Microsoft’s Xbox has opened up a new feature that allows users to design their own Xbox controller. Known as “Xbox Design Lab,” gamers can “Customize the features of the new Xbox Wireless Controller, including the hybrid D-pad, textured triggers, quick-access Share button, and more for a personalized controller that’s uniquely yours.”
One customization option is an “optional laser-engraving” to make the controller “one-of-a-kind.” However, as John Walker noted for Kotaku, a hilarious collection of words is forbidden by Microsoft.
“First of all, they seem very ashamed of body parts. If you were hoping to see an Xbox Wireless Controller sporting the word ‘penis,’ ‘vagina,’ or even simply ‘ass,’ then you’re S out of L,” quipped Walker. “But they haven’t stopped there. Incredibly, Microsoft even blushes at internal parts of your front bottom, including the word ‘urethra.’ In fact, if you were especially proud of your ‘uterus,’ ‘clitoris,’ ‘scrotum’ or ‘fallopian tube,’ you’re not welcome.”
“Yet, peculiarly, ‘ovary,’ ‘cervix’ and ‘vas deferens’ are all just fine. They banned ‘fallopian tube!’ (Yet ‘fallopian’ and ‘tube’ are fine on their own.) And like Batman, your Xbox will not engage in ‘oral sex’ or ‘cunnilingus.’”
“It’s extraordinarily complicated in some areas, and woefully over-simplified in others,” Walker explained, saying that he “became increasingly sure human intervention was a large part of how this list was compiled, deliberately banning very particular word combinations where each word alone was acceptable.”
Walker continued to list numerous words and combinations of words that were bizarrely allowed or disallowed.
“‘Kill’ is an allowed word, but then will get banned in particular pairings. ‘Kill Penguins’ is fine, but ‘Kill Women,’ unsurprisingly, is not. Yet, and well, hmmm, ‘Kill Men’ is apparently all good. (‘Kill All Men’ bad though,)” Walker wrote. “Switch out to ‘murder’ — another accepted word — and now you can’t ‘Murder Children’ but you can ‘Murder Women.’ Oh, and babies too.”
“Meanwhile, the Beast Of Redmond is absolutely not down with a controller suggesting ‘Kill Americans,’ but takes no issue with ‘Kill The English,’ ‘Kill Belgians’ or ‘Kill Russians.’ However, in a curveball, it does take issue with ‘I Hate England’ and ‘I Hate Russians,’ but allows ‘I Hate Belgians,’” Walker continued. “Getting more imaginative, I wondered if I might be allowed to ‘Nuke America,’ but I was not. Yet apparently it’s all good to unleash the bombs on ‘England,’ ‘Egypt’ and once more, poor old ‘Belgium.’ Nuking Israel or Palestine is unacceptable, as is nuking ‘Africa,’ but pick an individual African country and bombs away. You can’t ‘Nuke Japan,’ but you can ‘Nuke China!’”
After discussing various rules regarding religions — such as “Kill Christians” being prohibited while “Kill Sikhs” is permitted — Walker noted a surprisingly non-woke theme.
“Moving away from murder, this does tip over into some unfortunate prejudice,” Walker said. “If you wanted to boast your ‘queer pride,’ sorry, nope, that’s no good. But if you want to ‘punch queers,’ they’ve got your back. Whatever system they’ve got running there that bans ‘queer’ but allows ‘queers,’ seems… problematic. Equally awful, you cannot threaten ‘trans’ but you can threaten ‘trans women.’”
After listing multiple other examples, such as “Men Are Trash” being allowed while “Women Are Trash” is not, Walker stated that “If there’s a serious point to be found here, it’s that such design tools open up extremely complicated issues for companies, as they create the situation where they’re selling officially licensed products that might well contain some problematic wording.”