Lady Gaga caused a bit of a stir when she innocently tweeted out “What’s fortnight,” which made the entire Fortnite fandom to sit up and take notice. The most well-known name in the community, Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, took this random opportunity to shoot his shot by asking if she wanted to steam a little Fortnite with him.
This would normally be win-win for video gaming and for Lady Gaga as this sort of cross-pollination will undoubtedly benefit both fanbases, but the whole situation is tainted somewhat given Ninja’s controversial stance on streaming with women.
The Fortnite streamer previously said (via Polygon) he chooses not to stream with female gamers out of respect for his wife, Jessica, and to minimise any potential drama or unsavoury rumours that may arise should he stream with a woman.
Ninja’s response unsurprisingly drew a polarised response among the gaming and streaming communities. Some supported his decision and argued it was reflective of how toxic the gaming community can be rather than any sexist views (which is a good point).
Others thought it was a misuse of the massive influence he wields and refusing to stream with female gamers not only does a disservice to women in the industry but also highlights sexism within the community as while he doesn’t have to stream with women, him essentially saying “it’s not worth it” simply adds to the ridiculous idea that men and women can’t have non-sexual relationships (which is also a good point).
So having stood firm on his “no streaming with women” stance, his begging of Lady Gaga to stream Fortnite with him brings up one big question: why the sudden change of heart, Ninja?
Not wanting to stream with female gamers as a way to reduce harassment is perfectly valid. Gamers can be awful and no one needs that sort of treatment in their life, especially if you’re as big as Ninja.
But you can’t help but smell the hypocrisy when you see him go from “I refuse to stream with women” to “please play Fortnite with me Lady Gaga” without any hesitation or thought about any rumours that particular team-up might cause, especially since she’s apparently single and ready to mingle.
After being called out for flip-flopping on his rules, Ninja hit back by claiming he’s played Fortnite multiple women since he made his “I don’t stream with women” stance.
To be fair, he has streamed with women since then. There was that time he played Fortnite with Ellen DeGeneres and, uh, that’s basically it actually. Fine, he’s streamed with a woman but that’s still more than none.
Now this might be a coincidence but it seems like Ninja’s streaming partners of choice are those who have far larger followings than he does and gender becomes a non-issue.
Now I’m not saying that Ninja is more than willing to make an exception if the woman he’s streaming with has a bigger following than he does but there’s a pretty massive disparity between Lady Gaga’s followers (79.8 million on Twitter alone) and Ellen’s followers (78.8 million on Twitter alone) compared to his “mere” 5.2 million Twitter. Throw in other big names like Drake and Trevor Noah and the massive following disparity soon becomes hard to ignore.
As for Lady Gaga’s response to Ninja’s Fortnite stream invitation? Well I’ll let her tweet speak for itself:
It’s still up in the air whether Lady Gaga decides to read up on who Ninja is and whether she wants to stream with him, but this whole saga has been more about the most popular video game streamer revealing how willing he is to bend his own rules.