Dr. Disrespect Breaks Silence On Mysterious Twitch Ban

It's been weeks since the mysterious dissonance of Dr. Disrespect. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, or people around the globe have watched the final moments of his last Twitch stream, or have read about the story. It has been the biggest story in the online gaming community since the story broke.

To understand why this is such a big deal, let's take a second to explain who Dr. Disrespect is. His legal name Guy Beahm, and he's a former level designer for Call of Duty video games. But after his video game designing career, he decided to take on the emerging world of online video game streaming. Over the last 5 years, Dr. Disrespect has risen from random game streamer to the face of his industry. He's appeared with ESPN, WWE, and recently signed a television deal with the company responsible for bringing The Walking Dead to TV.

Dr. Disrespect has inked massive endorsement deals with major companies as well. He's been the online face of Gillette, ASUS, Razer, and Mt. Dew's Game Fuel. In fact, Dr. Disrespect had signed a massive deal with the streaming company Twitch earlier this year, a deal rumored to be in the 8-figure range. Which is why its so weird that the same company would now ban him from streaming on their platform.

But as this story has gotten bigger, it's even bled beyond the world of online game streaming. National publications have been covering the story, and now one of them has locked in a prized interview with Dr. Disrespect.

The Washington Post (who interestingly is owned by Amazon, the parent company of Twitch) has landed the coveted first interview with Dr. Disrespect, or actually, with Guy Beahm.

With nothing being said about the ban from Twitch, and a single, limited, statement from Beahm (through is Dr. Disrespect Twitter), the internet has been left to speculate and try to piece together what happened. But Beahm wasn't able to shed much light on why he was banned, because he told the Washington Post that he still doesn't know why:

"Honestly, we just don’t know. It was a total shock. Imagine showing up to work and the doors are closed and you can’t get inside. You’re going, ‘What’s going on?’ And you’ve been told you’ve been fired. But you haven’t been told the reason why. We just weren’t given an answer. It was the worst feeling."

The final moments of the last Twitch stream of Dr. Disrespect has been broken down over and over online for little clues. With many speculating that something he said in the final moments led to the ban. But Beahm told the Washington Post that the final stream was not connected to the ban, even though he's not sure what the ban is for. He said about the awkward final moments:

“I kind of stepped out of my Doctor character, which I do from time to time, just having more of a personal moment with my audience in my community. And that was one particular moment, and that’s pretty much what that was.” 

You can see the heavily scrutinized video here, it does include some NSFW language:

Beahm addressed the timing of the ban, saying that it came at a time in his life where everything was coming together for he and his family. Both Beahm and his wife work full time on the Dr. Disrespect brand and streams, and he told The Washington Post that they were getting to a really good place:

“All the right points were lining up, all the pieces of this big puzzle of the Doc universe. And everything was just good. Everything was just getting lined up, to push the Doctor character outside of the realm of just streaming and more into this universe. You know, sort of encompassing mainstream media.”

This isn't the first time that Dr. Disrespect has faced a forced break from his stream. In 2019, Dr. Disrespect was hosting an IRL (In Real Life) stream, where a camera followed him everywhere during the E3 Convention. The camera continued to roll as he entered the men's bathroom, which caused major issues. Twitch suspended his account for two week. Beahm also gave the character and stream a two month break at the end of 2017 and start of 2018, when he admitted to infidelity. He and his wife reconciled, and have persevered through that disruption.

In the Washington Post interview, Beahm explains that he's taken responsibility for each of those issues publicly, and has grown from them.

"I’ve been very transparent with those around me and my community. If anybody knows the Doctor and who I am, you know, I’ve stepped up and taken full responsibility each and every time. And I’ve learned from those mistakes."

Some of the rumors and innuendo surrounding the Twitch ban have speculated that Beahm was the subject of a criminal investigation. There have been no arrest records published online with Beahm's legal name attached to them, but that didn't limit speculation from some "insiders" in the industry. However in the Washington Post interview, Beahm didn't sound like a man facing a large criminal investigation.

Though he did not directly address any rumors or speculation, declining to address any conspiracy theories, he did talk about the plans he still has for his career. He spoke about the television deal he's working on with Skybound Entertainment, as well as talking about the future in general. Beahm said:

“But, you know, I’m surrounded by a good team. And we’re putting together a nice little game plan. I’m really excited to take things to the next level.”

Though Dr. Disrespect is currently without a streaming home, and likely will be out of the public eye until the contractual aspects of his Twitch deal are sorted out, it was good for a lot of people to finally hear something new in this situation. The more we hear from Beahm, Disrespect, or Twitch, the less the rampant speculation online can spiral out of control. Which the internet seems to do...a lot.