Esports caster Semmler under fire for ‘transphobic’ comments on ESL Impact post

Auguste “Semmler” Massonnat has come under fire on social media for posting comments that the community has called transphobic on an ESL Impact post.

ESL Impact, a CS2 women’s league, put out a post on December 3 highlighting its best players from the Season 4 regular season. Lucy ’empathy’ Verkaik, a transwoman was the highest-rated player from the season.

Semmler, a multi-esports caster best known for his work in Counter-Strike, pounced on the post, saying “In this case, I think it would be best if we lacked empathy. Didn’t take long, did it?”

Now, the esports community, other broadcast professionals, and players have again called him out for the post.

Esports community calls Semmler ‘transphobic’

One day after this comment, another X (formerly Twitter) user commented on his original post with a photo of comments that empathy received on social media after Semmler’s original post.

Semmler doubled down on those comments, saying “Good. The men competing in this female league should feel deeply ashamed for taking opportunities away from the women striving to compete in it. Considering the backlash one gets when commenting on this topic, it isn’t surprising to see no pushback from the women in the league.”

empathy responded to Semmler’s post by talking about her experience competing as a trans person in esports.

“I come out and everyone makes fun of me every game, my ex-teammates block me and call me slurs, I can’t play without random people throwing and making fun of me. I play ESL Impact and I’m the enemy and ‘I should be ashamed and kill myself’ for it. It doesn’t matter what I do the problem is I’m ugly and trans. Like genuinely what do people want me to do? Maybe if ‘mixed teams’ wouldn’t call me a “f****t” when I ask to play with them things would be different,” she said.

Former Cloud9 White Valorant player, and now full-time streamer, Annie ‘Annie’ Roberts also commented on Semmler’s post claiming the caster doesn’t care about women’s leagues in the first place.

“Esport Transphobes love to parrot this idea as if they ever cared about women’s esports. They don’t, they just hate trans people more,” she said.

Other esports casters and broadcast professionals have also commented on Semmler’s post.

Jennifer ‘LemonKiwi’ Pichette, a multi-esports caster, said she would be cleaning up her follow list and that “Transphobia does not belong in esports.”

Frankie Ward, a long-time Counter-Strike interviewer and presenter, said in a post that Semmler is feigning concern for the league over the wrong issues.

“Every so often someone who doesn’t care about ESL Impact decides to use feigned concern to make trans women feel unwelcome rather than actually focusing on the important issues like regional slots and the removal of Katowice from the Impact calendar,” she said.

This is not the first time the caster has been accused of being transphobic and he has pushed forward the idea that transwomen are stealing spots in women’s esports leagues about a year ago.

While industry professionals have called out the caster, he still has fans who support his position on the issue and his comments on transwomen in women’s esports events.

The esports caster has not worked on a Counter-Strike broadcast in some time according to his Liqupedia page with the 2021 Blast Premier Fall Finals as his last gig listed. He is currently a member of the podcast network Last Free Nation and appears on their streams and shows.