The German gaming streamer Erik “Gronkh” Range commented on the Twitter shitstorm that raged on the evening of February 3rd due to a statement about “Hogwarts Legacy“. With this, he had the largest stream in Germany on Friday evening.
What was the shitstorm on Twitter about? Gronkh was attacked by some people on Twitter last week, after a clip from one of his streams on Twitch was shared (via Twitch).
In the clip, he said: J.K. Rowling doesn’t concern him. And he asked if that made him a bad person.
Previously, he announced that he would play and stream the controversially discussed “Hogwarts Legacy”. The money he would receive through Twitch donations, he wanted to forward and donate to certain organizations.
Gronkh says: Clip was taken out of context – Rejects J.K. Rowling
This is what he says about the shitstorm: Gronkh explained that the clip was taken out of context. J.K. Rowling does matter to him, and he rejects her views and statements.
Someone sent him a letter with arguments supporting J.K. Rowling – to this situation he responded with the statement “J.K. Rowling doesn’t play a role in my life”, asking not to send him emails.
This does not mean at all that he doesn’t care about transgender people and their difficulties. Quite the contrary.
The people from his stream, who watch him, and for whom he made the statement, know that as well. At that moment, he spoke to this community: They would be aware of his views.
Gronkh admits that he often expresses himself in a way that leaves room for misunderstandings. In this case, he also believes that the clip was maliciously taken out of context. The 45-year-old thinks that certain people on Twitter hoped to gain significant reach by using him as a big name and directing attention to this topic.
Gronkh does not boycott Hogwarts Legacy, but has already rejected advertising campaign
What does he say about Hogwarts Legacy? Gronkh says he understands if people want to boycott the game. He himself has not played Hogwarts Legacy yet and has not said much about it.
However, he declined to participate in an advertising campaign for the game. Gronkh canceled the campaign even before the shitstorm erupted against him. Although he had considered participating and donating the money from the campaign.
He cannot understand why he had to be the one portrayed as a supporter for “Hogwarts Legacy” during the shitstorm – it appears to be due to his large reach.
He will not buy Hogwarts Legacy either; he is getting the key provided.
At one point, Gronkh was somewhat awkwardly interrupted, as he was gifted many subs:
Gronkh believes: The shitstorm has done a disservice to the matter
How does he see the shitstorm? Gronkh repeatedly emphasizes that he does not see himself as a victim in the shitstorm. Ultimately, those who made this a topic have done a disservice to keeping Hogwarts Legacy down.
Because of the shitstorm, Hogwarts Legacy received enormous attention: For two hours, Hogwarts Legacy was featured on the homepage of the online edition of BILD.
Gronkh also notes that the discussion on Twitter was infiltrated by trolls within a few hours, who pretended to be transgender people under false pretenses and fueled the discussion with provocative statements. Gronkh said he always looks at the timelines of such posters, and often there are indications that they are “right-wing trolls” or “scum trolls”.
At one point, Gronkh says he could not sleep that night, only scrolling through Twitter and seeing how people were writing to each other. It was no longer about him or the topic; people just shouted at each other. He finds that “not productive.”
On the contrary: Gronkh emphasizes that in his stream, they have always strived to discuss things calmly.
Much support, sympathy, and subs for Gronkh
How was the mood in the stream? Gronkh was supported and overwhelmed with positive emotes right from the start of the stream. Even before the stream began, many users on Twitter expressed how much they appreciated Gronkh and how sorry they were about how attacked the streamer seemed.
As during the shitstorm, he received a lot of sympathy.
After Gronkh finished his statement, a massive flood of donated subs flowed into the chat, triggering special effects and alarms repeatedly and interrupting the stream.
Only the Twitch streamer Tanzverbot donated until 19:55 570 subs to Gronkh – that’s over 2,000 €.
Gronkh repeatedly urged the chat to calm down – but the viewers wanted to do something good for him with more and more donations.
With over 42,000 viewers at peak, Gronkh’s stream had about twice as many viewers as usual.
More about the incident:
Twitch: Gronkh asks, “Am I a bad person if I don’t care about J.K. Rowling?” – Trending on Twitter
