The online shooter Destiny 2 has gone through its ups and downs over the years, but a dispute over the German Twitch streamer Luis is now showing a side of the community that is indefensible, believes our author Schuhmann. Death threats and severe insults are being normalized and defended as part of gaming and Destiny 2.
This is the occasion:
- The German Twitch streamer Luis, known as Lachegga, was permanently banned from Destiny 2 by Bungie in July 2023. According to Bungie, this was due to “ongoing violations of the code of conduct, particularly regarding harassment of players, other creators, and Bungie employees.” (via twitter)
- While the streamer himself admits to having repeatedly insulted people and having violated the rules and deserving the ban. He believes, however, that such rule violations and “in-game toxicity” occur all the time in the game’s PvP and are not the real reason for his ban. He thinks, he was only banned because he was too critical of Bungie and they “couldn’t stand him.”
- Rather than admitting the mistakes and stepping down with dignity, the big conspiracy theory is being put forward: a content creator, with an average of 123 viewers on Twitch and 20,000 subscribers on YouTube, is such a globally relevant and critical voice that Bungie has to silence him under a pretext.
The German community shows its ugliest face in the YouTube comments
The hate and toxicity in Lachegga’s community and how normal it is to wish death upon people “in the game” is simply not okay:
- In the comments on YouTube, people are dehumanized and insulted in the worst way: the talk is of “sons of whores” and “cock suckers.”
- Anyone against Luis is a “no-name”, “filth”, a “piss ant” and an ass licker.
- Bungie is a puppet club, a laughing stock, and other players are termed “part-time retirees”.
- And when US streamers comment on this and say: “Bungie surely acted correctly, we don’t want such people in the game”; then they surely don’t know “the whole truth” and need to be enlightened about the injustice happening there.
And such insults in the comments are not isolated cases, they are not just a few individual comments – this is the general tone of the entire comment section (via youtube).
All of this remains completely unmoderated and unchallenged on YouTube, and is viewed by the content creator as confirmation in his fight “against injustice”.
The YouTuber is referred to as an honorable man, praised for his “constructive video”.
As a justification for why Luis’s ban is unjustified, one user proudly states: He told every Titan he met “Go die”, yet has not been banned. A clear proof that something must be going on.
Although some in the comments under the video confirm that they too have been insulted by Luis, they say that this is part of Destiny.
Even people who witnessed Luis wishing death upon others applaud
Yes, Luis would sometimes wish death upon people, one reads there. But that does not justify the perma-ban.
But it does.
The peak is that someone actually quotes Martin Luther King to support Luis: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
The perpetual flamer, who insults people to the worst degree and wishes them death, portrayed as a fighter for justice.
Bungie has restricted communication in Destiny 2 due to death threats
And yes, such comments are unfortunately not a unique anomaly that can only be found in Germany:
- In the English-speaking Destiny 2 community, the community management that has been known for years collapsed after personal death threats were made against an employee. Since then Bungie hardly communicates at all and when it does, it’s through a faceless Twitter account.
- An activist like Anita Sarkeesian received so much hate during GamerGate that she could hardly show up publicly (via polygon).
- The developers of Battlefield 2042 also received death threats along with negative feedback.
All of this has happened. But here, in Destiny 2 in Germany, all of this is happening right before our eyes.
Alongside Bungie, YouTube and Twitch must also take action against such behavior
I want nothing to do with this part of Destiny that behaves like this and actually endorses and normalizes this behavior.
It is urgently necessary that not only Bungie takes action against such elements of the community, but also Twitch and YouTube. Those who normalize and endorse this, who say, “If I get flamed, I won’t report it, but flame back twice as hard,” contribute to making Destiny 2, gaming in general, and the community worse.
Yes, one can be angry and disappointed with Bungie. One can criticize. One can stop playing the game. All of this is completely okay.
But one cannot treat other people this way.
