Scrabble, Slurs, and Safe Spaces

Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words can really tear our community apart.

“FUCK. 26 points.”

That happened with no offence, given, nor taken at all. It was simply me making the opening move in a Scrabble match, and declaring the score. My opponent didn’t bat an eyelid.

I play Scrabble competitively. Yes, there are Scrabble tournaments played all around the world. I’m nationally ranked here in Singapore and compete regularly in various other countries until CoViD-19 put a stop to international travel.

There’s even a world body governing the global English-language competitive Scrabble scene (World English Language Scrabble Players Association — WESPA for short).

We play any words allowed in the official word list (which is derived from a comprehensive English dictionary) sanctioned for use, regardless of meaning. Since FUCK is listed in the word list (as one would expect in a comprehensive English dictionary), it’s legit.

But the above may be the last time I get to play the F word, as the word list is set to change.

The Lexical Cleansing

It began in July 2020 when Hasbro announced the removal of slurs from the official Scrabble Dictionary in North America.

Only North America because Scrabble is in a bit of a funny pickle. It’s a trademarked game, but globally there are two different owners. In North America (the USA and Canada), the Scrabble trademark is owned by Hasbro, while in the rest of the world it is owned by Mattel.

Recent expurgation in North America started after the Black Lives Matter (BLM) events of 2020 unfolded. It did not have an immediate impact outside America, but eventually inspired a corresponding action that would impact all Scrabble players worldwide.

An Australian filed a complaint against Mattel over the inclusion in the Scrabble dictionary of words such as ABO which as slurs against Australian Aboriginal people. Mattel then announced their own changes that will lead to the removal of “hate speech” from their officially endorsed word list, and hence bringing a change to the entire world outside North America.

Specifically, Mattel also moved to direct WESPA to ensure the words deemed unsuitable by Mattel to be removed from tournament play worldwide. The current list used is Collins Scrabble Words (CSW), which is produced by Collins under licence from Mattel and sanctioned by WESPA for tournament use.

That push to WESPA led to a huge uproar, and a rift, within the international competitive player community playing under WESPA’s aegis.

Much A*o About Nothing?

There are tournament players who speak of the benefit to the community of such moves, such as making the scene more accessible to a wider audience.

With online streaming becoming easier, some Scrabble players have taken to broadcasting games to promote Scrabble. They are eager to avoid drawing controversy or ire from the platform they broadcast on should an offensive word be played and shown to audiences.

This scenario actually did happen even before the days of streaming, when LEZ was played in a real Scrabble tournament final which was to be televised. It was fortunately taped rather than broadcast live, and the player was made to undo his move.

But by and large, the comments in various social media groups of Scrabble tournament players are against, and expressed in strong terms too. There is a clear sense of outrage over this change.

To the public, it may appear unthinkable, even petty, of the Scrabble tournament community to make such a big fuss out of this matter. Surely everyone, including Scrabble players, can recognize how the meaning can be offensive to some people.

Furthermore, the list of words to be removed is relatively short — the list is not released yet at the point of writing, but estimates from the current draft seen by a few payers give a range of hundreds.

Percentage-wise this is indeed small given the whole CSW contains around 279,000 words. Surely, it is a minor inconvenience that doesn’t merit such a strong reaction, and hence the actual adversity from the community only reflect badly on the community showing it as intolerant.

They’re Taking Away OUR Words

Those who oppose the change have different reasons. Some bemoan the unnecessary reduction of the words available to use, though most acknowledge that they would get used to it — the word list is periodically updated anyway, like any other dictionaries, in keeping with the growing vocabulary of the time.

Some others dispute the arbitrary/subjective choice of words deemed as hate speech. Those who have seen the draft list have pointed out words that most people won’t know or find offensive (eg ASPIE — someone with Asperger’s syndrome, and according to some aspies themselves, not usually a derogatory term).

At the same time, some words most would consider vulgar remain, including CUNT (which apparently can be neutral, as used by some people in Australia). Even FUCK apparently may survive the cull — so hopefully my opening statement to this article may yet repeat itself.

Others are opposed based on principles, drawing comparisons to censorship. Given the subjectivity of the selection, there is the fear of more words to be removed. Parallels are also drawn to normal dictionaries, whether they will be targeted for similar purges, and if not, why the Scrabble word list is singled out.

Yet others are incensed more by having a change imposed on them by the brand maker. They feel they are customers and promoters of the game, but yet Mattel does not treat them like one. Their opinions do not matter and are not even sought in the first place.

It even becomes a proxy battle between the left and right of the Western world political spectrum. Some players point fingers at the “woke” movement extending the influence into the game and politicizing what once was a scene for all people who love all words.

(Inside joke: WOKENESS is not acceptable for Scrabble play. At least not with the current dictionary.)

All told, even though the matter at hand is the removal of words from a lexicon, it is not so clear anymore that the topic on hand is language. It is much rawer than that. There is a sense of loss of trust, of violated independence, of outside interference, of us against them.

Our words have been snatched from us, by outsiders. Why are they doing this to us?

Separation of Act and Intent

Going back to the trigger that starts the reaction: the objection against hate speech used in the game.

The Australian Aboriginal activist who complained about Mattel cited his concern about sending a message to children on the importance of not using racially offensive words to gain points in Scrabble.

It is an understandable desire, especially coming from people who have a history of being at the receiving end of abusive treatment, to want to stop being subjected further such abuse, and stop such acts from being propagated.

In this case, however, it has perhaps been a stroke too broad. The action to stop the verbal abuse over the game may have assumed every use of such hate speech to be abusive.

It may not have considered the possibility of an act, such as hate speech, to be used for different intents. Tournament Scrabble is an example where hate speech may be used without intent to abuse.

An analogy that comes to my mind is boxing. It is publicly accepted and recognised as a sport with its fans, both practitioners and spectators. To the uninitiated, its core activity is a violent one, hitting another person to subdue him. This hitting to win may be something that many parents would not want their children to learn.

But yet there are many more nuances here. The act of hitting in the sport is not out of hate, it is part of the sport. Hitting may be an expression of hate elsewhere, but does not necessarily equate to hate between the competitors here (setting aside the drama played up for some promotion).

The participants — practitioners and spectators alike — recognise that and do not infer meaning where there is none to be inferred. A white boxer beating a black boxer is not an act of racism in the ring.

Letting Good People Play Bad Things

There is also the element of consent. Both competitors in modern boxing matches are willing parties, either taking part out of passion as many amateur boxers do or with a lofty goal such as a glorious title or substantial prize fund that motivates them.

I don’t think boxers necessarily appreciate being hit out of blue in their daily lives without their permission first, but in a match/training, they consent to being hit as part and parcel of the game.

So too the audience. They come to watch a strenuous physical activity of their own choice which may involve acts some may view as uncivilized outside the sporting context, but they have chosen to accept the scene that they are going to witness.

So despite the potential of some societal non-acceptance, boxing — and the associated practice of hitting another human being — is generally acceptable wherever it doesn’t violate any local laws. There is space accorded to people who want to box, as long as they don’t infringe on others’ rights. The individuals’ right to choose is preserved.

Competitive Scrabble players may feel this space has been denied them, by outsiders, even when the players are not infringing on others’ rights. That fans the fire of outrage amongst the dissenters.

The Need to Respect Needs

I can understand the possible need of some people who play Scrabble recreationally with their families and friends to avoid having certain offensive words turning the mood sour.

At the same time, the reaction from Mattel to hear out this need — possibly requiring a public and significant one, again due to post-BLM lens — do not address the needs of the competitive players.

I definitely understand the need of competitive players (mine included) to have as comprehensive and definitive a word list as possible to play the game at a level that stimulates our minds to their maximum.

Both parties need their respective safe spaces, even if they all live under the same word game umbrella.

There may be others — players who may not care for rigorous competition, but the integrity of the language even in casual games. After all, a word removed from the game doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist in the language. Indeed, one can find many English dictionaries that will still list and define FUCK, even if it’s excised from the Scrabble dictionary.

The challenge for the Scrabble community, I believe, is how to create spaces for the different groups of people playing Scrabble. Before that though, the challenge is whether there is a willingness among the various groups of people to respect the space for each other.

The Nail in the Coffin

WESPA recently convened an Extraordinary General Meeting to get a mandate on the response to Mattel’s expurgation. A motion was put to the vote, not directly on whether to accept the expurgation or not, but on whether to modify WESPA constitution to disassociate itself from Mattel.

The premise was, WESPA being dependent on a licence from Mattel to use the Scrabble name, had no choice but to remove the words unless the constitution was modified to allow the disassociation.

The motion was defeated — that is, the constitution was retained, and the expurgation would happen — largely due to the desire to still retain the licence. However in the discussions preceding the vote, many of those who voted to retain the constitution also clearly voiced unhappiness with the expurgation.

The outcome was a shock to many, who had fully expected WESPA to defend how Scrabble has been played so far and viewed the motion failure as a capitulation to the corporate overlord. The vitriol that flew around in the forums just before and immediately after the vote was proof of how deep it cut.

The Mourning After

For now, many tournament Scrabble players are still hurting. A lot of us feel victimized. We will need time to grieve.

Eventually, though, we need to find our way forward. Some have publicly vowed to quit Scrabble altogether after the disappointment. For the rest, we all still want to play our Scrabble, preferably the way that satisfies us the most.

We owe it to ourselves to create our own space. However, as evident in this current episode, since Scrabble is played by many, there are likely times when the interests do not intersect and may result in our interests will not be represented if we don’t have our space.

We owe it to ourselves also to ensure our space is recognised. We may need to understand better how other Scrabblers think and feel, and be conscious that not everyone sees the Scrabble we do.

This goes not just between competitive and non-competitive Scrabble communities. It starts within the competitive community, where a rift is now open between those who accept the expurgation (willingly or otherwise) and those who are against it.

We need to understand each other better, find a common unifying reason for our love for the competitive game, and rebuild our space around this common goal rather than dwell on our differences.

We are not ready yet to do that now. We see the other parties with different views as, well, others. It’s us vs them, even within the community.

At the moment we are communicating in a way that makes it difficult for others emotionally to want to hear us because each party now is demanding and imposing, putting up barriers and protestations. We are not ready to hear others, and we are not speaking in a way that will get others ready to hear us.

I am not leaving competitive Scrabble despite my disappointment in the latest event. I hope as time lessens the pain, we can start listening better, communicating better, and rebuild the state of our game. In fact, I hope this will be a catalyst to bring us to newer heights.

Quo Vadis?

Maybe yet another observation from boxing may help. There are various avenues to box.

Those who enjoy the acts of swinging punches and dodging them, or see them as fruitful exercises for a healthy body, can take up recreational boxing and apply the techniques in gyms but without opponents hitting back at them, eg hitting sandbags or a partner with punching pads.

Those who desire competition and relish proving themselves against others play by a different rule in competitive boxing. Perhaps not for everyone, age limit may apply for safety, weight classes may be enforced to avoid one-sided harmful bouts. But those deemed safe can compete against their equals.

Even in the competitive scene, some want to compete within reasonably safer boundaries of the amateur competition with safety rules such as headgear (which ironically may not be safer and may be reversed) and the standing 8-count. And some want less restriction to unleash their full potential for a higher pay-off in the professional scene.

That range of clear choices is currently lacking in organized Scrabble.

More precisely, that range of choices, even if they exist, have not gained sufficient recognition from the rest of the world.

We need to get our act together to continue creating the choices and actively gain recognition rather than just hope to be tolerated.

Coming Out for Acceptance

Some Scrabble tournament players aspire to be viewed as being pros in the game and feel the image of Scrabble as a fun family game continue to hold the pros back from due recognition.

Scrabble, though relatively easy to learn, takes years of dedicated practice to really excel in — the same commitment one might see in professional athletes.

The Scrabble “pros” spend thousands of hours learning all the eligible words — one may understand their “attachment” to their words and the dismay when the words are changed too drastically. They analyze thousands of games to hone their abilities to find viable positions on the board and calculating probabilities of moves with the best chance of winning.

To them, and the rest of the competitive players, Scrabble is serious stuff.

This may not square with the image of Scrabble held by many, as a more relaxing game that puts a higher premium on bonding over winning, and accordingly sets a different expectation on how the players should approach the game.

We may need to communicate our needs better, on why we need a different space, and what kind of space. The general public may not even know of the existence of competitive players, and hence their ignorance in just unilaterally sanitizing the dictionary. We can use some allies who understand us, and not just feel we are a thorn among the rest of the Scrabble participants.

Maybe it will be different if we can educate the public more, rather than just speaking within our community, on how words to us are just strings of letters for scoring and strategically shaping the board, devoid of meaning.

Maybe it will be different if they are aware of the dedication that the pros put in and the recognition that they hope to have, without infringing on the public image of Scrabble.

Maybe it will be different if more of the public know there are Scrabble clubs where all words count. In the same way that youths with physical outbursts may be pointed to boxing clubs as outlets to channel their energy more constructively, language purists who want a full expression of their language can feel welcome in such clubs rather than more casual family players. Maybe the public to acknowledge such clubs can benefit such people.

Maybe we should start with ourselves: do we really know what space we want? What do we want out of Scrabble, and what do we not need from Scrabble that we can let go of?

Maybe we can then match our will to grow our scene with the goodwill of the rest of the world to allow us to grow.

Maybe then we, like the boxers, can be better accepted despite some of our practices which may seem unconventional.

We are still far from that picture, but that’s OK if we start taking steps.

Even a sport with a long history and better-established structure such as boxing continues to experience pull from both directions: on one side those who continue championing a ban on boxing, and the other side those who want to push their limit even more (bare-knuckle boxing, anyone?).

Recognition, and clear spaces, ensure competitive boxing remains available for licensed boxers, in a world separate from those who shun hard-hitting sports. Good fences make good neighbours.

My Name is Ricky, and I am a Competitive Scrabbler

I have often played up the fact that I’m a competitive Scrabble player where possible eg when getting to know a new acquaintance better.

I have also reached out to strangers who I thought may benefit from knowing the competitive Scrabble scene — I once greeted a young lady out of the blue on the train and gave my number, because I saw her holding a list of Scrabble 3-letter words.

Not something a deep introvert like myself would do, but I am glad it led to a handful of new people (the lady brought me to coach her group of friends) knowing more of competitive Scrabble. (I’m also glad that I survived my wife’s incredulous stare when I just greeted a young lady right in front of her eyes.)

In light of the current event, I will resolve to promote the scene even more and find more reason to proudly proclaim the competitive Scrabble scene to the public.

I for one am also ready to pay for a licence to compete in Scrabble. I will sign off my consent on the words to use and rules to abide by. I will go for a psychological test if need be to certify my moral fitness, that I am not a misogynist/racist/misanthrope or whatever it is that may prejudice the choice of words I play in the game.

If going through a registration like what the licensed boxers do will allow me to lay the game I love at the highest possible level with the widest possible option, sign me up.

I look forward to losing a game of Scrabble to an opponent playing CHINK against me, then shaking his hand congratulating him on the superior moves in the end, just like a losing boxer congratulating his victorious opponent after 15 rounds of vigorous slugging.

And I hope I still get to play STARFUCKING one day. The word, not the act. One can but dream.