Solving the Hot Tub Stream Conundrum

Twitch now finally has an answer, and it may be enough to stave off further controversy.

Courtesy of Amouranth on Twitch.

Blanket criticism of female streamers on Twitch has long been a staple of the platform, even more so because much of it remains mired in the emotional trappings of toxic gaming culture, one whose foundation is deeply-rooted in misogyny, sexism and all manners of exclusionary mechanisms to keep those on the opposite side of the binary gender spectrum confined to a role of mere sexual objects. Hot tub streams on Twitch were particularly tricky to assess because they didn’t expressly break the platform’s terms-of-service, yet they were seen by many as intentionally skirting the rules in order to court favor from those seeking an experience adjacent to that of OnlyFans on the lowest end, and Chaturbate at its most-ideal.

As with most changes in the online content delivery landscape, much of it is spurred by advertiser discontent–following a recent controversy in which top streamer Amouranth could no longer pocket revenue from ads displayed on her channel with no prior warning, the platform decided to set the record straight. As of yesterday, there’s now a new category under which these streams should ideally be categorized — “Pools, Hot Tubs and Beaches” Twitch calls it — and this will simultaneously allow advertisers to better target against their peculiar content preferences while allowing users who show open disdain towards the category to curate their experience more, eliminating the need to flood Twitch’s socials with borderline self-incriminating screenshots of hot tub streams being floated on their discovery tabs.

One might be compelled to chalk the issue’s controversial character strictly to a misogynistic pathos, but there are multiple factors at play. Chief among them currently is a seeming deference to neopuritanism in what seems like the first murmurings of a cultural backlash against the post-sexual revolution status quo–in that scenario, the objection is as simple as a fundamental disagreement with streamers who show too much skin. There’s also been an increasing worry among viewers of the “corrupting” nature of streams with sexual character, parroting a similar line of criticism from conservative concern-trolling around the need to preserve children’s…