When playing around with the relaunched Xbox Design Lab, to create the colorful Xbox Series controller of my dreams, I was delighted to notice I could add a little 16 character engraving on the front to really make it my own. But then realized my ideal choice was deemed ânot a valid engravingâ according to The Man. Dashed were my dreams of a controller boasting the words, âLovely Bumholeâ. So I decided to see what else Microsoft forbids.
First of all, they seem very ashamed of body parts. If you were hoping to see an Xbox Wireless Controller sporting the word âpenisâ, âvaginaâ, or even simply âassâ, then youâre S out of L. But they havenât stopped there. Incredibly, Microsoft even blushes at internal parts of your front bottom, including the word âurethraâ. In fact, if you were especially proud of your âuterusâ, âclitorisâ, âscrotumâ or âfallopian tubeâ, youâre not welcome. Yet, peculiarly, âovaryâ, âcervixâ and âvas deferensâ are all just fine. They banned âfallopian tubeâ! (Yet âfallopianâ and âtubeâ are fine on their own.) And like Batman, your Xbox will not engage in âoral sexâ or âcunnilingusâ. In fact, joining Twitch, it even outright bans the word âlickâ.
Itâs extraordinarily complicated in some areas, and woefully over-simplified in others. As I experimented, I 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.
âKillâ is an allowed word, but then will get banned in particular pairings. âKill Penguinsâ is fine, but âKill Womenâ, unsurprisingly, is not. Yet, and well, hmmm, âKill Menâ is apparently all good. (âKill All Menâ bad though.)
Switch out to âmurderââanother accepted wordâand now you canât âMurder Childrenâ but you can âMurder Womenâ. Oh, and babies too. Microsoft officially on record saying you can murder babies.
Meanwhile, the Beast Of Redmond is absolutely not down with a controller suggesting âKill Americansâ, but takes no issue with âKill The Englishâ, âKill Belgiansâ or âKill Russiansâ. However, in a curveball, it does take issue with âI Hate Englandâ and âI Hate Russiansâ, but allows âI Hate Belgiansâ.
Getting more imaginative, I wondered if I might be allowed to âNuke Americaâ, but I was not. Yet apparently itâs all good to unleash the bombs on âEnglandâ, âEgyptâ and once more, poor old âBelgiumâ. Nuking Israel or Palestine is unacceptable, as is nuking âAfricaâ, but pick an individual African country and bombs away. You canât âNuke Japanâ, but you can âNuke Chinaâ!
How about religions? You may not âKill Christiansâ, âJewsâ, âHindusâ nor âMuslimsâ, but apparently weâre fine to âKill Sikhsâ and âBuddhistsâ. âKill Jesusâ isnât accepted, but âKill Christâ is. And, incredibly/worryingly, âMohammedâ/âMuhammadâ is fair game.
Oh, and just to be absolutely clear, donât think of asking it to write âKill Microsoftâ, and âKill Nintendoâ is out, but youâre just dandy to purchase âKill Sonyâ or âSegaâ. Huh. (âMicrosoft Sucksâ is also banned, but the rest of the console makers are fair game.)
Moving away from murder, this does tip over into some unfortunate prejudice. If you wanted to boast your âqueer prideâ, sorry, nope, thatâs no good. But if you want to âpunch queersâ, theyâve got your back. Whatever system theyâve got running there that bans âqueerâ but allows âqueersâ, seems⊠problematic. Equally awful, you cannot threaten âtransâ but you can threaten âtrans womenâ.
Theyâre very pro-feminism, Iâm pleased to report. If you want to control your games while reading âFeminism is coolâ, youâre good. But if you were to disagree and think âFeminism is badâ, then no slogan for you. At this point I got a little obsessed with trying to fathom the algorithm or whatever is going on here, because somehow something as nonsensical and specific as âFeminism is rudeâ is banned, but you can be unequivocal and declare that âFeminism is fineâ. Itâs actually kind of incredible. Youâre allowed to write âMisogynyâ, but it jumps in to stop something as peculiar as âMisogyny winsâ. Yet âMisogyny rulesâ is A-OK.
Microsoft has clearly some personal preferences when it comes to the time of the month. You may not discuss your âtamponâ on your controller, but you may bring up your âsanitary towelâ. And if you were wondering, no, Xbox doesnât like to use a âcondomâ.
The system clutches its pearls at pretty much all curse words, even including âDamnâ, which is a damned shame since that looks damned cool on an Xbox Controller. Obviously you may not âfuckâ, but equally you cannot âfeckâ. Yet there are some weird oversights, like it being completely cool with âBuggerâ.
âInfanticideâ is not an appropriate thing to write on a controller. I mean, in general, Iâm just telling you that. But Microsoft agrees. However, where we divert is on âMatricideâ, with which theyâre cool. Yet if youâre after a more general approach to the matter, unfortunately âGenocideâ is not going to get printed.
If you were hoping to commemorate the last year and a half, Iâm sorry to tell you that âCoronavirusâ, âCovid-19â and all its variants arenât acceptable. But then at the same time, youâre also not allowed to get a controller with âSmallpoxâ written on it. âChicken poxâ is good though, as is âRabiesâ. Yes, I reached the point of trying âRabiesâ.
A bespoke design shouting âYOUR MOMâ is not available. Nor indeed could you get âYo momma so fatâ. And if youâre hurting after a break-up, youâre good if âMen Are Trashâ, but out if âWomen Are Trashâ.
This is literally my day now. There is such a fantastic lack of internal logic to this system that it becomes infinitely fascinating. You canât have âMufflerâ, which I presumed was due to its containing âMuffâ, but nope, âMufflersâ is fine. You may use âButtâ, but you may not require it âKiss my buttâ. (Yet you can, and I so very well might, get âKiss My Bottomâ.)
If thereâs a serious point to be found here, itâs that such design tools open up extremely complicated issues for companies, as they create the situation where theyâre selling officially licensed products that might well contain some problematic wording. Banned word lists are usually easily evaded with misspellings or creative approaches, but Microsoft really seems to have gone out of its way to try to prevent some extremely specific instances of this here. While at the same time leaving some very troubling gaps. That you can, right now, buy an official controller from Microsoft right now that reads âKill trans womenâ is a big problem. It becomes a farcical one when you equally cannot buy one that says, âDamnâ.
There is no elegant solution. If you reverse the process and allow customers to choose from a list of acceptable words, by necessity that prevents positive statements like, say, âGay and proudâ in order to prevent âgayâ being misused elsewhere.
Then again, right now with the current system you absolutely cannot get âGay and proudâ written on your Xbox controller, while âgayâ is not a banned word. So clearly something has gone extremely wrong.
