TFBlade is currently undertaking a 14-day challenge to reach the top 1 Challenger across all League of Legends servers worldwide; however, when he stopped at the Korean server, this streamer’s journey did not go smoothly.
Firstly, he faced a boycott from the Korean gaming community, as every match with TFBlade on the team saw Korean players automatically go AFK, accepting penalties to prevent him from winning. This was all because TFBlade openly criticized professional League of Legends players, notably Nuguri.
However, the situation did not stop there. Last night, while streaming on Twitch, TFBlade received a notification that his account on the Korean server had been permanently banned. What’s more, this was an account provided by Riot Games, and throughout his try-hard efforts, TFBlade had not displayed any behavior outside the norms of a gamer.
Upon investigating the reason for this sudden punishment, TFBlade was shocked to discover a post on a Korean social media forum, capturing an image of him pushing his eyes up during a previous stream. This image was taken by the Korean gaming community and used as evidence to accuse him of racist behavior towards Asians (implying the slanted eyes of Koreans).
Immediately, Riot Games Korea acted swiftly against him.
Even during his Twitch stream, this hot streamer explained that it was simply an act of rubbing his eyes. He even expressed frustration, suggesting that Korean fans were being overly sensitive and that these accusations were merely due to their hatred for him: “What do you think, I can rub my eyes differently while wearing those huge glasses and headphones?”
Afterward, TFBlade also filed a complaint to Riot Korea to regain his account; however, the answer was “No,” and of course, the result was that his League of Legends account on the Korean server remained permanently banned.
In protest of Riot Korea’s actions, TFBlade even threatened to… switch to streaming DOTA 2 out of spite. However, this threat is likely difficult to realize given that his streaming contract with Team Liquid has specific obligations.
TFBlade’s case has sparked quite a bit of debate within the League of Legends community. Many opinions defend that the Korean fans were indeed too sensitive in this case. However, the majority argue that TFBlade is no stranger to controversy; he has a history of being banned for 30 days on Twitch due to racist behavior, so if his actions carried a negative connotation, it wouldn’t be surprising.