Great news for a great cause.
SteelSeries, the worldwide leader in gaming and esports peripherals, and Kontrol Freak, the creator of Performance Gaming Gear, today announced a partnership with The Trevor Project, the world’s largest suicide prevention and crisis intervention organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer & questioning (LGBTQ) young people, to send messages of love and support to LGBTQ gamers and amplify voices from the LGBTQ gaming community.
This Pride season, SteelSeries and KontrolFreek are celebrating and waving the Pride colors along with the gaming community through donations, giveaways, and a month of advocacy across its social media, community, and product channels to raise awareness for the need for inclusivity, accessibility, and equality in gaming.
As an official partner and corporate sponsor of The Trevor Project, SteelSeries will donate 100% of the funds raised from its weekly live streams on Twitch. Additionally, SteelSeries will match the total amount generated from the live streams and KontrolFreek will donate a portion of its online sales at the end of June. To help fans to show their support and allyship, SteelSeries has created a run of limited-edition Pride-themed speaker plates for its award-winning Arctis line of headsets. 100% of the profits from the sales will be donated to The Trevor Project to help provide free, 24/7 crisis counseling to LGBTQ young people who are struggling. The limited-edition speaker plates are available for $29.99 at steelseries.com.
To amplify advocacy and allyship and get the community involved, SteelSeries and KontrolFreek will distribute a collection of limited-edition Pride-related gear through giveaways across its social media and digital channels, as well as making digital assets available for fans to show their support. Additionally, the brands are offering their communities, influencers, and fans the opportunity to help support The Trevor Project’s efforts through donations and donation matching.
According to research conducted by The Trevor Project, more than 1.8 million LGBTQ young people in the U.S. seriously consider suicide – and at least one LGBTQ young person (13-24) attempts suicide every 45 seconds. Those are staggering numbers, but Trevor’s research also indicates that LGBTQ youth who reported having at least one LGBTQ-affirming space had 35% reduced odds of attempting suicide in the past year.
The Trevor Project currently has more than 700 digital volunteer crisis counselors in total and trains a new counselor cohort each month. The Trevor Project aims to triple its digital volunteer crisis counselors in 2021, and eventually grow the pool by 10x – significantly increasing the number of LGBTQ youth served each year. LGBTQ young people who contact The Trevor Project will always speak to a highly trained human crisis counselor, available 24/7 and for free.
If you or someone you know needs help or support, The Trevor Project’s trained crisis counselors are available 24/7 at 1-866-488-7386, via chat https://www.thetrevorproject.org/get-help-now/, or by texting START to 678678.
