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A<br />
the<br />
As a kid, Anne Munition was a “tiny<br />
little wannabe rock star,” the vocal,<br />
independent, youngest of three kids who<br />
was playing open mics at coffee houses<br />
by age 13, always looking for attention.<br />
She has it now. Today, Anne Munition<br />
(not her real name), 30, is a professional<br />
streamer and a legitimate star to legions<br />
of fans. Back in 2014, while working as<br />
a UI/UX designer and feeling uninspired<br />
by the job, she found Twitch, the livestreaming<br />
platform for gamers that<br />
allows viewers to subscribe to players’<br />
streams and chat with them. She started<br />
her own stream in June 2014, partnered<br />
with Twitch a month later, then quit<br />
her design gig and went full-time as a<br />
streamer in 2015. Today she has more<br />
than 600,000 followers on Twitch and<br />
over 90,000 followers on YouTube and<br />
has a partnership with <strong>Red</strong> Bull Gaming.<br />
And beyond that, she has a platform to<br />
talk about how we can all be a little<br />
kinder online. Here are highlights from<br />
a conversation about her life and career.<br />
red bulletin: You have a tattoo<br />
of the moon, sun and a star that<br />
represents you and your siblings—<br />
which one are you?<br />
anne munition: I’m the star. That kind<br />
of plays into the rock-star motif of my life.<br />
Was being the star your idea?<br />
No, my mom came up with that. She<br />
used to draw a sun, moon or star on our<br />
Christmas presents instead of our names.<br />
She would say we were her universe.<br />
Your mom gave you a Super Nintendo<br />
when you were 7. What got you<br />
hooked on gaming?<br />
I like solving puzzles. I think that’s what<br />
really drew me in, especially as a kid,<br />
was that video games were about solving<br />
a problem.<br />
You were 11 when you first<br />
encountered harassment playing<br />
games. How did that not deter you?<br />
Anytime you’re playing online, you’re<br />
going to deal with people who are not<br />
very nice. I was just bullheaded. Even as a<br />
kid, I liked to prove people wrong. When<br />
people would say things to push me away<br />
from playing, it was more of a challenge<br />
to me. I was like, OK, you don’t want me to<br />
do it? I’m going to do it even more.<br />
When you first discovered Twitch,<br />
what did you find so enticing about<br />
watching other people play?<br />
Imagine there’s a person online who is<br />
really good at a hobby you enjoy. You can<br />
practice that hobby with them, you can<br />
ask them questions about it, and they’ll<br />
respond in real time. I was working<br />
a full-time job, so I didn’t have time to<br />
play myself, but I loved the games. So<br />
I would watch people play and kind of<br />
live through them vicariously.<br />
What was it about you that made you<br />
think I can do this. I can be a streamer.<br />
I don’t think you get into it thinking,I’m<br />
going to succeed at this. But you get into it<br />
thinking This is interesting and I want to<br />
try it. It turned out that people thought<br />
I was funny. And that’s something that I<br />
pride myself on. I think I can be pretty<br />
entertaining, and other people agreed.<br />
Besides being entertaining, you’ve built<br />
an environment known for being kind.<br />
I’ve been streaming for almost six years,<br />
and I’ve been pretty stringent about<br />
creating a community that people enjoy<br />
hanging out in. Imagine going to work<br />
every day and you hate all your coworkers,<br />
or they’re all mean to you. I didn’t<br />
want to deal with that. People say I have<br />
one of the nicest communities on Twitch,<br />
and that’s one thing I’m very proud of.<br />
“Streamers are trying to build a relationship with people on our channels,” Anne says.<br />
You’ve said people underestimate how<br />
bad it can be online for women or<br />
people recognized as “other.” How<br />
bad can it be?<br />
People will search for anything that<br />
makes you different and pick it apart. I’m<br />
sure athletes or celebrities go through<br />
the same thing, but they don’t usually<br />
have a direct conversation with their fans<br />
on a day-to-day basis. Streamers are<br />
trying to build a relationship with people<br />
on our channels and in our chat, so I<br />
think it cuts deeper. <strong>The</strong> effect it’s had on<br />
my mental health is pretty bad. It makes<br />
it hard to see the positive side of your<br />
job when you’re constantly exposed to<br />
this negative force. A lot of people see it<br />
like, “Well, you just play video games for<br />
a living. That’s easy, right?” <strong>The</strong>y don’t<br />
see the hate mail you’re exposed to.<br />
50 THE RED BULLETIN
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