Andrew Tate has faced criticism from the Valorant community, after trolling a female streamer who faced abuse in voice chat, as he said women should be “banned” from gaming.
Valorant streamer Taylor Morgan blew up on social media when she shared a clip from a recent stream where she was threatened with sexual assault by one of her teammates.
In the video, a teammate asked Morgan if she “knows what rape feels like” and if “she wants to know,” prompting the Twitch streamer to quit the game and abruptly end her broadcast.
I have never made a more desperate plea that what I am about to say right now. @riotgames @RiotSupport I need you guys to fucking do something. I am an incredibly strong person and I have been streaming for a very, very long time. But absolutely nothing prepares you for someone… pic.twitter.com/Gr77uBsBrT
— TaylorMorgan (@TaylorMorganS_) May 13, 2024
The clip, which has received over 24M views on X/Twitter, lead to many players echoing Morgan’s calls for Riot to take action against such remarks through hardware bans.
Andrew Tate, who has been posting increasingly inflammatory posts on the platform in 2024, responded, claiming women are “ruining everything.”
“Women join men’s spaces and cry and bitch and ruin everything,” he said. “Men say the worst things to each other all day and nobody cries. Easiest way to fix this problem is ban crybaby women from gaming.”
Women join mens spaces and cry and bitch and ruin everything.Waaa waaa waaa like babies.Men say the worst things to eachother all day and nobody cries.Easiest way to fix this problem is ban crybaby women from gaming. Done.
— Andrew Tate (@Cobratate) May 15, 2024
Tate’s comments, clearly made to incite, were instantly slammed by the Valorant community. Esports host Yinsu Collins struck back: “Very on brand of you to think rape threats is just women being ‘crybabies.’”
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Content creator Muselk responded: “Maybe just don’t be an a**hole hey? Not totally shocking you wouldn’t have an issue with what he said though. Explains the confusion over the arrest.”
Throughout May, Tate has been posting overtly hateful and inflammatory posts on X/Twitter, presumably to drive engagement. These have included posts like “Make Homophobia Great Again”, claiming he beats women, and comments about abortion. Some of his posts have been given “limited visibility” for potentially violating “X’s rules against hateful conduct.”
Tate, along with his brother Tristian, have been charged with multiple crimes including sexual assault, rape and human trafficking. The two are set to face trial in the UK following their trial in Romania.
Lead Valorant dev Anna Donlon has since responded to the viral clip too, promising changes while claiming that the team has already taken action against the account that made the threatening comment.
More news is coming on what is being done behind the scenes to deal with such toxicity with Donlon planning to share her own thoughts on player behavior in the near future as well.