The Challenges Female Streamers Face on Twitch and Their Strategies Within a Male-Dominated Gaming Environment

This study examines how female streamers on Twitch navigate sexism, harassment, and objectification within a gaming culture long shaped by male dominance. Situating its inquiry within the legacy of the #GamerGate campaign and the broader exclusion of women from the video game industry, the research argues that Twitch, closely tied to gaming and skewed toward male audiences, mirrors wider platform norms that reinforce masculine authority. Its central aims are to understand the challenges women face on the platform, how they respond to abuse, and whether Twitch's protective mechanisms are effective.

Drawing on in-depth interviews with five female streamers, supplemented by content analysis, the research finds that respondents widely perceive being a woman on Twitch as a disadvantage. They describe persistent appearance-based scrutiny, feelings of objectification, and frequent harassment, with the most distressing content centred on physique and sexist insults. Coping strategies include humour, banning users, and in some cases withdrawing from streaming altogether. Participants regarded Twitch's existing tools, including reporting systems, keyword-based AutoMod, and bans easily evaded through new accounts, as largely ineffective, particularly over the long term. The study also notes structural imbalances, such as the scarcity of top-tier female streamers and the fact that only about a quarter of moderators are women.

The author interprets these patterns as products of a hypermasculinised gaming culture and broader heteropatriarchal, capitalist structures that treat female creators as commodities. Rather than locating responsibility with individual streamers, the analysis contends that platform design places the burden of protection on those being targeted. Recommendations include dedicated spaces for female streamers, female moderators trained in genre-specific ideology, algorithmic changes that avoid penalising creators who do not display their bodies, and stronger channel-level rules enforced by streamers themselves.