Asmongold slapped down for racist tirade

Content warning for hate speech in the paragraphs ahead.

All this builds on decades of Israeli containment of and intervention within Gaza, which a United Nations special rapporteur hasargued is a form of apartheid. The UN have repeatedlycondemned Israel’s killing of civilians, together with the atrocities carried out by Hamas, who are stillholding a number of Israelis hostage. Back in March this year, another UN special rapporteurarguedthat there are “reasonable grounds” for defining Israel’s current operations in Gaza as genocide.

Asmongold appears to agree that Israel’s actions are genocide, but he seemingly thinks the Palestinians deserve it, based on his own, sweepingly racist assessments of Islam and of Palestinian culture.

“If you want to consider it genocide as a systematic killing of a group of people, they have genocide built into Sharia law right now,” Asmongold said during the stream, as preserved byPCGamer. “So no, I’m not going to cry a fucking river when people who have genocide that’s baked into their laws are getting genocided. I don’t give a fuck. They’re terrible people. It’s not even a question. It’s crazy that people don’t see it that way. They’d be doing the same thing.

“These people are not your allies,” he went on. “They’re not the same as us. They come from an inferior culture that is horrible. It kills people for their identity, and it is directly antithetical to everything Western values stand for, and it is an inferior culture in all ways. It is that simple. No, I don’t feel bad for them, I don’t feel sorry for them, I don’t care.”

All of this is a clear infringement of Twitch’s ban on hate speech. Here’s an excerpt from theircommunity guidelines: “Twitch does not permit behaviour that is motivated by hatred, prejudice or intolerance, including behaviour that promotes or encourages discrimination, denigration, harassment, or violence based on the following protected characteristics: race, ethnicity, colour, caste, national origin, immigration status, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, serious medical condition, and veteran status.”

Naturally, a number of people have lodged complaints about Asmongold’s tirade. And of course, he has now apologised. “Looking back on it, I was way too much of an asshole about the Palestine thing,” he wrote onXitter, adding “my bad” and “of course no one deserves to have their life destroyed even if they do things or have views I find regressive”. In conclusion, “you guys deserve more than me saying stupid shit like that, I’ll do better”.

Twitch’s ban only applies to Asmongold’s secondary “Zackrawrr” account, but it also means he can’t stream via his primary account either. However, he’s still free to publish videos on Youtube, where he has about 4.85 million combined subscribers. Asmongold himself hasreportedly earned many millions from Twitch, more than enough on paper to ride out any temporary suspension of service.

As Asmongold’s colleague TipsOutBabyhas discussed on Twitter, referencing his own experience as a Muslim and child of Syrian immigrants, Asmongold’s comments reflect long-established patterns of “calculated dehumanization” that create the conditions for bloodshed, consisting of the same language that is “used to justify wanton violence, genocide, and the destruction of our universal brotherhood”. You’d think all that would warrant more than two weeks in the wilds. We asked Twitch for comment about all this yesterday - they haven’t responded.