Esports and charities – when a community comes together for a good cause

Charity work is important – there are so many important causes out there that need people’s support, both fiscal and otherwise. Generally speaking, charities are a pretty amazing thing – they show people selflessly working together to support a cause like children, animals, sick people or something similar.

Research is another topic that many charities concern themselves with – both in healthcare and other sectors like technology and education. There is a variety of great causes that people can support, and when it’s a big event or famous person that supports one, this also comes with the added benefit of the charity getting additional exposure – this also happens within the esports community.

In fact, it’s becoming more popular, and that’s a great thing – one recent such example is the Four Millionaires & Paul event – one that has four streamers (Ninja, DrLupo, TimtheTatMan and ActionJaxon) collecting money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. To this end, they designed T-shirts and are selling them. The goal is to sell 20k shirts and raise over $280.000. Sales are live now and ongoing until April 15th.

As a matter of fact, this isn’t the only time an esports star has worked with that very hospital – Overwatch and the Overwatch League have already collected some very impressive sums for a good cause, as has the esports team Immortals. There are plenty more examples like this one, of course – for all its issues, the esports community can be an incredibly supportive and positive environment.

Other charities and other esports teams, games and organisations have their own efforts as well. Late last year, esports platform Swarmio ran an event called ‘Gift the Rift’. A League of Legends charity tournament that featured popular Twitch streamers like Pokimane, LilyPichu, ImaQTpie, Scarra and more. The end of the tournament saw $100k split between four different charities – BC SPCA, Last Chance for animals, Hope for Justice and, you guessed it, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

There are even dedicated non-profits like the Esports Foundation that support smaller-scale projects like the Martin Luther King Jr.’s school in Massachusetts; the esports foundation helped provide new laptops for a classroom in said school.

Another pretty interesting event was one that actually saw the CEO of Intel himself participate in an esports tournament. Once again, a LoL event, Intel’s boss played to help raise funds for the Cybersmile Foundation, an organisation that fights cyberbullying, along with several pros. He was praised from various sources for being willing to go toe to toe against several League pros. This actually happened several years ago in 2015, but it is still a pretty good example of people working together in order to support a common cause.

When it comes to charities and supporting those in need there is no such thing as too big or too small – whether it is $100k high-profile LoL tournament or a single classroom getting better materials for the kids studying there, they all need to be celebrated and praised!