Pro League of Legends player Gabriël “Bwipo” Rau has come under fire in and around the LoL community after stating that women are not suited for playing pro League of Legends while they are on their periods.
While streaming live, Bwipo began discussing the lack of female pro players in the League of Legends world with his viewers, stating that there is not enough support available for women. This has been the case for quite some time, so it seemed that Bwipo could be onto something. But the community turned against him once the Belgium-born FlyQuest top laner began to clarify that women needed that more support than men specifically due to their periods.
“I think a lot of people, even men, tilt out of their minds when they play League of Legends,” Bwipo said. “When a woman is on the wrong part of the month… There’s a time of the month you should not be playing competitive games as a woman, in my opinion. This is my experience. I’m not trying to be sexist or anything.”
Bwipo offered some solutions, like creating a competitive schedule that would work “around [a woman’s] period,” though every woman’s cycle is different and periods all fall on a different day. He said that it’s not impossible for women to compete at the pro level due to this supposed barrier, it’s just harder given the mental and emotional grind of esports.
Fellow Belgian esports personality Eefje “Sjokz” Depoortere took to TikTok to share her own feelings on Bwipo’s statements. While she admitted up front she has “grace for Bwipo,” she said she felt the need to address the stream due to the “harmful rhetoric” found within it. Sjokz agreed that there is not enough support for women, in part due to their periods, which she called misunderstood, understudied, and under-supported, but that is where her agreement with Bwipo ended.
“To make the connection that when a woman is on her period she shouldn’t’ be able to play competitive – that basically says they shouldn’t play League competitive because they could have their period. That’s a crazy take,” Sjokz said. “Women are on their period, bleeding, having extreme pains, extremely tired, [but still] running Olympic records, putting in 24-hour nurse shifts, being a provider for four kids, caring for the elderly, being an executive for a huge company, being lawyers!”
Photo by Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games
While it may initially seem like an esports-specific issue to fans, Sjokz pointed out that this continued rhetoric regarding women’s periods impacts women in every field and across everyday life, saying that it was “all connected.”
The LoL community has largely agreed with Sjokz, with many wondering why women’s health is still such a mystery to people like Bwipo in 2025. Others worried that the FlyQuest star isn’t the only pro in the League of Legends scene who may carry these kinds of thoughts about women. Still others pointed to the irony of Bwipo questioning the emotional stability of women immediately after he’d gotten involved in a public spat with fellow pro Niship “Dhokla” Doshi that had also left fans upset with Bwipo’s words and behavior.
Update: Esports organization FlyQuest has announced that Bwipo will be suspended from the team’s next series in the LTA Championship.
Featured image credit: Riot Games
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