On December 15th, 2016, Twitch announced the IRL channel, a place for streamers to “share your thoughts, opinions, feelings, and everyday life”. The blog post focused on how you could use this to discuss and share events with your community, but I saw something different. The word that stuck out to me was “opinions”.
On November 8th, 2016, an incredibly long election campaign came to a surprising end (not to some) with Trump winning. During the 18 month long campaign, America was bombarded from all sides with negative ads, talking heads, and generally shoddy journalism. People’s trust in media is at an all time low as a result. Even the most politically active people I knew were just excited that the election would be over and we could all move on. But as news of President-elect Trump’s cabinet choices came out and his first month in office, it’s become clear that this wouldn’t be the case.
So, when Twitch announced IRL, a place where the focus was on the world around us, it was a no-brainer to me to put these together. As of writing this story, though, I’m the only one.
As a bit of backstory about me, I had done some streaming in the past, mostly just League of Legends and speedruns of Outlast and Mega Man X. Never took it too seriously because my work schedule was all over the place and didn’t allow much time for streaming. I got frustrated at this eventually because I wanted to do more, so I started doing YouTube, focusing on gaming at first and then some rants. Then more rants. Talking about political and social issues. Started growing a small following. Come December, I had a better work schedule and a recent breakup allowed for a much more open streaming calendar.
On December 18th, I went live doing a show about real topics, in this case minimalism (something I love), a recent article that argued that the newly released Mario Run game was sexist, and the scandal around the leaked John Podesta emails. I called it, The IRL Show. I’ve been doing it 3 or 4 times a week since.
The premise of The IRL Show is simple: We talk about all of the things that get you banned in other channels. Politics, culture, religion, racism, sexism, homophobia, you name it. If people have feelings about it, we talk about it. I encourage everyone watching to participate, especially if they don’t agree with me. I’ll cover a story and present all of the facts on the issue first, then give my opinion on the matter, and during that time I’ll address any questions in the chat. Think I’m wrong about something? I want you to tell me so we can hash it out. Did I get a fact wrong? Show me a source that says something different and we’ll discuss it, or I’ll just correct it.
There’s only one rule in The IRL Show: Be ready to openly discuss your viewpoint. If you want to say your opinion, and either I or someone in the chat disagrees, you better be ready to be challenged. You’ll need to provide citations on claims. And on matters where there may not be hard facts, like religion, you better be able to discuss it intelligently. But if you aren’t able to openly discuss, or need to resort to name calling to prove your point, then meet Mr. Banhammer. He’s unforgiving.
Now, you would think that opening my show up to these controversial topics would mean I deal with a TON of trolls. I mean, every other streamer puts a ban on these topics for a reason, right? The truth is, I’ve been lucky so far. Between me and my mods, we’ve banned about 10 people thus far. Granted, my reach isn’t massive yet, as I’m averaging high 20s, low 30s in viewers. But I’ve also learned how to use trolls. Let’s say a troll comes in and just shouts “MAGA” at everything, blindly pro-Trump. No big deal, just ask them to defend their statements. When they fail to, and just shout “MAGA”, you ban them, but then I’ll argue their point better. I’ll provide them with what they should have said from their perspective, then argue against that. Am I helping this troll learn? Probably not. But I’m not out to help them. I’m out to help everyone willing to listen. To understand where a Trump supporter is coming from, and why you may disagree with them. Or, on the flip side, understand where a Clinton supporter was coming from, and where you may disagree with them.
Here’s my major takeaways to give to my fellow streamers about my experience:
- Try something different. Twitch is changing constantly. The Twitch audience is changing constantly, and so is their attention. Don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone and try something nobody else is doing. Maybe it won’t work. Maybe it will. You never know until you give it a shot
- Make sure your mods know your expectations. Modding The IRL Show is tricky. When someone new comes in, we give them the benefit of the doubt when possible. A lot of people are used to being defensive when they discuss their beliefs, especially with politics. The right and the left are nasty and vicious at times, so we like to give people a bit of time to adjust to that. So my mods (who are amazing, btw) and I had to talk about how much leniency we’ll give and where the line is.
- We NEED to be having these conversations. Twitch is a massive market full of young people. AGDQ, SGDQ, and many other charity events show the enormous opportunity for good that Twitch can do, but understanding our world, being active in the things we believe in, and making sure our votes are educated is critically important. Given the historically low approval ratings of the mainstream media and the government, we need new sources of information so we can put in power people who share our beliefs and goals. We can’t do that without knowing what’s happening right now. Every time I go live with The IRL Show, I say it’s the “only news show on Twitch”. I want that to change. I want a more conservative version of The IRL Show. I want a more liberal version. I want a Europe-centered version, I want an Asia-centered version. But so many streamers are just too afraid of upsetting people that they stay quiet. This fear is only true if you don’t have a strong community that is willing to support you, and it also is what leads to indifference, which is what leads to our situation in this country now.
- I needed to have these conversations. When I registered to vote at the age of 18, I registered as a Republican (I’m in Florida, which is a closed primary state, so this is important). I had held on to that identity proudly, despite the fact that I’ve hated almost everything the GOP has done in the last 16 years. I’ve never voted for a Republican nominee for President in the general election, but I still believe in smaller government and more empowering of individuals. In the last few years, I’ve changed some, realizing that universal healthcare is the morally and economically right thing to do, that our military budget is excessive, etc., but I still maintained I was a Republican. That is until recently, with the creation of the Justice Democrats and the conversations about political identity we’ve had on Twitch, I’ve started the process of changing my affiliation. This experience has increased my awareness of what’s happening and helped reinforce my personal identity.
The IRL Show has helped me grow as an individual, it’s built up my community in size, but most importantly to me, I’ve heard many stories from them that they’ve learned new things about events that the headlines hadn’t shown them, or that one source they read didn’t touch on. The amount of support I’ve received from viewers and fellow streamers alike has been so much more than I expected, and I’m incredibly grateful. It reinforces my belief that I’m right about this project. There is an audience on Twitch that wants a break from the levity most streamers trade in. I’m not saying imaqtpie should have to do a serious show, unless he wants to (hit up my DMs if you want, qt), but there’s room for truly meaningful change coming from Twitch. If you do want to start up a show, I’d love to help in any way I can, and I encourage you to use the Community TheNews if you do. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you on the next one.
