First Departure on the verge of losing sponsorship over religiously intolerant remarks





First Departure coming second in Flash Dota 2 League Season 2. Scripted, as their sixth member is not in this pic

First Departure or more specifically Scripted is in hot soup over a religiously intolerant nickname to which the Muslim community took offense. First Departure's main sponsor is urging the team to drop Scripted or risk losing sponsorship for the whole team.

At 16:00 CEST today, First Departure started their final Netolic Pro League groupstage game against Lowyat Esports to determine whether they will be making the playoffs of the two-week long tournament. Jonathan Wen Jun 'Scripted' Lee, First Departure player known for using spoof accounts, joined the game and changed his nickname to ALLAH (Muslim God) as the game began.

Muslim stream and in-game viewers immediately took offense to the nickname because Scripted had publicly dissed the Muslim religion in public games and non-streamed tournament before. Although this is the first time he has done so in such a publicly viewed tournament, it's the third time his remarks have been caught in screenshots.



Incident #1 - 31st May

Scripted then apologized on First Departure's Facebook page stating his actions are childish and immature despite being provoked in the first place. "I would like to add that I do not tolerate any racism in the Esports scene," Scripted wrote.

Incident #2

This happened in a non-streamed tournament. Nobody reported it and as a result he did not get penalized for it.

Incident #3 - 20th September

Muslim viewer Mohd Hilmi Ghazali immediately took it to Facebook group Kaki Dota 2 Malaysia and asked if he should be reported for such behaviours and soon enough, Armaggeddon, First Departure's main sponsor heard the commotion. Wanda Hu, the Product Manager of Armaggeddon, replied in the same Facebook post stating she have told the team to drop Scripted because they do not want to sponsor him anymore or risk the whole team getting dropped from sponsorship.

Facebook post by Wanda Hu, Product Manager of Armaggeddon:

Marco Fernandez, head organizer of the Netolic Pro League, was away when the games began but assured us that First Departure will be disqualified for their actions. The spot for the playoffs will ironically be given to Lowyat Esports who was suppose to be eliminated from the tournament.

First Departure's team manager, Bryan 'Jupi' Koay told us he know the action is wrong and will not defend Scripted in this case. He also apologizes to the Muslim community on behalf of the team.

We stress that while Scripted may be the culprit in all the incidents, the rest of First Departure's players are most likely not but will lose their sponsorship nonetheless if they insist on keeping Scripted.