ZeRo's "BANNED SERIES" Tournament Tweet

Overview

ZeRo's "BANNED SERIES" Tournament Tweet refers to a controversial proposition by former top Super Smash Brothers player ZeRo in which he proposed holding Smash tournaments featuring only players that have been banned from playing competitively like himself. The proposition was mostly met poorly by fans of the game, as many banned players received their bans due to allegations of grooming minors and committing acts of sexual misconduct that came out during the 2020 Smash Community Sexual Misconduct Allegations.

Background

In July 2020, top Super Smash Brothers player Gonzalo Barrios, aka "ZeRo," was accused by two women (known as Jisu and Katie) of talking with them sexually when they were underage. ZeRo apologized and exiled himself from the Smash community and was dropped by his sponsor and banned from Twitch.

However, on November 16th, 2021, ZeRo returned to YouTube with a video responding to the allegations.

In an upload to his channel, he recanted his confession and denied all allegations. ZeRo claimed that the stress brought on by the allegations and his inability to disprove them caused him to spiral into depression and self-sabotage by confessing. He said his confession was intended to be a suicide note. ZeRo later attempted suicide in March 2021. He also stated he'd retained legal counsel and would be suing Jisu for character assassination.

On September 9th, 2022, ZeRo announced in a YouTube video the lawsuit had been settled, that the document containing the allegations against him had been deleted, and that both he and Jisu wanted to move on with their lives to make more positive content. He attempted to start a campaign to get himself unbanned from Twitch with the hashtag "#UnbanZeRoTwitch."

On September 12th, 2022, ZeRo tweeted^[1] a proposition for a Smash tournament series that would only include banned players, writing, "Aboutta host my own tournament series online and get other banned players in and call it the BANNED SERIES with cash prizes and stuff. Nothing they can do about it ☠️ Low key would be the hyped tourney of the year."

Developments

The "banned series" proposition was mostly met with poor reception by other members of the Smash community following his post on September 12th, 2022, as many banned players (such as Nairo and Ally) are accused of grooming or having sexual relations with minors. In a follow-up tweet, ZeRo joked about facing Ally at his proposed event, to which Ally responded,^[2] "I'm not gonna participate please leave me out of this stuff."

Many also expressed disgust at ZeRo's tweet. For example, on September 12th, 2022, Twitter user @exstatikk^[3] tweeted, "How Zero go from trying to convince everyone he’s innocent to saying he’s gonna host a tourney and invite rapists and pedos who were banned from the smash community," gaining over 530 retweets and 5,300 likes in one day (shown below, left). Smash player Jut^[4] then tweeted, "no matter how you feel about him or his situation, there's no denying that zero's recent tweet shows what kind of person he is. being capable of disrespecting victims like that is insane," gaining over 110 retweets and 1,500 likes in the same time frame (shown below, right).

Others posted memes implying that the tournament would only attract child predators. Twitter user @ST6RSKEETER^[5] posted a joke implying FBI agents would walk contestants to their top 8 matches, gaining over 10 retweets and 80 likes in less than 24 hours (shown below, left). That same day, Twitter user @BoWs1rJr^[6] posted a joke saying the "grand prize" of the tournament would be Epstein's Island, gaining over 30 retweets and 340 likes in a similar timeframe (shown below, right).

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References