Tyler “Ninja” Blevins has said that he won’t play games with women on his megapopular Twitch livestream. His reason is that he is concerned that people may start rumors that could upset his family. But that has not stopped him from pretending to play games with a woman in a commercial for Samsung’s Galaxy smartphones. It also did not stop him from actually playing games with Ellen Degeneres on her day-time talk show this week.
Ellen invited Ninja on after finding out that he makes hundreds of thousands of dollars each month broadcasting his Fortnite gameplay. She joked about how she bought an Xbox to get rich. Obviously, she needed a coach, and that’s where Ninja stepped in.
The show then cut to Ellen and Ninja playing Fortnite together on Xbox One. You can watch the extended clip right here:
As is standard for daytime talk show interviews, Ellen stuck to the basics. She asked how he met his wife and how many hours a day he plays the game. And then it was right into learning how to make money as a game streamer.
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Ninja still won’t play with women
But while Ninja is showing up on Ellen to increase his fame and cashing checks from Samsung, he still has not livestreamed with a woman. He refuses to. That turned into a controversy in August when he said he wouldn’t.
In a post on Twitter, Ninja explained that he won’t play with women because he is trying to minimize online harassment from his life. And it’s his belief that if he plays with women, people who watch his stream will harass both him and his wife about how he must be cheating.
But he’s obviously not worried enough about harassment to say no to Samsung money or an appearance on national TV. When it benefits him, you see him making exceptions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3ROyZFB7Is
On his livestream, which is his primary source of income, he continues to play alone or with other men. He doesn’t want to deal with harassment and rumors, and I view his solution as gender-based discrimination in the workplace.
