
A pretty bizarre case of fan harassment was started when some Chinese League of Legends fans threatened on social media to put laxatives in Top Esports’ takeout food.Â
The threats saw the Top Esports organization react with an official statement on the matter, saying that the organization takes these types of threats very seriously.
The fans who made the original threat had posted a picture of a takeout receipt on social media, that showed what was purported to be an order made by Top Esports. In the statement, Top Esports confirmed that the photo of the receipt was real, which was enough for the organization to react.Â
According to the statement, Top Esports has already reported the incident to the police and contacted the takeout website through which the food had been ordered. None of the players nor the management have yet been harmed, so the threats seemed to be empty for now.Â
Top Esports says that it value its employees’ safety highly and will make sure to safeguard that safety as required in the future.Â
League of Legends fans going to an extreme is luckily not something we see every day, but incidents in other sports have proven that player safety is something that needs to be prioritized. As League of Legends has grown, so has the interest of fans, and especially those that are most dedicated.Â
Sometimes this dedication takes things too far, resulting in real hate. Recently, T1 experienced a major backlash from its fans after the benching of star mid laner Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok in favor of rookie Lee “Clozer” Ju-hyeon. The fan reaction included heavy criticism and also direct hate towards T1 management and some of its players.
The identity of the fans who made the threats towards Top Esports is unknown, but it is very likely to be fans from another top LPL team currently battling with Top Esports for the 2020 LPL Summer Split trophy.Â
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