5 biggest streamer controversies in 2022 so far
2022 has been an eventful year for live streamers so far, and the year isn't even halfway through. Twitch itself hasn't necessarily stopped handing out ban hammers for either, whether it be for bad behavior or just to save face. Read on for in-depth explanations of recent controversies revolving around fan-favorite streamers and internet personalities so far.
Trigger warning: Mentions of s*xual assault, animal abuse, racism, and misogyny.
Top 5 streamer controversies of 2022 so far
5) Pokimane, Disguised Toast and many others hit with DMCA strikes
The TV meta has existed on Twitch for quite some time, but the budding live streamer platform has gotten not-so-friendly about bending the rules. Pokimane was caught streaming Avatar: The Last Airbender to her viewers mid-stream, and instantly received a 48-hour ban for breaking Twitch TOS and copyright laws.
Jeremy "Disguised Toast" Wang was also among others caught and banned for streaming anime shows like Death Note to his viewers. But to him, it was more of a game rather than purely just an accident.
After returning to Twitch post-ban, he was clipped explaining what was originally his brilliant master plan to scare people off of purposely breaking DMCA laws. Toast messaged good friend and fellow OfflineTV member Lily "Lilypichu" Ki, requesting her to file a DMCA strike on his channel.
Luckily, it was discovered that Lily never ended up going through with the decision to file a fake claim (which is illegal) and that Toast was temporarily banned within his own rights.
4) SkyDoesMinecraft
YouTube creator Adam "SkyDoesMinecraft" Dahlberg was accused of s*xual assault, among other things by their former girlfriend Elizabeth at the end of January.
The latter took to Twitter and posted an iCloud document to her Twitter account composed of receipts and screenshots of her less-than-satisfactory experiences with her now ex-partner.
But the narrative didn't end there. Since then, Elizabeth's story has elicited a conversation and more accusations against the Minecraft streamer have come out of the woodwork.
One individual story came from Dahlberg's own ex-wife, Alesa. Dahlberg was eventually revealed to be a serial abuser who had also committed several instances of emotional and even animal abuse.
The individual stories can be read here.
3) xQc and the Streamer Awards
The first-ever Streamer Awards, hosted by YouTuber Blaire "QTCinderella," was definitely one for the books. But what's a good award show without a little drama? Many fans agreed with several of the category winners, except for one — Streamer of the Year.
Four notable streamers were nominated for the award: Popular content creators Ludwig Ahgren, Sykkuno, Matthew "Mizkif" Rinaudo, and Félix "xQc" Lengyel. And the lattermost did not seem too pleased that the former made the cut.
In a now-deleted tweet that he claimed to have accidentally tweeted out, xQc wrote:
“OF COURSE I’M NOT UPSET I DIDN’T WIN. IT’S A FUN IN-HOUSE EVENT. I JUST WISH SOME OF THE BIGGEST, MORE MAIN STRB,"
Seemingly innocuous, the Canadian Twitch streamer cranked up the pettiness and wrote how he is relieved that he didn't overspend on an event that he didn't even win an award in.
Fans alleged that the voting was 'rigged,' given the fact that 30% of the votes came from the streamers themselves. Ludwig is currently in a relationship with QTCinderella, so that of course left a lot of room for speculation about whether the voting process was fair or not.
At the same time, many came to Ludwig's defense against claims that he urged his fans to vote via his campaign, while xQc did not do the same. Whether Ludwig deserved to win Streamer of the Year over any of the other nominees is completely subjective.
2) IShowSpeed
The most recent controversy revolves around Darren "IShowSpeed" Watkins, a 17-year-old YouTuber notoriously known for his type of streams and pretty supportive fanbase. In the following clip, IShowSpeed was clipped making misogynistic remarks towards a fellow teammate during a competitive VALORANT match.
The clip went viral on Twitter, and a Riot dev reached out to comment about banning IShowSpeed from VALORANT as well as other Riot games in order to maintain a safer environment for gamers of all marginalized genders as well as to preserve an image for their community itself.
Many considered this an improvement within the toxic playerbase, but many fans pointed out the hypocrisy of the notion given that there were multiple instances in which IShowSpeed was lambasted just for being black.
Fans were quick to bring up a clip in which he was playing as Phoenix, one of the only two black characters in VALORANT, and he asked his teammates how to heal himself. They did not respond well.
At the end of the day, two wrongs don't make a right and both behaviors are just as condemnable. IShowSpeed has since apologized for his actions, yet remains banned from his platform to this day.
1) Pokimane gets hate-raided by JiDion as Ninja and others get involved
During a mid-January stream, Twitch star Imane "Pokimane" Anys's chat was suddenly spammed with hate. What was originally confused for a bot spam turned out to be a hate raid sent by fellow streamer Jidon "JiDion," who was eventually convicted of doing so in the name of blatant misogyny.
The fiasco garnered a lot of attention, and Twitch eventually slammed a permanent ban hammer on JiDion. But the story didn't end there, and sexism still prevailed. JiDion fans flocked to popular content creator Richard "Ninja" Blevins's chat, essentially begging for him to reverse the ban. Pokimane posted the clip to her Twitter account below.
Both Ninja and his wife and manager Jessica Blevins reached out and accused Pokimane of character defamation, as well as threatened to sue. Pokimane showed the DMs from Ninja on stream, in which he told her she was making a "big mistake."
Despite never apologizing to Pokimane, Ninja and Jessica eventually backed off after admitting to their empty threats. And here's the alternate ending no one expected: Pokimane and JiDeon have a collab.
Their dispute finally ended once JiDion personally reached out to Pokimane and they resolved their issues one-on-one, as revealed by a sixteen-minute YouTube video posted on his channel titled Pushing P with Pokimane.
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