Last Friday, an ex-Twitch employee alleged that popular streamer Dr Disrespect was banned from the platform over sending inappropriate messages to a minor. A flurry of statements and speculation happened over the weekend but now Dr Disrespect’s game studio has cut ties to him.
After reviewing the allegations and doing an investigation, Midnight Society, the studio co-founded by Guy Beahm (Dr Disrespect’s legal name), has terminated their relationship with Beahm effective immediately.
Midnight Society spoke with the “parties involved” and decided to cut ties with with Beahm “in order to maintain our principles and standards as a studio and individuals.” To date no comments from Twitch,
“While these facts are difficult to hear and even more difficult to accept, it is our duty to act with dignity on behalf of all individuals involved, especially the fifty-five developers and families we have employed along with our community of players,” the studio said.
The original post from an ex-Twitch employee said: “He got banned because got caught sexting a minor in the then existing Twitch whispers product. He was trying to meet up with her at TwitchCon. The powers that be could read in plain text. Case closed, gang.”
These allegations were corroborated with a report on The Verge who cited other ex-Twitch employees saying the same thing: Dr Disrespect used the Twitch “Whispers” feature to exchange messages “with a minor and initiate a conversation about meeting up at TwitchCon.”
According to the report, a “significant amount of time” had passed since the alleged messages were sent between the two and the conversation being reported to Twitch’s moderation team. Soon after this Dr Disrespect was banned from the platform.
To be clear, no public reason was ever given for Dr Disrespect’s Twitch ban from several years ago, however the streamer promptly threw a lawsuit at the company. Just under a year after that, the lawsuit was quietly settled and nothing seemed to have come from it – though Dr Disrespect never returned to the platform.
To date Dr Disrespect hasn’t denied or confirmed the allegations publicly on social media or on his livestreams – he has been saying very legalese-sounding blurbs like this response to esports commentator Jake Lucky: “Jake seriously… I get it, its a hot topic but this has been settled, no wrongdoing was acknowledged and they paid out the whole contract.”
Dr Disrespect posted a more formal and thorough statement yesterday once again with more legal speak, this time alluding to the settlement he made with Twitch:
“Listen, I’m obviously tied to legal obligations from the settlement with Twitch but I just need to say what I can say since this is the fucking internet,” Dr Disrespect said. “I didn’t do anything wrong, all this has been probed and settled, nothing illegal, no wrongdoing was found, and I was paid.”
Former Call of Duty community manager Robert Bowling, who co-founded Midnight Society with Beahm, said “I’m now aware and I’m dealing with it,” only to promptly clarify he is doing his own investigation: “I […] saw the tweet and immediately began an investigation to learn everything I need to know so I can ensure a full follow through.”
When the Midnight Society’s statement was posted, Beahm was livestreaming Elden Ring for its new Shadow of the Erdtree expansion pack when he got silent for a couple minutes. He then closed out the stream by saying he’s possibly taking a “planned vacation” as he’s feeling “fatigued” and “burnt out.”
Beahm said it might be time for him to “step away” from his online persona and seemingly acknowledged the Midnight Society statement, saying “maybe I step away from there too. Just completely remove myself from the scene. That’s what I need to do.”
