 PM
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This is the run-away train wreck of political correctness, and quite honestly, it is destroying our country.

On the national stage, we have an idiot pastor in Florida who wants to burn a bunch of Kurans (I don't really give a crap how it's supposed to be spelled, so don't correct me). If some idiot wanted to burn a stack of bibles or take a dump on a crusafix, an army of ACLU lawyers would be there to assure that his right to freedom of expression. However, this guy in Florida wants to burn a stack of Kurans and he's getting chastised by the White House. Really?! Not to mention that his Internet service provider has yanked his websites. So that's where we are. Freedom of speech and expression exist for some, but not for others. The hypocrisy is so thick, you'd need a chainsaw to cut through it.

mlopinto2k1 09/09/2010 3:35 PM
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COLGeek 09/09/2010 3:43 PM
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Automation without intelligence equals ignorance.

back_by_demand 09/09/2010 3:55 PM
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mlopinto2k1 :
Funny, what operating system do you use?


Using Windows as your OS has no impact on your gamename in Steam, or WoW or any other PC game for that matter...

CoreyM72 09/09/2010 4:20 PM
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If MS used zip codes along with MapPoint then they could automatically poulate Fort Gay. What a bunch of 30218 rods!

wolfram23 09/09/2010 4:22 PM
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Here's to not using an Xbox.

coleipoo 09/09/2010 4:25 PM
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I live in Flaming Homo, New Mexico. I hope I don't get banned.

maigo 09/09/2010 4:35 PM
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Don't tell the internet where you live!