On January 11, 1983, the world was introduced to the joy of painting thanks to Bob Ross and his half-hour instructional television show The Joy of Painting. Running for a total of 11 seasons consisting of 403 episodes up until May 17, 1994, Ross taught the world his method of creating landscape paintings, telling everyone who watched they can paint “happy trees” and “almighty mountains.” Needless to say, The Joy of Painting has inspired many people, some who have become great artists on their own too.

In celebration of The Joy of Painting as well as honoring Bob Ross, who spent over a decade of his life showing people around the world his method of painting in the comfort of their own living room, Twitch — a website known for live streaming of the best gamers playing video games for other gamers to enjoy viewing — will feature every episode of Ross’ television show nonstop as their marquee launch of their creative professional hub. Unfortunately, Ross and his show were not immune from all the trolls, spammers, and other sickos that often plague the online gaming community as they plastered the live stream with disgusting comments and jokes.

Before continuing, it should be noted that it is okay not to like Bob Ross and his paintings. The reason why is that landscapes are not everyone’s preference. Some people like surrealism (Salvador Dalí’s The Persistence of Memory). Others like cubism (Pablo Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon). Why some people find subjects considered vulgar to be artistic (Gustave Courbet’s The Origin of the World). Despite this fact that not all art is admired by other artists, connoisseurs, and enthusiasts, there is at least appreciation. That seems to mostly be non-existent in Twitch’s live stream of Bob Ross’ The Joy of Painting.

According to T.C. Sottek of The Verge, he claims that chat on Twitch, like many other live public spaces on the internet, is deemed garbage. Sottek actually watched Bob Ross for hours one night saying the messages in chat were filled with inside jokes, innocuous emoji pictures, and a mixture of ironic and genuine praise. However, that changed when an episode featuring a female painter as a guest was aired. The chat became a cesspool of homophobic jokes, sexual suggestions, and accusations of Ross having a sex change.

The Mary Sue followed-up on the original post made by T.C. Sottek recognizing that online chats are often hostile by comparing it to a dumpster fire. They even recognized that some will retaliate, and that such behavior is expected on a site such a Twitch. Still, they still call out the need to strive for something better especially when a genuine show like The Joy of Painting is on.

The bright side of this situation is that Twitch’s creative hub is actually being taken seriously among certain artists though they may have a preference to gaming and/or comic books. For example, professional Starcraft II player Livibee is now showcasing her art live on Twitch. Milkncookiesss is actually showing viewers the art of cooking. Glassmancometh is creating glass art by melting and bending it. Finally, CWatHapp1ns is building a life-sized sword from the Halo game series out of pipe cleaners.

The live stream of all episodes of Bob Ross’ The Joy of Painting is currently airing on Twitch TV over the course of nine days. It began airing Thursday, October 29, 2015, and will continue on until Friday, November 6, 2015. Viewing is absolutely free. However, take this warning to heart. The chat shown on the the right side of the live stream shows comments from viewers in which some, as mentioned in this article, can be disgusting.

[Image via Crtrue/Wikipedia Commons]