Two of World of Warcraft's top North American raiding guilds have been called out for racist and intolerant behavior, sparking a broader debate about racism and toxicity in the WoW competitive scene.

Earlier this week, image galleries containing approximately 70 screenshots of 16 members of raid guilds Clout Gang and Instant Dollars began circulating in various WoW communities. These images, taken from private Discord servers and World of Warcraft in-game chats, show members of Clout Gang and Instant Dollars frequently using the n-word and making homophobic and sexist comments as well as jokes about murdering them. While the Clout Gang and Instant Dollars are far from the largest guilds in WoW's global raiding scene, they are two of the top raiding guilds on their respective servers.

Note: This article contains graphic and racially charged image descriptions and links.

In one screenshot, Decenaryk, a former member of Instant Dollars, repeatedly spams "Twist n***** heads off" in World of Warcraft in-game party chat. In another screenshot, Apfelsaft, the guild master of the Clout Gang, recites the lyrics to Strange Fruit, a 1937 poem and song by Billie Holiday. Later in the gallery, there is an image of Apfelsaft posting a meme that reads "Shut up, n*****." Taken out of context, this excerpt is extremely vile.

The moderators of the WoW subreddit initially removed the posts regarding these screenshots. However, due to the influence these guilds have and the seemingly widespread nature of this behavior, the leak ultimately prompted the moderators of the World of Warcraft subreddit to create a thread summarizing the evidence and allegations. This sparked a larger discussion about the racism and toxicity that many players claim is prevalent in WoW's North American and European competitive raiding scenes.

"Without a doubt, this raises questions about the culture among high-end raiding guilds and what behaviors are normalized," wrote Ex_iledd, moderator of the WoW subreddit.

World of Warcraft raiding has only recently become a more organized esport, even though it has been a competitive scene for decades. However, most of its teams are still hobbyists and Twitch streamers. Instead of competing in PvP, raid guilds compete to be the first to complete a new raid when it is added to World of Warcraft; raids on WoW's highest difficulty levels require superhuman levels of coordination, with teams usually consisting of around 20 members. Traditionally not a spectator sport, the "Race to World #1" became a sport on Twitch when the European raid guild Method partnered with Red Bull to turn the race into a live streaming event. These streams often reach hundreds of thousands of simultaneous viewers. Last year, however, Method collapsed when one of its top raiders was accused of sexual assault and its co-founder was accused by an employee of sexual harassment and misconduct.

The two North American guilds involved in this new controversy are nowhere near Method's size or influence; Clout Gang and Instant Dollars are not professional esports organizations with sponsors, and they do not play World of Warcraft or Clout Gang is currently ranked 38th in the North American raiding scene, while Instant Dollars is ranked 16th. However, as this story develops, more and more players from several other well-known WoW raiding guilds around the world are coming forward with screenshots and videos showing similar behavior.

Below: a video showing the guild Ethical hitting WoW's newest raid.

Moderators on the WoW subreddit have begun archiving and verifying evidence of racist, homophobic, and misogynistic remarks by known raiders. In one video, a member of raiding guild Ethical, currently ranked 16th in the world, says, "Beat this motherfucker," as his raiding team is taking down the final boss of the current raid.

In another screenshot, a member of WoW's top raiding guild, a player named Gapezilla with 14,000 Twitch viewers, says, "Literally every Blizzard employee should be raped to death ****."

Because raid riders tend to change guilds somewhat frequently, the moderators also tracked the movements of different raid riders across different guilds by cross-referencing videos and Twitch streams, just as athletes jump between teams. For example, several members of Instant Dollars previously belonged to the Clout Gang.

Despite being posted only a few hours ago, the current thread on the WoW subreddit now has nearly 800 replies. Many of these comments are from WoW players who claim that this type of racism and intolerance is not limited to within a few guilds, but is prevalent throughout the competitive raiding scene in World of Warcraft.

"Sad that this just made the news," wrote one redditor. 'The top guilds in NA have been racist, sexist, and offensive for a long time. I remember applying to the top 20 guilds in NA and they asked questions like "we are adults and you must be able to handle adult language like the n-word used in a casual way." Many raid riders were unable to stream on Twitch due to the open racial discrimination on Discord during raid hours."

"We are a mid to low tier CE guild and even at our level we have applicants saying they are leaving our current guild because of racism. It's wild and really offensive."

Some of those involved in the gallery of screenshots have since defended themselves. Moderator Ex_iledd explained that the guildmaster of Instant Dollars was contacted to clarify that he was in a different guild at the time these screenshots were taken." With the exception of Decenaryk, all expressed remorse for their actions and were expelled from the guild for internal review," Ex_iledd wrote.

It is clear that many players hope that the culture of WoW's hardcore raiding community will eventually change. Ex_iledd writes, "Silence within communities like the guild about longstanding systemic issues of sexual harassment, assault, bigotry, and hatred, as we saw in last year's sexual abuse and misbehavior cases like [Method], is not the answer." Only shining a light can help."

We will continue to update this article as relevant information becomes available. We have reached out to Blizzard for comment on this article.