Twitch has frequently been criticized for its seemingly inconsistent moderation policies, with various streamers getting banned for no reason or streamers who should get banned supposedly getting special treatment. One example of the former is Twitch streamer Viperous getting banned for saying “Nerd,” and the latter seems to happen with big-time streamers. At these moments, there are usually viewers calling for the streamer to be banned.
Twitch CEO Emmett Shear recently explained that, mistaken decisions aside, bans come down to context and intent. Yet, that still doesn’t always seem to be the case, as many feel that some streamers are exempt from context and intent. However, this isn’t always a bad thing, with at least one streamer on this list getting called to be banned for an just reason. Here are just a few times that viewers wanted a streamer banned, but it didn’t happen.
Sweet Anita
Sweet Anita is the streamer whose call to be banned by viewers seems to be unjust and unfair, as it relates to her medical condition: Tourette Syndrome. During a stream, she said some seriously offensive things during a tic that would easily get others banned, but the main difference here is that Sweet Anita has no control over what she says during a tic. She also addressed the fact that her audience inadvertently or intentionally promotes this sort of tic with the way they approach her condition. Either way, Twitch is well aware of her condition, so no ban came as a result.
Alinity
Alinity is no stranger to controversy when it comes to her pets. During a stream of Apex Legends, she is seen lifting her cat by both hands and throwing it over her head. This incident led viewers to dig up past occurrences, like when she shared vodka with her cat. Because of all this, a massive petition arose online calling for her to banned for her actions, and even PETA seemed to make a statement about this. Despite the outcry, however, Alinity was never banned from Twitch.
Amouranth
Amouranth has been banned before after a wardrobe mishap, but that saw her come back with quite a few more follower. Some were bots, so exact numbers can’t be verified, but she had a large influx of viewers upon her return from said ban. Many argue that this type of attention only begs for more controversy for Amouranth, with an incident taking place after the fact where she was clearly violating Twitch rules. It appears that she was checking chat on her phone while driving in a IRL stream, which is clearly against the ToS. However, nothing came of this.
Tfue
A quickfire way to flame a fanbase and get viewers calling for a ban is to say a racial slur. Understandably, this is a big issue and has been banned several times, even if Twitch takes into consideration context and intent. Several viewers have said various slurs and been banned, while streamers like Ninja who said it during a song didn’t seen the banhammer. Unlike Ninja, though, Tfue has dropped a couple of slurs in stream where the context would suggest a ban is appropriate.
His latest was just a few months back during a stream of Minecraft. Viewers quickly rallied and called for Tfue to be banned, yet this never came to be. Tfue did take a hiatus shortly after that, and while it doesn’t necessarily seem to be related, it may have influenced the decision some.
Alinity…Again
Alinity finds herself on this list again, as the drama centered around her pets recently took a new turn. During a recent stream, she was performing yoga, while her dog decided to sniff her groin. This was a bad situation for her, as she couldn’t use her foot on the dog to even move him away as it would lead to cries of animal abuse, but the overall situation itself didn’t look good. In fact, people said Alinity should be banned for it, despite a scientific reasoning provided. It’s a strange scenario, but not one that resulted in a ban.
