Punishment and Its Discontents: An Analysis of Permanent Ban in an Online Game Community

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Online platforms such as multiplayer online games often struggle with widespread toxic behaviors such as flaming, harassment, and hate speech. To discipline their users, platforms usually adopt a punitive approach that issues punishments ranging from a warning message to content removal to permanent ban (PB). As the harshest punishment that a platform does to its user, PB deprives the user of their privileges on the platform, such as account access and purchased content. But little is known regarding the disciplinary effect of PB on the user community. In this study, we analyzed PB in League of Legends, one of the largest online games today. We identified five distinct player discourses regarding PB, revealing how PB is only nominally a disciplinary device, and functions primarily as a platform rhetoric. Our findings amounted to the recognition of a restorative approach, and more specifically, the need to contextualize toxicity.