G2 esports, a prominent organisation in the professional scenes of games like League of Legends, Valorant and CS:GO, has announced that its CEO, Carlos Rodríguez, will be taking eight weeks of unpaid leave following a controversial tweet.
The post in question featured a video of the celebrations following a second-place finish for G2’s in the European League of Legends championship and showed streamer Andrew Tate sharing some champagne with the players.
Naturally, this provoked a negative reaction from social media users who don’t believe people with Tate’s views on women should be welcomed into the esports community.
Carlos Rodríguez faces backlash for shindig featuring de-platformed former professional kickboxer
Among those to condemn Rodríguez's actions were other key figures in the esports space, including Misfits Gaming Vice President of Communications Becca Henry, who shared the clip and commented: “I’m sure I don’t even need to say this, but to all other teams and organisations in any esport: keep Andrew Tate out of esports. We are better than this.”
At first, Rodríguez responded to criticism like this by seemingly doubling down on his original tweet, posting another which stated: “Nobody will ever be able to police my friendships. I draw my line here. I party with whoever the (expletive) I want.”
A short time later, this sentiment was seemingly walked back and apologised for by G2 itself, with the organisation tweeting a statement which said: “The actions of our CEO spoke a language in stark contrast with the values and the culture G2 lives by and strives for.”
The statement also specified that Rodríguez will be going on eight weeks of unpaid leave as per a mutual agreement between him and G2’s supervisory board, with the CEO retweeting it and adding: “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.”
He also added in a separate tweet: “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.”
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