Popular Twitch streamer Kaitlyn “Amouranth” Siragusa has been banned from the platform after partaking in a new ASMR trend where she, and other streamers on the site, lick the microphone when receiving a new subscriber. Although Twitch is generally cagey when it comes to the specific reasons for its bans, most are attributing Amouranth's latest removal from the site as an indication that the ASMR licking trend is considered sexually explicit content, and therefore against their terms of service.
After the recent hot tub meta on Twitch died down, viewers have been waiting for the next big thing to shake up the platform. ASMR has been a category on Twitch for a long time, with most of its content fairly being innocuous. Recently, however, it has seen a large boost in viewers, with streamers like IndieFoxx and Amouranth performing ASMR routines that push the boundaries of Twitch's terms of service. Many Twitch users are also concerned with the sexual nature of the content, with many suggesting that it is pushing Twitch further and further from its gaming roots, and others worried for the large population of younger viewers on the site.
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The latest Twitch trend certainly seems to be even more salacious than the recent hot tub streams. Content creators like Amouranth will performatively lick their microphone for subscribers while stretching into suggestive yoga poses in what the internet is calling 'TikTok pants' —yoga pants adorned with a hexagonal pattern and an inbuilt 'butt lift.' This will be Amouranth's fourth ban from Twitch, and she has recently been targeted for demonitization on the site during her hot tub streams, with advertising being suspended on her channel without warning; an act of opacity by Twitch that Amouranth described as "an ALARMING precedent."
Fellow ASMR streamer, IndieFoxx, has also received another ban from Twitch, likely for the same reason as Amouranth, although many are suggesting that the bans will be cited as being for the use of LinkTree to advertise their OnlyFans accounts without posting a direct link to the site itself, something which could be deemed as attempting to skirt Twitch's terms of service. Both streamers have seen channel growth since starting the ASMR streams, with IndieFoxx boosting her follower count by 95,000 in the last week alone. Amouranth has seen a huge increase in subscribers over the last few months, with the hot tub meta and this new trend pumping her sub count from around 11,000 in March, to over 20,000 at the end of May.
Whatever the reason for Amouranth's latest ban, it is obvious that Twitch staff have their eye on the streamer. While Amouranth and IndieFoxx's latest streams are certainly boundary-pushing when it comes to Twitch's terms of service, it should be noted that licking the microphone during ASMR streams isn't technically a bannable offense, and if the company isn't clear about what is not allowed on its platform, streamers may find it difficult to remain within Twitch's guidelines.