A player was bullied due to his disability in CS:GO and was kicked from a match. The community reacted and made him an overnight star on Twitch.
GameStar reports on Adam “Loop” Bahriz. He is 17 years old and a player of the shooter CS:GO. Bahriz suffers from a condition called “Hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy” (HSAN). As a result, he is nearly blind and deaf. His face is deformed, and he is missing teeth. To see something, he sits directly in front of the monitor – as close as possible. His voice sounds strange over voice chat.
Bahriz has a small Twitch channel and plays CS:GO in the ESA. When he joins a match, he informs the teammates via chat command about his condition and why his voice sounds so strange.
However, he encountered players in a match who were so disturbed by his voice that they accused him of being a kid trying to troll them while thinking he was particularly funny.
Although Bahriz was only asking about normal, game-relevant things and was playing quite successfully, his team muted him and eventually unanimously kicked him from the match. Bahriz was frustrated about this, he struck the monitor. It feels bad, a terrible day.
Teenager suddenly has thousands of viewers, ten thousand dollars in donations
Another player observed the drama in Bahriz’s stream and didn’t want to let it go. He posted the incident on reddit along with some clips. He said: Basically, he was bullied because of his illness and kicked from the game. Please show him your love. He is a nice guy and is going through a tough time.
The action made a big splash on reddit. The thread received over 8000 upvotes. Players flocked to Bahriz’s stream. They showed solidarity with him. The people who had kicked him out of the group did not represent the CS:GO community.
Professional players from teams like Cloud9 support the action, contacted Bahriz, and played with him.
Donations also started flowing in. Bahriz is raising money for cosmetic surgery to correct his deformed nose for his 18th birthday. After $6,000 was raised and the donation goal reached, he asked for the donations to stop. But over $10,000 came in.
Worst day becomes the best day
According to GameStar, Bahriz was even offered a contract as a professional streaming partner by the pro team EnVyUs.
Hey @FDN_Loop, we want to offer you a contract to stream and represent our team. Let’s do this.
— Team EnVyUs (@TeamEnVyUs) April 18, 2017
The player who initiated the kick was penalized by the ESA with a three-day game suspension.
What could have been one of the worst days in Bahriz’s life became, thanks to the community, the best day of his life.
this is literally the best day of my life.
— Adam Bahriz (@FDN_Loop) April 17, 2017
Read more about the positive impact a game can have on someone going through a tough time here:
Destiny: “Destiny has saved my life” – story moves thousands
