Tag: Video on demand services

Streaming platform Twitch has banned several high-profile Arab streamers for a panel that took place at TwitchCon last month. The banned streamers include CapriSunnPapi, Fr0gan, Raffoulticket, DenimsTV, and Vio (who is not Arab), all of whom took part in a live-streamed panel during day two of TwitchCon San Diego called “Rating Streamers,” where they placed popular Twitch personalities on a tier list of who could or couldn’t say “habibi,” the Arab word for “friend” or “beloved.”

The 30-day bans were handed out seemingly simultaneously and came after days of social media dialogue accusing several Arab and pro-Palestinian Twitch streamers of being antisemitic. A clip of Fr0gan saying that she “hoped” American soldiers got PTSD during a livestream was shared across X (formerly Twitter) and Reddit and commented on by YouTuber Ethan Klein and Steven Kenneth Bonnell II, aka Destiny.

On October 20, Fr0gan issued an apology on X, writing:

the us military has conducted some of the most horrific crimes against humanity in the modern era in countries such as iraq, afghanistan, syria, lebanon, and palestine my anger is directed at individuals who are currently championing these war crimes as if they “liberated” my people. it’s horrific and disgusting. the beginning of the clip was worded poorly and i do apologize for that. i go onto clarify in the clip that i do not mean “all” military, but specifically those with no remorse. what i said was out of frustration as they are currently bombing my family in the name of “liberation”. i realize that wishing people harm isn’t the best way to talk about these issues and that i could have talked about these topics in a more sensitive way.

However, it appears Fr0gan was not banned for what she said on her more recent stream but instead for the Rating Streamers panel from September 21. During the panel in question, the streamers utilized a popular internet meme called a tier list, in which the top of the tier is the “best” or, in this case, the person for whom using “habibi” is most acceptable and the bottom was the least acceptable. At the TwitchCon panel, the tiers were labeled “Arab Coded, Asks Permission, Thinks It’s a Slur, and Loves Sabra,” a reference to Sabra Hummus, a popular brand of hummus manufactured in the United States. The VOD for the entire second day of TwitchCon (which was when Rating Streamers aired) has been removed from the GivePlz Twitch channel, which hosts all of the TwitchCon videos. The video is still available on the Ayyrabs YouTube page.

Fr0gan, Capri, and Raffoul are all Arab (Fr0gan is Muslim, Raffoul is Jewish, and Capri is Christian) and host a podcast called Ayyrabs together. DenimsTV is an Arab woman and Vio is Middle Eastern. Two other streamers who briefly took part in the panel were not Arab or Middle Eastern. They were not banned at the time of publication.

On October 19, Klein posted a video to YouTube titled “Twitch Has a Major Problem” in which he said that panel was “kinda Arab good, Jew bad,” because Sabra is a “very popular Hummus brand” in Israel that is “the subject of [a] pro-Palestine boycott.” He also shared a clip from the panel in which Denims jokingly says that Klein deserved his own category for “Zionist.” Then, on a live-stream on YouTube today, October 20, Klein discussed Fr0gan, the “Tier List,” Twitch CEO Dan Clancy, and Hasan “Hasanabi” Piker, another noted political streamer who used to host a show with Klein before the two had a falling out. The livestream was titled “Dan Clancy Must Resign As Twitch CEO.”

The ban wave (which also appeared to include a permanent ban of popular streamer Sneako, who Klein mentioned in his October 19 YouTube video as an example of someone who should not have been allowed to return to Twitch) occurred while Klein was streaming. “30 day ban for saying people like bottom of the barrel hummus but other people get 2 WEEKS for advocating for the genocide of palestinians. got it,” Fr0gan posted on X after the bans were announced, referring to Twitch banning streamer Zack “Asmongold” Hoyt for 14 days after he said that Muslim people come from “an inferior culture” and that he’s “not going to cry a fucking river when people who have genocide that’s baked into their laws are getting genocided” on a recent stream.

Capri also reacted to his ban, writing, “Ngl I’m gonna take a few days off and I’m going back live and ranking hummus just to prove a point. #hummusgate” on X.

Before the ban but during the heat of the online dialogue about the alleged antisemitism of the panel, Raffoul, who is Jewish, wrote on X, “These fucks are so anti semitic I’m the one who made the list on ‘who can say habibi’ and they try and spin this as ‘Frogan ranking people from Arab to Jew’ keep Jews out your fucking mouth.”

On October 21, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) shared on X that it had spoken with Twitch staff “after becoming aware of several concerning incidents on the social media platform and/or involving Twitch streamers in the past week.”

“We appreciate @Twitch making the right decision to finally suspend the streamer Frogan for abusing her platform and the @TwitchCon event to spread antisemitic vitriol during this time of intense apprehension for the Jewish community,” the official ADL account posted in a thread. “@Twitch must learn from this situation and improve how they address antisemitism and hate on their platform, which is an ongoing and significant challenge.”

It is unclear why Twitch chose to issue a ban for a panel that took place a month ago, the contents of which the company was aware of, Kotaku has confirmed. During TwitchCon 2024, the company emphasized that the platform was “no place for hateful conduct” after announcing new changes and advancements to its ban policies.

Kotaku reached out to the ADL and Twitch for comment and will update this story accordingly.

Update: 10/21/2024 at 11:20 p.m. ET: Updated story with more context regarding Sneako ban.

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