“Men under 170cm don’t have human rights”- Japanese Tekken Player Fired For Derogatory Remarks

Professional Tekken 7 player Tanukana has been fired from Osaka-based eSports team Cyclops Athlete Gaming for body-shaming remarks she made about men’s heights during a livestream. The Cyclops Athlete Gaming team is known to compete in first-person shooters like PUBG, Call of Duty, and Rainbow Six Siege as well as fighting games like Tekken.

In a stream earlier this week, Tanukana revealed her opinion on what she found attractive in potential romantic partners: “Men who are under 170cm don’t have human rights,” she said while livestreaming. FYI, 170cm is 5ft’ 6.9″, just under Japan’s average height of 5ft’ 7.2″.

Tanukana also added that short men should get bone-lengthening surgery to artificially increase their height, furthering the stigma against shorter men.

That sudden statement had the streaming audience feeling less sympathetic towards Tanukana, but when she saw the lukewarm reactions her height-based statements were getting, she doubled down and stated: “165 centimeters is tiny. It’s no good. Honestly, if you’re under 170 centimeters, you have no human rights. If you’re a guy who’s less than 170 centimeters tall, please live your life with the idea “I have no human rights” in your mind at all times. Yeah, I’m saying it. Short guys obviously shouldn’t have human rights. Know your place. I’m tough on short guys. But let me say this: I’m nice to fatties and baldies”

Nothing says you’re a great person like doing some extra body-shaming people who are bald or on the plump-side. Someone give this woman a Kindness Award or something.

In a now-deleted tweet, Tanukana wrote, “It was pointed out to my that my stream contained hate speech.” She admitted that body shaming was not her intention and that she had simply, yet poorly, expressed her love for tall people. She did apologize, but it was hardly the kind of formal apology that’s become expected from Professional Gamers in Japan. In accordance to rules stated by the Japan Esports Union, one of the main points that defines a pro gamer is “self-awareness of being a professional.” The apology made by Tanukana seems very limp and half-baked, if you consider the standards pro-gamers need to maintain in order to be taken seriously in the eyes of Japanese society.

“I have deep remorse for this statement, which is unbecoming of a pro esports athlete and a member of society,” Tanukana wrote in another tweet, apologizing more formally. However, she was dropped from her team, who also wrote an apology of their own. Cyclops later announced they had terminated Tanukana’s contract.