Remember, Nintendo wasn't going after Melee specifically. They were going after emulation. At the end of the day they're in it for the money, and they see emulation as a gateway to piracy. Shutting down the Splatoon stream was an attempt at damage control that backfired horribly.
I'm not defending Nintendo's actions. But it's good to have the perspective that this wasn't a raw act of malice against the fans as much as it was just a corporation doing what they saw as most profitable in the long term. It's not like Nintendo completely changed over night - they're just doing what they always would have done in this situation.
It's also good not to personify corporations too much. They aren't individual people with wills of their own. They're organizations with different people in charge of making different decisions. Nintendo can't "love" or "hate" its fans, so dont' get attached to the notion it can.