Hugely popular Twitch streamer Guy Beahm, known on the platform as “Dr DisRespect,” was recently banned from Twitch and had his E3 badge revoked after he broadcasted live from a public bathroom at the games industry convention. The ban was implemented on June 11, but just two weeks later Beahm is back on Twitch.
Beahm's account returned to Twitch late on Tuesday night, but the stream remained offline. Fans noticed immediately and began flooding the chat with emotes and subscription notices, despite the stream being offline. The chat has remained active throughout the night and into the morning, though Beahm has yet to make an appearance.
Beahm hasn’t tweeted about returning to Twitch, but the streamer has retweeted multiple fans in the last 15 hours expressing excitement about his suspension ending. Beahm did not immediately respond to VICE's request for comment.
Streaming from a public bathroom in Los Angeles appears to have created hype for the streamer, despite it likely being a violation of California's privacy laws, if the still-active Twitch chat is any indication.
In the lead-up to his return, Beahm made posts that could be interpreted as ginning up excitement. On June 21, Beahm tweeted a 30 second video of his head bobbing around à la the DVD Video screensaver. Days later, on June 24, he posted an image of "renovations" for an imaginary "Champions Club," which is the designation for Beahm's Twitch subscribers. The image appears to be a nod to the bathroom incident—it's set in a locker room—with a sign on the wall that prohibits photography and filming beyond a certain point.
The hype echoes Beahm's return to Twitch after taking time off in 2017. Beahm left Twitch for a short period after stating on-camera that he'd cheated on his wife. He returned after almost two months and hit 389,000 concurrent viewers, breaking a record at that time.
Twitch doesn't outline in detail how it determines suspension or ban length for violations against its terms of service (TOS). Breaking the law is against Twitch’s TOS, and the "unauthorized sharing of private information" is, too. Specifically, this means that "sharing content that violates another’s reasonable expectation of privacy, for example streaming from a private space, without permission" is against the rules. Presumably, this would make streaming random people’s trip to the bathroom a violation of Twitch’s policies.
A large-scale return to Twitch after a violation of this kind sets a disturbing precedent about what's acceptable on the platform, which has been criticized for inconsistent enforcement of its rules. In December, a Fortnite streamer was arrested and banned for assaulting his girlfriend on stream. The streamer, Luke "MrDeadMoth" Munday, had his stream reinstated after two weeks before it went offline again later in the week.
Twitch spokespeople were not immediately available to respond to VICE's request for comment.
Beahm has not said if or when he'll return to Twitch with his first stream after the ban's apparent lifting, but many fans expect it to be soon, judging from excitement in the Twitch chat.
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