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Group Behind Steam Censorship Policies Have Powerful Allies

The organization behind Steam's latest payment processor censorship, Collective Shout, appears to tell some misleading tales.

While it’s unclear whether Collective Shout is actively targeting Detroit: Become Human in 2025, the removal of such a game would be akin to artistic censorship of material discussing misogynistic abuse against female family members. In 2014, the organization called on Target to remove Grand Theft Auto 5 from store shelves, sharing a petition that claims the game “encourages players to commit sexual violence and kill women.” Collective Shout described GTA as if it was a misogynistic funhouse, stating the game lets players “enact their fantasies of committing extreme violence against women, including punching women to the point of unconsciousness, killing them with a bat, gun or machete, running them down with a car, and setting them on fire as they continue screaming.” But unless Collective Shout directly publishes its list of so-called “child abuse” games on Steam, its public bluster on the topic appears to be manipulative in nature, akin to how it treated GTA and Detroit: Become Human in the past.

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