Eric Hansen has spoken out against GM Hikaru amid the ongoing Twitch chess drama and explained how Chessbae “manipulated” Alexandra Botez into not seeing him.
On April 12, Chess Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura issued an apology after Eric Hansen’s Chessbrah’s YouTube channel was hit with copyright strikes by Chessbae – a member of his community and former Chess.com moderator.
While Hikaru may have attempted to clear the air and even requested Hansen speak with him privately about the situation, the Chessbrah took to Twitch to explain why the apology doesn’t hold much weight.
In a long and emotional broadcast, Hansen delved into how the strikes against his channel were allegedly premeditated, how Chessbae was completely against how he and Alexandra Botez would spend time together, and how he can never co-exist with her or Hikaru again.
“For the personal life manipulation and then the business side, there’s nothing that works. It’s gone way too far,” he explained, noting that he feels more comfortable speaking out now that he’s built a strong viewership and others have spoken out too.
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“Hikaru, in his own position, has tried to get prominent members of the chess community canceled through his name and push them away from coaching, collaborations, sponsorships,” he explained.
“Then you add Chessbae into the equation, and you have somebody who can manipulate the narrative to make them always look like the good guys while behind the scenes they’re f**king with everybody and playing everybody,” the streamer added.
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He explained that things allegedly got so bad with Chessbae, whenever the two had an apartment together, they would try to make the room look different to make it seem like the two weren’t in the same city.
Eventually, when Eric tried to rekindle things with Alexandra, Chessbae allegedly told her that if she were to visit him, she would be cut off from PogChamps, raids, hosts, and other stream benefits.
“[Hikaru] has benefited greatly from this scorched-earth behavior,” he noted. “It’s not in his interest to get rid of Chessbae because whenever he had an issue with somebody, Chessbae would be his attack dog.”
It seems like there is a lot more behind-the-scenes drama than meets the eye. We’ll have to see what transpires next and if more members of the chess community speak up in the days or weeks ahead.