Intentionally misgendering a person can be reasonably expected to create a feeling of being bullied or harassed, and is unacceptable behavior at events and in our community. This includes intentionally using incorrect pronouns or otherwise referring to another person as a gender other than their gender once stated.

A judge who intentionally misgenders a person or declines to act when they become aware of another person doing so is failing in their responsibility to create a safe and positive play environment.

A safe environment is a basic expectation of any tournament. Creating and maintaining that is one of our primary duties as judges, a duty we share with tournament organizers. We believe it is essential to clarify this issue as we know it has been a recent topic of discussion in many judge communities. 

WHAT THIS LOOKS LIKE IN PRACTICE

As a judge, you have an obligation to stop the harassment that’s going on at your event. If you are having a problem with people harassing other people at an event, there are two things you should do.

1. Stop the match, separate the players, and issue the appropriate penalty:

• • • If this occurs at a Regular REL, this is a Serious Problem. An effort should be made to educate players before and during events on what’s appropriate and what is not, but any person engaging in any Serious Problem (intentional misgendering included) must be removed from your event. The tournament organizer will need to determine if they will remove the player from the venue entirely.

• • • If this occurs at Competitive REL, this behavior is USC – Major. After the match loss is applied and the players are separated, the judge should take the time to talk to the offending player. If the misgendering was done with malicious intent, the player does not feel remorse for their action, or the action is repeated at a later time, the penalty is upgraded to Disqualification, and the player should be removed from the event. The tournament organizer will need to determine if they will remove the player from the venue entirely.

2. Organizers have a shared responsibility for creating a safe space. Therefore, in addition to issuing the appropriate penalty above, you must also make the tournament organizer aware of the issue to give them an opportunity to address the situation based on their own policies and the WPN Code of Conduct.