It's been four years since Herschel "Guy" Beahm, better known as Dr Disrespect, was mysteriously banned from Twitch. After signing a multi-year deal with the streaming platform in March 2020, he was banned just one month later.
Twitch offered no specific reason for the ban, other than a generic statement that they take action when they have "evidence that a streamer has acted in violation of our Community Guidelines or Terms of Service." On the same day, Discord also removed Dr Disrespect from their partnership program, citing violations of its Code of Conduct. Beahm maintained that he was never given a reason for his bans.
In 2022, Beahm and Twitch announced that they had resolved their legal dispute with neither party admitting to any wrongdoing.
That was thought to be the end of the entire ordeal as Dr Disrespect found a new home on YouTube.
However, just this week, former Twitch director of strategic partnerships Cody Conners alleged on social media that the reason for Dr Disrespect's ban was that he had inappropriately messaged a minor through the platform's now defunct Whispers messaging feature and attempted to meet with her at TwitchCon.
Beahm quickly took to social media to respond to the allegations, denying that he did anything wrong but also claiming he couldn't comment in too much detail due to legal obligations from the settlement.
Beahm returned to his Dr Disrespect persona today but it was shortlived. He briefly addressed the allegations, and all was seemingly fine until he seemed to get a bit of bad news mid-stream After glancing at his phone, an uneasy-looking Beahm announced that he was stepping away from streaming and the gaming industry.
"Over the years it's been drained out of me, been drained out of my family and I," Beahm said, noting that he's been livestreaming since 2009. "And I just feel like—I had the mindset of, let's just see what happens today, how we're feeling. And I'll tell you, I'm just feeling burned out. Maybe it's time to start something new, something different. Challenge those creative senses. A desire to explore different realms, if you will."
Beahm stated that he had a planned vacation coming up and that he "might just extend that, starting today, starting right now."
"When I say step away, I think—I mean I'm gonna have to relay this to the Midnight Society, but I, you know—maybe I step away from there too," he concluded. "Just completely remove myself from the scene. It's what I need to do."
Midnight Society, the game studio that Beahm co-founded, announced shortly afterward that it terminated its relationship with him, effective immediately.
At this point, we don't know what comes next, if anything. Will any additional investigations be conducted? Dr Disrespect's most loyal fans have seemingly stuck by him, claiming that there is no proof he did anything illegal. Still, it's understandable why Midnight Society would want to distance itself from these sort of allegations.