G2 Esports CEO Carlos “ocelote” Rodriguez received public backlash after he posted a video over the weekend with Andrew Tate.

As of the time of writing, the tweet captioned “yesterday we celebrated G2’s world championship” by Rodriguez has garnered 3.4 million views and almost 2 thousand replies in just over 24 hours.

In the video, the CEO is seen in a party with a host of people, one of which caught most people’s eyes: Andrew Tate. Tate is an influencer, infamous for his misogynistic content primarily on TikTok before he got banned from the platform. TikTok isn’t alone in banning the notorious personality, as YouTube and Meta (Facebook, Instagram) have also prohibited his content from being posted on their respective platforms. He is also being investigated for sex trafficking and fled the UK after being accused of sexual assault, among his other destructive and violent behavior.

Several hours later, Carlos seems unapologetic on a follow-up tweet. It read “nobody will ever be able to police my friendships. I draw my line here. I party with whoever the f*ck I want”

 

The initial video posted by Rodriguez, as well as the follow-up tweet, received negative comments from other esports personalities, including LEC caster Aaron “Medic” Chamberlain, interviewer Laure Valée, and Korizon Esports co-founder and journalist Ashley Kang.

“There’s no way you didn’t predict this reaction. You posted a video partying with a known misogynist who calls women property. It’s misguided at best and engagement bait most likely. This is f*cking low man, party with who you want but expect people to judge you for it.” Medic wrote. “You could be such a good example of someone who aspired to create something and reached their goals. Now… yeah. I don’t know what to say.

Kang tweeted “People will not be able to police another person’s friendship. However, people WILL be able to feel disappointed by that person’s choice of friendship, the initiative to double down on publicizing it. People will be able to judge you and consequently G2 for it.” Afterwards, she linked an article of Tate’s recorded misogyny.

Valée’s was quick and simple: “We won’t police your friendships but you should expect reactions from it. This is fcking off.”

Ex- G2 Esports League of Legends player Luka “Perkz” Perković responded in a more joking manner, but disagrees with Rodriguez’ behavior, nonetheless.

“Where do I apply for the job?” Perkz responded to the announcement of the G2 Carlos’ suspension, followed by a tag to his current team’s, Team Vitality’s, CEO Fabien “Neo” Devide who responded “Don’t worry I understand that you want to have the recognition that you deserve. You built G2.”

Responding to another tweet, Perkz wrote “I was already there – was not a bad run – qualified to lcs won 9 titles poached several players and single handedly made g2 [a] profitable org.

not bad resume huh ?”

A day after the video was posted, Rodriguez put up a series of tweets that read “Many G2 fans were let down this weekend which created confusion about what I stand for. It has always been my consistent target to stand for absolute equality of opportunity regardless of who you are or where you come from, which is what gaming is all about. Make no mistake, my life was full of learnings and I had my fair share of situation I got into in the past. I failed to read this room right, feel terrible about the discussions it created and will stand up and accept the consequences in full.”

Remarks were made how this posting was a “PR speech” and are “empty words written by someone else” in the replies.

Shortly after, the G2 Esports official accounts announced a ruling regarding their CEO’s actions.

“Hey G2ARMY,

Last night we failed you. The actions of our CEO spoke a language in stark contrast with the values and the culture G2 lives by and strives for. And for that we apologize.

Since our creation, we have worked hard to build a safe and inclusive environment to enjoy Esports. These are just small steps in the right direction we need to take as a company. We’ll continue to do our best each and every day to improve ourselves and the industry at large.

After internal discussion, Carlos and our Supervisory Board have mutually agreed that he will take weeks of leave as CEO and suspend his earnings during that time.

Thank you to the G2ARMY and the Esports community for holding us accountable.

G2 Esports”

G2 Carlos quote-tweeted this announcement with the text “G2 is above Carlos and always has been. I will do anything to protect this company and my colleagues in it as it is my unconditional duty to them.”

Despite this, his liked tweets go against this “apology.” He liked responses to his tweets that read “Never apologize to the mob.” “Don’t let cancel culture win.” “Based ex CEO (for 8 weeks), go take that vacation champ.”

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