TWIBS: Game Makers Vow to Donate Harry Potter Spinoff Game’s Profit to Trans Charities
After making the absolutely bizarre choice to license Harry Potter for a spinoff of their popular game Codenames, Czech Games Edition apologizes three times and swears they’ll do better.
Humor by Aly Gibbs
This Week in Barrel Scraping (TWIBS) is Assigned Media’s oldest column! Every Friday, Aly Gibbs digs deep from the well of transphobia and finds the most obnoxious, goofy thing transphobes have said or obsessed over during the week and tears it to shreds.
Have you ever played Codenames? It’s a cute party game where two teams compete to guess the correct words associated with a one-word hint, and it was so popular on release that it won a prestigious board games award, a thing that I didn’t even know existed until exactly right now*!
*“Exactly right now” may vary based on when you read this article and when I wrote it. Thank you for understanding.
Unfortunately, having one good idea doesn’t protect you from having really bad ideas, which is why Codenames’ publisher, Czech Games Edition (CGE), caught a lot of flak last month for publishing a Codenames spinoff on July 23 based on vast multimedia franchise Harry Potter, created by Britain’s most transphobic woman and one of the wealthiest and most powerful anti-trans activists on Earth, J.K. Rowling.
This amusingly buffoonish series of blunders was documented by Mollie Russell at Wargamer, beginning with coverage of CGE’s first statement on July 25 explaining their decision to license a Potter spinoff. Without naming Rowling, they describe her franchise as “a source of inspiration,” one which “ignited a passion for learning English and exploring new worlds through reading … even among those who have been hurt by the public views and actions of its creator.”
After saying that they respect people who would rather not engage with the game and encouraging “care, empathy, and respect” when discussing their decision to create it, CGE began blocking their detractors on social media.
Then, on July 30, CGE put out a second statement admitting wrongdoing and begging for patience from those they had harmed, saying they were “working towards a concrete solution” to make amends.
At last, on August 8, CGE shared their face saving plans in a third announcement.
“We are all devastated that the project we were so excited to share with you caused harm instead of joy,” they said. “In our excitement about creating a game within a universe many of us still treasure, we failed to see how that universe no longer brings joy to others … We apologize unreservedly for not doing more to consider that possibility, and for subsequently announcing the game without taking preemptive actions to mitigate the pain it would cause.”
They vowed to donate 100% of the profit generated by the Potter spinoff of Codenames to “appropriate charitable organizations,” which sounds awesome… but CGE makes charitable donations at the end of the calendar year, so we’ll see if they put their money where their mouth is come December. They haven’t named specific charities yet, instead opting to solicit recommendations from their community on which charities best support trans people. So if you’ve got a pro-trans charity in mind, I guess you can let them know on social media.
Here’s my take on the situation:
It’s great that CGE listened to their community and responded in a mostly positive way from the start. Blocking critics was a goofy move, obviously, and they cited being generally overwhelmed by the volume of responses as their reasoning for doing this… which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, considering the account isn’t anybody’s primary social media profile. If your brand account is getting yelled at, you can simply log off until you feel better equipped to respond to people.
You can have that pearl for free, CGE.
While I sincerely appreciate their decision to donate their profits to pro-trans charities (hopefully, anyway), I think it’s absurd that they made this mistake in the first place. Many of us have been saying this online for years now, but please, read any other fantasy books. Pratchett is the obvious go-to for replacing Potter specifically, but there are also countless incredible trans authors you can patronize, like Maya Deane, Gretchen Felker-Martin, or Rivers Solomon. The list is truly inexhaustible, and if you’re looking for a convenient place to find more trans fiction, I recommend Bethany Karsten’s Transfeminine Review.
Here’s my advice to you, if you happen to be a cisgender (or, terrifyingly, transgender) fan of Rowling’s wizarding world franchise: Those books were always bunk. They’re hot garbage. Even setting aside the quality of her writing (extremely low, she’s a hack), before Rowling became a conduit for world shattering transphobia, her books were filled with racist drek, fatphobia and rape culture apologia.
So if you’re considering endorsing or engaging positively with her work in any way, simply don’t. Heed your better instincts, as seeded by me, and don’t force yourself to pen three apologetic press releases in a single fortnight.
You’re welcome!
Aly Gibbs (She/They), formerly Alyssa Steinsiek, is a trans writer who reports on news important to the queer community.
