Make body shaming an actionable / bannable offense once and for all
I'm going to say this once, I want ALL body shaming to be bannable offenses. If I don't mention certain types of body shaming, please don't think that means I don't take it seriously or that I think it should not be included. I decided to make this post after finding out that you get emails whenever a report leads to action being taken. That means 95% of the reports I have made against body shaming IN THE LAST 2 YEARS have had no action taken.
Yesterday I unfollowed yet another streamer who didn't moderate body shaming in their chat and neither did their moderators. I'm going to give 3 examples of the body shaming I see constantly. This isn't a contest. These are just my observations from 2 years of watching Twitch. I'll also give several examples of how these examples bleed into other problematic areas such as transphobia, ableism, and racism.
Fat shaming. Neckbeard and "fat f*" are some of the most popular terms I've heard. Yes neckbeard is a reference to a type of body. Overweightness (if that's a word) and enough facial hair to cover the neck. It's explicitly a body shaming term. Overweight people have to deal with a lot of judgement and hatred that heavily impacts their self esteem and mental health. There are also medications and disorders / diseases that can dramatically impact a person's weight.
Height shaming. Hoooo boy. This is an issue I have faced my whole life that has contributed to my heart being filled with a lot of hate. I'm a 5'2 Dominican male. It is absolutely NOT an exaggeration to say that 80% of the time whenever height is brought up on Twitch, height shaming "jokes" are made by the streamer or chat or both. A lot of these jokes aren't even jokes, they're just flat out degradation.
On top of that is the 100% social acceptance of this shaming and how often it's used to attack or "own" any users that make problematic comments in chat. Would you believe me if I said it's gotten to the point where my heart starts to race whenever a user makes a comment that the streamer and / or chat finds distateful? A lot of the times body shaming is used to attack these people and it ends up, ONCE AGAIN, hurting people like me.
How is height shaming not racist? My race is shorter than white and black people on average. Everytime I speak out against height shaming I get flamed to **** and back and / or moderated. HOW IS THIS OK?
How is height shaming not ablest? There are a PLETHORA of disorders, conditions, and diseases that can cause shorter height. God forbid someone being height shamed is also dealing with suicidal thoughts, hopelessness, and / or depression.
How is height shaming not transphobic? Trans men are erased almost entirely. Trans men on average are shorter than cis men. They have to deal with a tremendous amount of shaming that can cause them to constantly doubt whether they'll ever be considered "real" men in the eyes of society. Trans teens (especially trans masculine) have an astronomical attempted suicide rate. This is one of the many examples of why I roll my eyes when I hear people on Twitch claim to care about mental health. The default attitude (Although of course this isn't specific to Twitch) to problematic behavior being called out is ridicule, rage, and of course moderation.
- ***** size shaming. If it's possible for a form of shaming to be more than 100% socially acceptable, then ***** size shaming would be it. It's utterly disgusting how this evil practice is not only not punishable, but seems to also be in the top 3 most popular attacks against anyone that makes a problematic comment in chat, especially if that comment is sexist. So something men have NO control over which affects *** and love (2 important areas of life and fulfillment) as well as self esteem gets no protection when it comes to abuse.
This includes highly problematic terms like BDE (Big D Energy) and SDE (Small D Energy). This also includes that horrific chat bot tool or whatever, that tells people what their ***** size is. I have seen this in so many streams and there's almost always some dehumanizing comment after the result if the result is considered small. For example "Your ***** size is 2 inches. RIP". This lovely world routinely dehumanizes men with small penises by telling them to kill themselves, telling them they will never satisfy women (While also dehumanzing them for not being sexually successful of course), repeatedly blaming violent or problematic actions on men with small penises, and of course telling them directly and indirectly that they are not real men.
How is this not transphobic? Did you know trans men, who have gotten bottom surgery, tend to have smaller penises on average. Dear god I can't imagine how unbelievably difficult it must be for trans men to have any confidence or love their bodies in the face of the near infinite amount of emotional abuse that they face. YES it's emotional abuse.
There are already a lot of studies that show body shaming contributes to suicidal thoughts. Do you all understand that the shame is so great that there are men who are afraid of mentioning their ***** size in any suicide notes they might leave behind if they commit suicide. The blame for feeling sad or mad is also put on the men. The issue is the emotional abuse and bullying that is so incredibly pervasive and the collosal pushback against anyone who speaks out, especially if that person is a man. That's why so few men speak out. Check out the subreddits that talk about that stuff. Check out trans masculine subreddits as well.
There's also the fact that this shaming is so powerful that it also affects men with average size penises. There are men who don't get physicals for years because of the shame. There is NO EXCUSE for treating this type of abuse differently other than you just don't want to admit how evil it is. Gaslighting men by saying "Hey pal it doesn't matter XD, just don't think about it no one cares" is just more emotional abuse.
You don't dehumanize someone 24/7 for something they can't control and then tell them to not think about it. Far too many people do this to justify any rolling of eyes or anger at men who have to deal with it. The truth is people know how evil it is and often times just want to put the blame on the men and / or quickly move on to another topic. This type of shaming absolute crushes self esteem and if you think it doesn't create any anger or hatred you're in denial or just flat out lying.
Twitch for the love of god please take a stand, preferably a strong one, against ALL body shaming. Make it an actionable / bannable offense. If it already is then fire the people who analyze reports and get a new team. ALL gaslighting with regards to the effects of body shaming need to stop. ALL body shaming needs to stop. You may disagree but I absolutely put body shaming on par with other isms and phobias. The toll to mental health is astronomical.