UPDATE 1/8: Following a suggestion from Sean “Day[9]”Plott, Twitch will replace the PogChamp emote with a new one every day.
Original Story:
On Wednesday evening January 6, Twitch updated their site by removing the popular emote PogChamp, following a string of posts from the emote’s face, Ryan “gootecks” Gutierrez. gootecks originally made the face in 2010 in part of a YouTube series starring fellow fighting game community personality Mike Ross, Counter Cross TV, and the name comes from a later video featuring the same two hosts.
Despite its popularity on the site, Twitch released the following statement along with the removal of the emote.
In their statement, Twitch refers to a series of Tweets created by gootecks around the events that took place at the United States Capitol on January 6. A large group of rioters stormed the campus in protest, broke into the Capitol and invaded the building. Congress would confirm the Electoral College’s votes for President Biden today. A woman was shot in the neck and died, which was publicly referred to.
Gootecks first tweeted that he would later share a graphic video of her death, simultaneously inciting violence and noting the alleged censorship by Twitter in return. He then tweeted a recording of the woman being shot, again citing censorship. He claimed the rioters “gave her life for our country” and used the hashtag #MAGAMartyr in both tweets.
In addition to the invasion of the Capitol, several explosives were also found on campus.
Popular political streamer HasanAbi streamed about the events throughout the day as they took place live. He also lived after PogChamp’s removal, showing his frustration that the emote had “transcended the person himself,” but acknowledged that he had gone “alt-right.”
Twitch has recognized the importance of the hype emote and said it will work with the community to create a replacement.
gootecks has not publicly commented on Twitch’s removal of the emote.
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