A harassment-free environment for Scrabble is essential

If you pay attention to other games out there besides our beloved crossword game, you may have caught wind of a major news story that's upended the chess world in recent weeks. It involves a high-profile male player in the community, a number of female accusers, and some disturbing allegations of misconduct.

Alejandro Ramirez, an elite American grandmaster who was a prominent figure in the game as a player, coach, and commentator on many chess broadcasts, has been under intense scrutiny lately, amid a number of reports of sexual assault and other similar offenses. Jennifer Shahade, a former U.S. women's champion, said publicly on Feb. 16 that Ramirez had assaulted her twice; soon after, several other accusers came forward. On March 7, the Wall Street Journal published a report detailing "interviews with eight women who said that Ramirez had used his position in the chess community to make multiple unwelcome sexual advances towards them since at least 2011." The offenses included "forcible kissing, groping, and coercing a drunk 16-year old to perform oral sex."

The Journal also reported that two major chess bodies - the U.S. Chess Federation and the powerful St. Louis Chess Club - knew about the accusations for years and "failed to act or effectively investigate."

It's important for everyone - including chess players and Scrabble players and just human beings in general - to understand the full significance of stories like these. First and foremost, your heart breaks for the victims. Enduring sexual violence is painful and traumatic, and no one ever deserves to go through that. You can only hope that those affected can recover from what they've been through - physically, mentally, and emotionally - and move on. Secondly, you want justice for the perpetrators of these crimes - they should be held accountable for their actions and removed from the community affected so they're never given a chance to repeat their past offenses. And thirdly - and this is perhaps the part that's most often overlooked - the organizations that cover up such offenses need to be held accountable as well.

Scrabble, like chess, has historically had trouble in this area.

Scrabble gets compared to chess a lot these days. Often, the comparison is a favorable one - both games are immensely popular and ubiquitous in living rooms worldwide, and both games have communities of tournament players with enormous potential for growth. Both games are using innovative new technologies, like streaming video for example, to increase awareness and draw in new people.

But unfortunately, the two games are comparable in some problematic ways too. And this is one of them. When our already-quite-small communities fail to meet the basic needs of all players - such as making them feel safe and wanted and included - that rises to the level of an existential crisis.

Shahade, when she first went public about Ramirez in a social media post last month, touched on a key point when she discussed how her life has changed since coming forward with her story. She wrote:

"You may have noticed I've taken a major step back from commentary as this plays out. I've filled the time with poker, writing and promoting girls in chess. And yet a lot of that work to make chess more inclusive is futile if we cannot make crystal clear that the safety of women, girls, children is of the highest priority. And that's why I'm speaking out now."

This is an absolutely vital point, and it's one that none of us - in chess, in Scrabble, or anywhere else - can afford to overlook. Creating an environment that is safe, welcoming, and harassment-free for all players is a basic need for our community. Failing that, any discussion of growing the game is moot.

This point is not lost on us at the CoCo. In fact, it's baked into everything we do. We believe in dealing with harassment aggressively, holding offenders accountable, and electing leaders and empowering directors who care about these issues deeply. We believe in all of this because it's good for the community, good for the game, and good for humanity. As we said from our very first day in business: "Our goal is to build a stronger Scrabble community - one that is diverse, inclusive, growth-oriented, safe, and supportive for players from all walks of life." We know this work is not easy. Transforming our community will take years. We’re in this effort for the long haul, and we won't rest until that work is done.