A Twitch streamer said in a stream that he would destroy heterosexuals. He apparently referred to beating them in Mario Kart. However, he was permanently banned from the streaming platform Twitch for the statement due to “hate speech”. After a passionate appeal to Twitch and with community support, the ban was lifted.
Who is the streamer?
- The streamer “AngelBePLayin” is a relatively small Twitch streamer with about 2000 followers. When he streams, an average of 16 people watch him.
- The streamer primarily shows Pokémon games on Twitch, including Pokémon: Sword/Shield and Pokémon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl. He refers to himself as a “Togepi-enthusiast.”
- The streamer has been on Twitch since June 2020.
Permanent ban for “hate speech”
What kind of ban was it? The streamer received a permanent ban on Monday, January 10, due to hate speech. This includes “promoting, glorifying, and supporting violence, physical harm, or death against others, based on their protected characteristics.”
Apparently, the streamer was banned for a statement he made after a successful race in Mario Kart. He said: “I am going to go now and destroy more heterosexuals.”
It was apparently intended as a lighthearted remark. “to destroy” is equated here with “to defeat”.
“Twitch ban takes away part of my livelihood”
This is what the streamer said about the ban: The streamer found the ban extremely unfair. He sought help, as Twitch is a part of how he earns his livelihood.
He also found it unfair because Twitch defends heterosexual people here while creators who belong to the LGBTQ+ community are regularly attacked and nothing happens to them. This refers to “hate raids.” Streamers had already protested against this in 2021 and called for a strike.
“Twitch does something to protect heterosexual people and bans my channel while simultaneously ignoring and abandoning BIPOC and queer creators, leaving them to deal with a ridiculous amount of hate speech alone. That is RIDICULOUS.”
AngelBePlayin
This is how the discussion went: The streamer shared many tweets from people who were also upset about the ban. Users said:
- “So it’s okay if there are hate raids without anything happening. But a people-of-color creator gets banned without warning. Makes absolute sense. You’re playing with someone’s income and taking half of it away!”
- “Stop trying so hard to protect the rights of heterosexual white people. We don’t need that.”
- “This is not correct. Please let a real person look at this, and if a real person has decided this, then they need to be retrained. Unban this account!”
Twitch unbans streamer – apologizes for the mistake
This is how it ended: Twitch actually apologized to the streamer and unbanned him. It was a mistake on their part, as indicated by a tweet.
The ban policy of Twitch is controversial. Errors keep occurring. A public protest seems to effectively address the problem:
The ban policy of Twitch is becoming increasingly ridiculous
