The streaming platform Twitch permanently banned a professional Valorant player because her child wrote in the chat. This is prohibited. However, the circumstances of the ban were so devastating that a wave of outrage broke out, and Twitch felt compelled to lift the ban.
Which streamer is involved? The 21-year-old Taynah Yukimi is a professional player in the shooter Valorant. She lives in São Paulo, Brazil, and competes for the team INTZ Angels, which consists solely of women. Brazil is probably the country worldwide where women play the most significant role in e-sports and gaming.
Under the name “Tayhuhu,” Taynah Yukimi mainly streams Valorant on Twitch. She has gradually managed to establish herself on the platform in recent months. At the moment, she has about 33,000 followers.
What kind of ban was that? The streamer was permanently banned from Twitch because her young daughter interacted with her chat unsupervised. This is against Twitch rules.
Streamer was finally able to earn money for her family
This is what the streamer said: Over Twitter, the Valorant streamer described her situation in Portuguese, completely distraught. Everything she had worked for for months crumbled in an instant.
Taynah Yukimi says:
- She had streamed for a year in front of 5, 10, or 20 viewers to get her channel going
- Now she finally has 300 live viewers, and the channel is growing – and now she is getting banned
- Her father is in Japan to earn money. He had to leave his wife and granddaughter behind. The family apparently needs every real urgently
- She has been trying hard as a streamer to contribute to the family and was finally close to her goal
- Now Twitch permanently bans her just because her young daughter appeared, saw the chat, and typed something while she was in the kitchen making food to “put food in their bellies”
- No one at Twitch is responding to her now; she can’t create an account, can’t do anything; her world is falling apart
As a Brazilian, the 21-year-old wrote entirely in all-caps and adorned her message with plenty of strong language. It was very emotional.
There was also a video in which she appeared defeated, sad, and desperate.
Many are outraged by Twitch’s ban of the streamer
This was the reaction: The story of Tay Yukimi touched many users in Brazil. The posts on Twitter received several thousand likes. The story also spilled over to the West. In the English-speaking Twitch community, the ban policy has long been a topic of discussion: The streamer Alinity once accidentally exposed part of her breast and Twitch only banned her for 24 hours. Other streamers receive permanent bans, and no one knows why.
The YouTube channel “Esports Talk” covered the case of the Brazilian streamer (via youtube). A permanent ban is entirely disproportionate. They cited as a counterexample a Twitch streamer who was banned for only 3 days despite streaming completely naked.
When it comes to bans, the context must always be considered, as Twitch itself emphasizes: Even though it is against Twitch rules for minors to interact with the chat, that was certainly not the intention in this case. The child simply saw people writing in the chat and interacted with it. That isn’t so severe.
Also, Rod Breslau, a more influential e-sports journalist with a large Twitter account, spread the story. Once again, the ban caused confusion among many users. Twitch’s behavior was found to be inexplicable. The streaming platform has been constantly under criticism lately due to issues with the music industry.
This is how Twitch reacted: The streamer was unbanned from Twitch without comment.
Tayhuhu thanked her fans on Twitter and posted a photo of herself and her daughter. In her first stream, she had almost 2,000 viewers – significantly more than her previous record of 300 at the time she was banned.
The story that began so tragically and tearfully seems to have a happy ending. It is noticeable how often Twitch seems to react to “pressure from outside.” Recently, Twitch banned the streamer Forsen for showing a prohibited image, although that was clearly not his intention. Also, the ban will likely be lifted after Christmas.
In any case, the example of the Brazilian streamer with her daughter shows that the global community has the ability to prompt Twitch to rethink, which could set a precedent.
Ban was probably due to the child’s nudity
Update 22.12., 20:23: The situation has now turned out to be a bit different in hindsight. The streamer assumed she was banned because her daughter interacted with the chat unsupervised.
Now she has learned from Twitch that her channel was banned for violating the “nudity rules”: For accidental nudity.
The streamer believes this must be because her daughter takes off her shirt in the high temperatures in Brazil. However, the streamer denied that her daughter was completely naked. She would have been wearing shorts or diapers.
There have been discussions for years about Twitch’s ban policy, particularly regarding female streamers. For example, in 2019, the streamer Quoqco was banned for a cosplay as Chun-Li. She believed at that time that trolls had targeted her.
Twitch bans streamer for cosplay as Chun-Li – She finds it unfair
