A former Kick employee is accusing staff at the streaming platform of being racist and discriminating against streamers who have Autism or are battling cancer.
On June 17, ex-Kick staff member who only referred to herself as Melissa posted a video to YouTube exposing her fellow employees of inappropriate conduct.
Melissa claims that she resigned and decided to leave the company because the office environment was “extremely hostile.”
“There was a consistent disrespect to other people’s opinions and beliefs. This went as far as consistently hearing the F-slur and not only just in gist as a joke, it was specifically targeted towards people it was supposed to discriminate against,” she said.
The former staff member also alleges that when she would walk past the socials room where employees would run the platform’s social media accounts, she’d hear the N-word dropped even with upper management in the room.
She went on to claim that people on the team would laugh at deliberately misgendering transgender streamers.
The alleged misconduct doesn’t stop there, either. According to Melissa, an Autistic streamer who they had signed wasn’t treated well. When she inquired about their contract renewal, Melissa recalled a staff member smirking and saying he “decimated his rate” down to a below-market set rate for an English streamer.
The incident Melissa says “really solidified” her decision to leave Kick came when they were trying to get a “very beloved” Twitch streamer to join the platform and gamble.
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“This particular streamer had been publicly battling cancer recently, so they decided to utilize that in their strategy to get this person over,” she explained. “The conversation very quickly became quite sinister.”
Melissa recalled a quote from one of the employees that made her want to quit. “We can get her on Kick streaming Stake for a relatively low price, because she probably thinks she’s gonna die soon and she’ll want to leave more money for her family.”
When no one objected to this remark, Melissa remembers thinking she was speaking with demons and went home early.
Mel, I am sorry I didn't get to know you better during your tenure. It's sad to see you leave on bad terms. I wish that further working flexibility could have potentially been organised for you, but consistent department and broader company policy is also important to us as we…
— Eddie (@StakeEddie) June 12, 2024
So far, Kick staff haven’t responded to their former employee’s claims, but she says she doesn’t care about any legal complications, saying that she’s prepared to declare bankruptcy if they take her to court.
Ed Kraven, the co-founder of Kick and Stake did, however, respond to Melissa claiming that staff were told she was fired and didn’t quit the company.
“Would you kindly be able to send me through some examples of the problems you are facing with what people are saying regarding your resignation?” he asked back on June 12.
Melissa, meanwhile, accused him of just doing “damage control” and wasn’t interested in hearing her concerns back when she worked at Kick.