Falling for Streamers: The New Heartbreak Hotel

 

Hey hey hey lovely readers! Back with another blog, and this one was written while I sat listening to my family debate office politics - I was definitely wishing I could put on a Twitch stream while I was listening to them. The idea for this particular blog was originally because of the post below that I saw when I was (doom) scrolling on what was probably a rainy winter day. I’ve always enjoyed watching streams and had often thought about how I would write a piece for my blog here on it - this won’t be last blog on streaming that is for sure! But there will be future streaming blogs coming soon. I guess part of why I find streaming and the culture of streaming interesting is because of how I knew of several streamers who created the illusion of being single, and so with that, it got me wondering why streamers feel safe to simp for and why the illusion of knowing that person is something we can cling onto - perhaps too tightly - is of comfort. 

So here is the post in question that I saw and got me thinking about all of this, it originally had me giggling as I thought about it on the surface, but as we all know I think about a lot of things in a lottttt of depth and that was part of this blog. Partly for me to just brain dump my thoughts on our relationship with streamers and also to just talk about this post in detail. I’m sure there are a lot of examples for this blog, that come to mind already for this particular topic - keep them in mind while reading and feel free to let me know your thoughts.

But anyway, moving on, I totally get the point of the post and I do see the funny side in it for sure, we can spend hours in front of a screen to not feel lonely and form a sort of emotional bond or attachment to streamers. Disclaimer - don’t ask me about the psychological impact here, I’m not a psych student, and like with most of my blogs, while I can give my own suggestions that are in some way psychologically accurate, I don’t actively study psych and am so merely hypothesizing. The casual chill nature of streamers with the comfortable atmosphere that allows us to feel like we know them on a deeper level, even if it is through a screen or we can’t see their face (a blog on faceless streamers will get posted eventually once I'm done writing it), there is something about streamers that I think personally, most people inevitably will hold onto and keep them going back for more.

The Illusion of Being Single

I’m well aware of course that not all streamers purposefully try to appear single, obviously - just look at the number of internet couples out there that are quite literally relationship goals. But I have noticed among some of my streamer friends and more generally too, sometimes my more well known friends in their communities, keep their relationship under wraps and private. Obviously completely fair - I do the same and am also very private about my relationship status and existence of any significant others (I’ll go as far to say that I was in a relationship last year but did not publicize it). However I do have quite a few friends who Twitch stream who despite the fact I know they have been in many (long term) relationships, have always insisted to fans that they are single - to the point of it being in their FAQs. This got me thinking for one main reason - is this like the marketing of kpop groups where appearing single helps to fulfill fan fantasy and keeps/improves popularity because of being marketable as being single? You could of course go down the path that fans won’t cope with knowing their favorite streamer is in a relationship but I think that discredits many fans who would be happy for the streamer or simply not care. Which again leads me back to thinking about kpop marketing and how marketing as single is often more successful - but does this really carry over to gaming? I don't think it does. If your audience care that much about your relationship status, is it really healthy?

But for the examples I’m thinking of, those reasonings don’t really fit, especially not where the s/o was a mod in the stream or played a role behind the scenes but would still hide the relationship in front of fans. Does this mean that to be a successful streamer you need to appear single to get more followers and keep growing, or that you need to hide a significant other? I’m not a streamer so I’m probably not the best placed person to answer that, but in my opinion I don’t think a true fan would really care about your relationship. Take the example of Kyedae, sure some people may care that she is engaged to Tenz, but her stream is enjoyable because of the environment she creates - and that isn’t anything to do with her relationship. And she is popular because her streams are enjoyable and she is an awesome streamer. Kyedae’s streams are great - when I started watching Valo streams she was one of the first people I watched because she was sooo good at streaming and being engaging. But again that's nothing to do with her relationship and most people don't care about her relationship past the fact they're a cute couple. But my love for Kyedae streams aside.

Something about this appearing single or not thing that gets me, is it makes me question if this is part of the wider simping for streamer theme and context that makes apparent available streamers have a wider audience because they are more chaseable / an ‘option’ or is it not an affecting factor? To answer this question, in my opinion, a contributing factor of needingg to appear single depends on the fanbase and why you are well known. If you were solely a gaming content creator whose fanbase was generated off this, while I'm sure there are some out there who care, it's not likely to be the main selling point. So let’s go on a brief tangent and talk briefly about ASMR/voice actors, when voice actors - especially the kind you find on YouTube who do the boyfriend/girlfriend/significant other audios appear single, it makes them more attainable to fans and likely brings in a wider audience. And with research I've noticed how a lot of these then branch out into gaming and streaming. But is this the case in gaming when isolated from that context? I mean we all know pro players will be attractive to one person or another and them being single might bring in an audience, but how much does their availability or therefore lack of,  really impact their popularity? 

As I said before, I’d like to hope that if a streamer were in a relationship and posted about it, that people would be supportive or just outright not really care. In the same way, I would hope that if I was a streamer and was public about my relationship status, that wouldn’t affect the number of people who supported me in that role. Though I suppose that is a situation where you would just have to go with it and hope for the best. The reason in particular I say this though, is because I follow several influencers on social media who had been appearing single and not promoting any relationships they had over the years but have moved into being more open in their female x male friendships or in general relationships and the amount of hate they received was astounding. Respectfully why it does matter that much? And I wonder if this is something the world of streaming has already been witnessing for years, but if a fan doesn’t support your relationship and you in that relationship, are they really a fan?

Simping 

Continuing onwards, simping. Simps cards at the ready my friends, a few of my IRL friends have previously described me as a A-grade simp - not sure if this is a good thing to be honest, but they don’t describe me as one anymore so that’s an improvement? But what is it about streamers in particular that make it so easy for us to simp for them? As said before I think a big part of it is the emotional connection or bond built over a series of hours and years. Looks get you so far of course (another topic I want to discuss is looks and pro players but we will leave that for another time) but it is the emotionality of it all that I think creates a connection, a sense of comfort and that is what can lead to simping or being more invested in one streamer than another. Just like how with friendships you might be closer with one person because you spend more time with them and have a deeper bond than with a different friend. Full disclaimer again I’m not a psych student and am by no means attempting to be one, this is just my attempt of an explanation on why the streamers we watch, we can become so invested in. When we watch streamers - especially those who stream frequently - they start to become a part of our routine, a comfort and something akin to calling a friend or family member as part of the daily routine. They can become a comfort person who can respond and be engaged and interact with you when you feel alone or want to take a break from whatever is going on in your world. So in some ways, we can almost form a dependence on someone we've never met.

And because they become a source of comfort, their stream becomes a safe space - where depending on the streamer, and their fanbase size, you can get to know them as much as they get to know you. Going beyond the traditional lines of a celebrity and fan. It blurs those lines of traditional forms of entertainment and the interactive level that exists, creating a bond or friendship or attachment of being a regular in the chat box which then creates a dynamic that we don’t see in day to day life. And therefore makes it easier to simp depending on the level of that relationship, in the case of one of my friend’s who streams, I can’t imagine simping for him - I know far too much about him, have had far too many dumb conversations with him and have had to tell him to stop being an idiot on several occasions; but I can see why others simp for him. For them, he is a source of advice, a source of comfort, a voice to listen to their struggles and acknowledge them when they don’t feel acknowledged. For me and many of the mods in the chat, he is our friend, so we see him less as a source of advice and more a source of amusement from the dumb situations he often finds himself in and someone we can meme because his relationship to us is different to that with his fans - or simps. The reason I'm referring to some of his fans here as simps is because of the behaviour I have seen openly exhibited in a way that is not only telling of their age and maturity but could be argued to cross the line in several situations. Because even if that person is comfort they're still a human, and they remain a human both before, during and after the cam and stream goes off.

On an even deeper level, I think it often feels like there is a form of safety or security in simping for a streamer or streamers. Realistically, like the post above points out, you know it isn’t going to happen. It’s a fantasy, ideal situation, dream etc. so it enables people to simp without a fear of rejection or heartbreak - probably the point of what you were expecting from the title. On the point of the title, the reason for it is namely because of the blurred lines that streams create, the line blurs so much it is hard to tell where it was to begin with. If it had felt like a possibility to become more involved with a streamer as a person in their day to day lives as opposed to the personality you see on the screen, (not to say all streamers have different versions of their irl self to their stream self) then the sense of rejection can be so much harder to face. Because that blurred line makes it so they are part of your day and you are part of their day but maybe not in the way you think you are. The possibility of dating a streamer will always hurt much more when it turns out it wasn't as probable or indeed possible as first thought, and it comes down to the idea of putting someone on a pedestal. And when they fall off that pedestal, it gets messy. Something I've witnessed far too many times.

The Illusions of Streamers and Why We Hold On

To be super cringe worthy here, I’m going to paraphrase a wattpad book I read when I was about 13 that made a good point about putting someone on a pedestal - basically if you don’t put someone on a pedestal you won’t be surprised when they fall off, but if they are on a pedestal it seems impossible for them ever to fall and so when they do it hurts much more. The book was called the End of Summer by MakeandOffer if you were wondering. But the point being made is so accurate. When I first met one of my friend’s who is a streamer, I thought of him as this amazing guy who had very few flaws, I don’t still think that because as we became better friends I saw his flaws but the reason I bring this up is because the point on the pedestal is something we typically learn with age. So for younger teenagers or perhaps even children who watch streams and don’t think their favorite streamer is capable of horrendous actions and is then revealed to be - it makes that fall harder. Not because it was necessarily based on simping but because that person was idolized being put on a pedestal and at the end of the day no human is perfect. So a fall is inevitable in some way, shape or form.

The whole reality of friendship bonds from a distance is one of the reasons I suspect we often fall fast, simp hard and hold on for a long time. While the sense of friendship creates the community and the cosy atmosphere that keeps people coming back, it might also be the reason that fans can be quicker to anger or be upset when the reality of their idol streamer doesn’t match up with the idealised version in their heads. After all, we all have a version of ourselves that we show the world and a version of ourselves that we save for the people closest to us, or perhaps just ourselves. And sadly I’ve seen the whole simp hard and unable to let go when it becomes painful thing, a million times and experienced it on an occasion too. Obviously when it comes to obsession it isn’t healthy, but in this world that we live in, which often feels so lonely and isolating, it’s not really surprising that an attachment is something we can hold onto for long after it stops serving us. My friends and I can look back and cringe and laugh at when we were simps for someone, but that’s because we’ve moved through that part of our lives already and grown out of it - just like how we grew out of our tween boy band obsession stage for One Direction - other cheesy boy bands are available. It was one of those phases that we probably had to go through just to come out the other side and realise our errors and continue on. Though admittedly simping for someone with a large following is probably a better idea than simping for one who the attachment is much stronger to. Because to bring back streamer examples that I’ve seen and mentioned from earlier, there was a streamer - several in fact - I knew of whose fanbases viewed them as a close friend, so close that they would trauma dump in chat and weren’t directed to a more appropriate source of help for that trauma. And that blurred line is one that I worry about for younger audiences who view streamers as the only person who cares about them or knows them. 

Of course no one is inherently to blame for anyone simping for streamers or anyone else, and whether you agree with the morality of the illusion of being single to viewers - there is a small part of us that can understand why someone would do that. In many ways it’s like having a fake name online to protect your real world identity, it separates your online life from your real world life and keeps them separate. To bring back the point I made about those influencers who had received hate for having significant others who they posted about, it’s the blurred line that enables it and is perhaps why keeping online and real world separate, in the way of appearing single for the internet and having relationships in private could be a lot better. Similarly, we can all empathize with someone coming to terms with an unrequited crush on a streamer and the heartbreak that they may feel. Fundamentally heartbreak online or in person still sucks on any level, it would be hypocritical of me to say you shouldn’t simp for streamers - it’s not always something that humans will have innate control over. So what I will say is enjoy it while it lasts, respect boundaries and remember the blurred line that exists, and once its done, move onto the next chapter of your life. There’s so much more to come once this one chapter ends. 

So that’s all I have for you today as part of this blog, I hope you enjoyed reading even if it was just me dumping my opinions on a page. Hopefully it didn’t feel too psych analysis based and gave you something you hadn’t considered before. There will be more posts in the future on faceless streamers, face reveals, the blurred lines, potentially something on voice actors and the comfort we seek in them and so on. Feel free to let me know if this is something you would be interested in or if there is something along those lines you think I should take a look at in particular!

Thanks for reading and for being here, and see you on the next blog!

Byeeeeeeee ʕ •ᴥ•ʔ