Ex-Twitch Employee Claims Dr. Disrespect Knew He Was Sending Sexually Explicit Messages to Minor

More information has been reported about the 2020 Twitch ban of Guy Beahm, also known as popular streamer Dr Disrespect, with a Thursday report from Rolling Stone including new details from a former Twitch employee.

As Beahm said in his lengthy statement earlier this week, he exchanged messages in 2017 with a minor through Twitch’s now-defunct Whispers feature that “sometimes leaned too much toward the inappropriate.” Now, the former Twitch employee claims that the minor informed Beahm that they were underage, and that Beahm continued to send them “sexually explicit” messages, according to Rolling Stone.

“There was no confusion,” the former Twitch employee said. “The messages sent after this was acknowledged were no less explicit and sexually explicit than before, and I think that’s more than the ‘leans too much towards inappropriate’ categorization would indicate.”

The former employee also detailed Twitch’s internal response to Whispers posts once the initial report about them was filed in 2020. They said the decision to permanently ban Beahm from the platform was made “relatively quickly, due to the seriousness of the behavior.

Additionally, the employee revealed that Twitch created an incident response team named “Gold Sparrow” to take action on allegations of sexual misconduct by streamers after a number of them occurred in June 2020.

Twitch and Beahm did not respond to IGN’s request for comment on Rolling Stone’s report. Twitch has not publicly commented on the revelations that have emerged about the 2020 ban in recent days.

While YouTube, where Beahm currently streams, has also not commented on the situation, former Google global head of gaming partnerships Ryan Wyatt told Rolling Stone that Beahm was not offered a deal with YouTube due to rumors surrounding the ban. YouTube employees, he said, were told the ban was for inappropriate messages with a minor.

The situation was reignited last Friday after former Twitch employee Cody Conners wrote on X/Twitter that Beahm was banned almost exactly four years ago for “sexting” a minor and was trying to meet him at TwitchCon (Disclosure: Conners briefly worked at IGN in 2011. While Conners did not name Beahm in his post, it has been confirmed in various reports that he was referring to the popular streamer, as further details have emerged over the past week.

Rolling Stone’s source added that it was Conners’ post that “definitely got the ball rolling” when it came to other former Twitch employees speaking out in previous reports on The Verge and Bloomberg.

Beahm responded to Conners’ post and subsequent reports with a number of statements, the most substantial of which came Tuesday via X/Twitter. While admitting in that statement that his conversations with the minor “should never have happened,” he added, “Nothing illegal happened, no photos were shared, no crime was committed, I never even met the individual.” He also pointed to his 2021 lawsuit against Twitch over the ban, which was “resolved” in 2022.

A number of brands and partners severed ties with Beahm following the revelations, including Turtle Beach, 2K and the San Francisco 49ers. Midnight Society, the game studio Beahm co-founded, also ended its relationship with him after its own investigation into the allegations.

Thumbnail credit: David Becker/Getty Images

Alex Stedman is a Senior News Editor at IGN, overseeing entertainment coverage. When she’s not writing or editing, you can find her reading fantasy novels or playing Dungeons & Dragons.