Sex addict sues Twitch claiming 'sexually suggestive' female streamers caused him harm
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A sex-addicted California man is suing streaming service Twitch for $25 million for exposing him to so many “scantily clad women” and, in turn, exacerbating his condition and causing him to hurt himself, court papers show.
Erik Estavillo, from San Francisco, sued the Amazon-owned video game streaming site earlier this month in Santa Clara County court.
“Twitch has extremely exacerbated his condition by displaying many sexually suggestive women streamers through Twitch’s twisted programming and net code making it nearly impossible for the plaintiff to use Twitch without being exposed to such sexual suggestive content,” the suit continues.
Estavillo claimed he injured his genitals and destroyed his computer while using the streaming service.
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He described himself in court papers as a sex addict who suffers from depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic disorder and Crohn’s Disease, and “heavily relies on the internet” for entertainment, especially during the pandemic, according to the lawsuit, which was shared online by the New York Post.
Estavillo argued that the website doesn’t allow its users to filter streamers based on gender. It only filters by category or show. And even then, he has to go through “thumbnails showing these scantily clad women, alongside men” to find what he is looking for.
A Twitch spokesperson told the Post the claims were "frivolous and have absolutely no merit.”
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Estavillo has a history of suing video game providers and big companies, such as Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, according to Kotaku.au,
He follows 786 streamers on Twitch, all of whom are women, the lawsuit states.
Twitch, he said, “takes advantage” of sex addicts “by allowing them to ‘Subscribe, Donate, or Pay Bits’ to these women streamers who are only streaming,” the lawsuit states, “with the sole purpose of taking advantage of such disadvantaged individuals who just want to watch a video game through Twitch, but then are enticed to spend money on these women for attention and sexual innuendo the streamer may do when donated to, i.e. blow a kiss into the camera and make sexual ASMR noises to entice the sexually addicted viewer to donate more.”
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The court papers go on to describe “user-generated sexual in-game content” as being prohibited, and shows more than 20 pages of photographs of Twitch streamers who expose users “to sexually addictive material and content on a consistent and regular basis.”
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He is seeking to the $25 million in damages “to be split between” Twitch Prime Turbo subscribers and him. He asks that any leftover money be “donated to both COVID-19 and Black Lives Matter charities and funds of the Court’s choosing.”
In addition, he wants Twitch to ban certain specified female streamers.