Friday 30 August 2013

Transphobia or a Joke Taken Too Far?


A few months ago a friend of mine that is also a passionate gamer introduced me to the online game reviewer ‘Zero Punctuation’.  Staring Ben ‘Yahtzee’ Crowshaw Zero Punctuation offers a comical video review of a video game every week, complete with animation and fun facts.

The reviews are almost always humorous, and often can be very scathing towards the games faults or certain companies.  Crowshaw will even at times turn his jokes around upon himself and make himself the butt of the jokes.

However, one of his latest videos, in which he reviews two downloadable games seems to take a particular joke aimed at trans people and uses it repeatedly to the point where I have to question if it is even a joke anymore or just straight up Transphobia.


I’ve watched loads of these videos, so I know how his sense of humour works and that he can sometimes pick on people but it just seems like this time he’s crossed the line from cheap joke to something a little nastier.  I particularly object to the work ‘Trannies’ being used onscreen repeatedly during the video.

It’s all down to personal interpretation though, an I urge you all to watch it yourselves and give your comments on the video bellow, I for one though feel that perhaps this was one joke too far and is just another in a long line of examples of how trans people are used as a source of humour and a target of thinly veiled insults.

Amy.
xx


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3 comments:

  1. It didn't bother me. It seemed like a very bit part of his overall review. He didn't harp on it. It does make me wonder why he'd bring up the point or if airports and checkpoints matching gender to IDs has become such a big mainstream issue.

    - Lindsey

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  2. you nailed it girl

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  3. As a transwoman myself, I think his review was borderline transphobic but I guess it would be how you looked at it. I have seen way worse so this is my reason for saying I think it id very borderline.

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