Last week Twitch shocked viewers by banning Hasan Piker for using the racial slur ‘cr*cker’. The Amazon owned company has a notoriously harsh policy against hate speech and the use of slurs in general. Despite this fact, no one ever expected a term like ‘cr*cker’ to be the center of a Twitch controversy. Since Hasan’s ban multiple streamers such as Vaush have received similar punishments.

One streamer Hasan defended after their recent ban was Bruce Ray who claims he was banned for saying things such as “you can’t be racist to a white person !!!!!” and “only race you can’t be racist to is white people”.

“twitch needs to stop capitulating to white supremacists and those doing white identity politics, you are making the platform a worse place overall. #FreeDEO” – @hasanthehun

Hasan eventually returned today to Twitch. It will be interesting to see in the coming hours if Twitch bends to the pressure or continues to uphold their terms of service.

Hasan’s suspension kickstarted a discussion surrounding both ‘what a racial slur actually is’ and ‘when people should be offended’. Should words like ‘cr*cker’ have the same impact as other traditionally bad slurs or are white people exempt from this?

“Entire timeline filled with twitch racism debate. Idk let’s just agree not to be racist no matter what. S***s cringe and unbased. If your a racist your parents are probably siblings anyways lmao” – @someordinarygamers

Hasan Piker is a polarizing figure and one of Twitch’s largest streamers. However Twitch addresses Hasan will affect this policy’s enforcement for the foreseeable future, regardless of where people stand on the individual issue.