Rumors have circulated since 2020 regarding the reason for Guy 'Dr Disrespect' Beahm's abrupt ban from Twitch. This week, allegations came to light that caused Midnight Society, a development team he helped set up, to sever ties with Beahm. Earlier today, peripheral manufacturer Turtle Beach also ended its long-running partnership with the streamer. Now, in a statement made on X, Beahm has addressed the allegations.
Beahm's now-edited statement directly addresses the reason for his Twitch ban, a subject he'd previously remained largely silent on. "Everyone has been wanting to know why I was banned from twitch, but for reasons outside of my control, I was not allowed to say anything for the last several years," the post reads. "Now that two former twitch employees have publicly disclosed the accusations, I can now tell you my side of the story regarding the ban."
"Were there twitch whisper messages with an individual back in 2017? The answer is yes," Beahm confirms. "Were there real intentions behind these messages, the answer is absolutely not. These were casual, mutual conversations that sometimes leaned too much in the direction of being inappropriate, but nothing more. Nothing illegal happened, no pictures were shared, no crimes were committed, I never even met the individual. I went through a lengthy arbitration regarding a civil dispute with twitch and that case was resolved by a settlement."
Notably, Beahm has edited his statement since posting, which originally confirmed "twitch whisper messages with an individual minor." As you can see in the screenshot below, this has since been changed to remove any reference to the individual's age.
The statement ends on a note implying that Beahm will return to streaming after a break. "I'm not fucking going anywhere. I'm not the same guy that made this mistake all those years ago. I'm taking an extended vacation with my family as mentioned on stream and I'm coming back with a heavy weight off my shoulders."
This current situation began to develop late last week. On Saturday, June 22, Cody Conners, a former director of strategic partnerships at Twitch, took to X to post about an individual widely believed to be Beahm. The streamer was suddenly removed from the platform in 2020, with few details publicly released over the intervening years. "He got banned because [he] 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," posts Connors. "Case closed, gang." Earlier today, a Bloomberg report featuring several people with knowledge of the matter confirmed that Conners' comments related to Beahm.
On Monday, June 24, the game developer founded in part by Beahm, Midnight Society, followed up on the allegations by formally removing the streamer from the company. "On Friday evening we became aware of an allegation against one of our co-founder's [sic] Guy Beahm aka Dr Disrespect," the post on X reads. "We assumed his innocence and began speaking with parties involved. And in order to maintain our principles and standards as a studio and individuals, we needed to act. For this reason, we are terminating our relationship with Guy Beahm immediately."
Turtle Beach has also since ended its long-running partnership with the streamer.