Black Twitch streamer \u2018hurt\u2019 after getting 3x more views pretending to be White: \u201cSomething needs to change\u201d Twitch: Just_Relax_KidTwitch streamer \u2018Just Relax Kid\u2019 went viral after raking in three times more views when he streamed with a picture of a white man rather than using his camera. We spoke to him about his experience streaming on Twitch and how he feels following this viral moment. Just Relax Kid, AKA \u2018Zach is Relax,\u2019 has been streaming on Twitch for over a decade, and has been partnered with the site for nearly nine years. Like many other streamers, his content primarily revolves around gaming. Generally, he\u2019ll play a game and show himself on camera using a green screen, allowing viewers to get a front-row seat to watch his humorous reactions. One day, Zach didn\u2019t feel like showing his face during a stream. Instead, he opted for a generic illustration of a white, bearded man with spectacles, a common practice among \u2018faceless\u2019 creators or even VTubers. Normally, Zach\u2019s streams would net him around 300-800 views. However, his broadcasts using the image of a White man garnered him three times that amount, as shown in a viral post on Twitter \/ X. Zach\u2019s views skyrocketed from below 1K to upwards of 22K views after switching from his camera to the drawing. Just Relax Kid \u201churt\u201d as other Black streamers hide their faces after viral post Zach\u2019s post has been viewed over eight million times. It has also sparked a major conversation within the streaming space about Twitch\u2019s algorithm and the experience of streaming as a Black creator on the platform. We got the chance to speak with Zach, where he told us he feels \u201churt\u201d by the situation, saying it has prompted other Black creators to turn off their cameras in the hopes of gaining more views. \u201cHonestly, I\u2019m hurt, \u2019cause of all these Black creators who were like, \u2018I\u2019m not using my camera anymore. I\u2019m not doing it,’\u201d he told us. \u201cAnd they were serious. So, I feel bad, because I feel like I\u2019m kind of responsible for that. I don\u2019t want people feeling shame just for being who they are.\u201d \u201cThere\u2019s thousands of people that are DMing me like, \u2018Yo, how can I set up this PNG?\u2019 There\u2019s so many Black creators who I\u2019ve watched since I\u2019ve tweeted who don\u2019t use their camera anymore and use a white PNG. And I\u2019ve had three of them tell me, \u2018Yo, my numbers have gone up.’\u201d On top of this, Zach was also hit with a slew of criticism for pointing out the issue in his viral post. \u201cI was getting hate from everywhere, from Black people and white people,\u201d he continued. \u201cWhite people were mad at me because they said I was screaming racism, but Black people were mad at me because I wasn\u2019t screaming racism.\u201d \u201cA certain type of Black\u201d for Twitch Zach has been clear that he doesn\u2019t view the situation as racist, and even says he\u2019s not \u201cangry\u201d about the ordeal. However, he did admit that he feels \u201cbetrayed\u201d by Twitch, having streamed for over a decade on their platform without hardly any recognition, aside from being featured in a subsection on Twitch\u2019s homepage during Black History Month. \u201cI\u2019ve been one of your partnered streamers for almost a decade, and I\u2019ve never gotten any love or nothing from Twitch ever,\u201d he explained. \u201cLike, not a single thing besides Black History Month. Like, nothing. It was wild to me, and I was like, \u2018You know what, I probably won\u2019t show my camera anymore.’\u201d To get recognition on Twitch, Zach feels that Black creators have to \u201cbe a certain type of Black,\u201d citing Twitch powerhouse Kai Cenat as an example of this. \u201cHow I see it, is that you gotta be a certain type of Black to get those opportunities,\u201d he said. \u201cYou either have to be like \u2018watered-down Black,\u2019 if that makes sense \u2014 you know, you\u2019re just Black, but you don\u2019t show any Blackness, in a sense.\u201d \u201cOr, you have to be making an ass of yourself. You gotta be making a movie, entertainment. It has to be like Hollywood every time you stream. Someone like Kai Cenat. Like, you have to make an ass of yourself on a regular basis just to get [recognized], you know what I\u2019m saying?\u201d Finding a solution Of course, Zach is far from the only Black creator on the internet to have openly spoken about the differences in his treatment on a platform as opposed to non-Black creators. Most famously, CoryxKenshin spoke out about favoritism and racism on YouTube in 2022, while BruceDropEmOff was heavily critical of his numerous bans on Twitch before leaving the site for Kick earlier this year. Even Kai Cenat was left befuddled after receiving a gift from Twitch in the form of custom sneakers after smashing subscriber records instead of a highly anticipated contract. \u201cI agree with them 100 percent,\u201d Zach said of the aforementioned creators. \u201cEven though they\u2019re huge creators, so it\u2019s like, they\u2019re in the top percentage and still feel alienated, you know, still feel on the outside. So imagine people under them, you know, how low they might feel?\u201d When asked if he had a message for the platform, or how the site could go about remedying the situation, Zach didn\u2019t have an answer \u2014 but ultimately feels that more opportunity needs to go around, and not just to the site\u2019s top streamers, or to those gaming the next hot meta on Twitch. \u201cI really wish I had an answer of how they could fix it. I really do, because something needs to change, but I feel like it\u2019s both a Twitch thing and a viewer thing, so it\u2019s really hard. I think that they should just start trying to push out more creators.\u201d Dexerto reached out to Twitch for comment, but received no response at the time of this article\u2019s publication. For now, Zach says his post is live for anyone who wants to see the evidence for themselves. \u201cI think everyone was happy because I\u2019m like the first person to show actual numbers instead of just saying it happened, so I don\u2019t know. Maybe it will spark something, maybe it won\u2019t, but hey \u2014 it\u2019s there, you know?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Black Twitch streamer \u2018hurt\u2019 after getting 3x more views pretending to be White: \u201cSomething needs to change\u201d Twitch: Just_Relax_KidTwitch streamer \u2018Just Relax Kid\u2019 went viral after raking in three times more views when he streamed with a picture of a white man rather than using his camera. We spoke to him about his experience streaming […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45099\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}