Behind The Model: Tiffany Witcher and Her Charitable Spirit

Tiffany Witcher is the VTubing Charity Witch on Twitch. It rolls off the tongue quite nicely, but it’s been a title she’s earned through hard work and determination.

The FURIA-signed content creator has supported more than 70 charities across her five-year streaming career. For most, that has included multiple donation runs and plenty of broadcasts with little revenue for herself and all for philanthropic causes.

Charity has long been a part of her life. And before she got into streaming, she was tabling at conventions to promote many causes.

“I wanted to also enjoy the convention at the same time because I would just sit at the table all day and not really enjoy the convention. So when I got into content creating and streaming I was like ‘maybe I can do charity streams.’

“That way I can still enjoy time and have fun with friends at conventions. So I did my research and saw there are ways that you can do charity through Tiltify, and from there that's how I started to build my content.”

However, it was the environment she was raised in that truly shaped Tiffany’s charitable spirit. She would accompany her mother, Myra Witcher, on weekends every now and again to help whoever needed it.

But the sheer scale of her charitable work was beyond even Tiffany’s expectations. A registered nurse, she spent countless hours teaching nurses in low-income communities. She helped out Girl Scouts groups. She would volunteer at soup kitchens, organize massive events, and take part in many more.

That impact wasn’t noticeable until she passed away in 2017.

“It wasn't until I did my speech about my mother, I looked into the pews and it was filled up with so many people. And then at the end of the funeral, people would walk up to me. They gave me condolences, envelopes, and gifts. And it was a line of people that my mother has helped.

“It was just so inspiring to see. My mom had this big of a legacy and I didn't know about it. All I saw her was leave at night to go help tutoring and go like on Saturdays to do charity stuff. So it was one of those things that took me off guard a lot.

“When I was done mourning and stuff like that, I had my wedding and I decided to do streaming. I wanted to honor her legacy and do it my own way and help people around the world.”

That legacy left behind has been carried on full throat by Tiffany. It’s easy to list the accolades and awards: she’s been nominated numerous times at shows like thegameHERs and the BIPOC Streamer Awards, and has taken away three gongs across her five years on Twitch.

She has raised tens of thousands of dollars for various charities. She has helped others set up their own campaigns. She has given back with her own money⁠—not just her time—and advocated for accessibility and diversity across the industry.

But it’s not sustainable for her. Tiffany has lupus, an autoimmune condition which attacks every part of her body, among other health conditions. She’s been burning both ends of the candle with content creation, voice acting, and charity gigs for nearly a decade now.

It’s catching up to her, and in 2023 she’s started taking more care for herself: “My husband literally said, ‘you can't help people if you're dead.’

“I've had other big charity streamers come to me saying ‘Tiffany, you got to focus on your own content. You can't save everyone. You're doing good work, but you have to understand that you come first.’ And as selfish as that may sound, they were absolutely right.

“I'm at the point where I do have to make my own bag and I do have to help supply for my family.”

VTubing was a way to take back control one chapter of her life narrative: “I started doing it and I told my community ‘hey, this is just probably temporary, I want to try it out.’ But then I started to like it because I didn't have to worry about my skin, my face and my balding and all these negative things that lupus has caused.

“I can just wake up, have a coffee, have breakfast, sit down and stream.

“I just stuck with it. And I will stay sticking with it because I also talk about the benefits of being chronically ill and how VTubing has saved me as a content creator and how we can save the accessibility community.”

However other systemic issues in content creation, like racism, continue to rear their head.

“I used to get horribly harassed on Twitch more when I was a face cam streamer than as a VTuber. I think they knew what I look like. We were in the age of ‘Twitch, Do Better’ [too].

“When it comes to the black VTubers we don't get as much respect as other people in the space. I don't see a lot of agency VTubers that look like me or at least around my skin color.

“It will be nice to see so you get more people from the black community to come in and be like ‘hey that looks cool. Look at that big agency VTuber… they're part of a big agency like VShojo, NIJISANJI, or, Hololive. That's awesome.' I would love to see that.”

No matter the struggles, whether they be health or otherwise, Tiffany has done incredible amounts of good for so many communities. Her influence spreads beyond the online realm, impacting thousands of lives offline. All out of the goodness of her heart.

She’s not just upholding her mother’s legacy but forging her own, and that’s something to be immensely proud of.

“My dad, he doesn't get it, but he knows I'm happy. When I was in the Wall Street Journal and he saw the article, he was like ‘is that your avatar?’ I was like ‘yeah.’ He was like ‘oh, she's pretty’ and I said thank you. Then he's like ‘I'm proud of you.’

“My dad says it all the time… he’s like [my mom] would have told you too, that she would be very proud because you're doing good things for people and you're not in a situation where you're in a bad space.

“I know deep down inside she would have been proud because I put aside my own pain to help someone get through theirs. And that's what she did.”

Learn more about Tiffany’s story, including her WWE ambitions and her job as a professional scare actor, in her Behind The Model episode.