Posted on 03/22/2020 7:34:02 AM PDT by NRx
The popular puzzles are largely written and edited by older white men, who dictate what makes it into the grid—and what is kept out.
Last month, Sally Hoelscher published her first crossword puzzle in The New York Times. It was Presidents’ Day; the theme was memoirs by first ladies. Like lots of nerdy subcultures, the crossword puzzle has a buzzing ecosystem, and it whirred into action. Hoelscher posted a photo of the newspaper her husband rose early on his day off to buy, and veteran crossword constructors, as they’re called, offered congratulations in a Facebook group that develops constructors from underrepresented groups. Some of the Times’ 600,000 digital-crossword subscribers finished Hoelscher’s puzzle with their thumbs, extending their solving streaks, and crossword bloggers (yes, they exist) favorably reviewed the puzzle’s theme, non-thematic vocabulary, and clues.
In comments sections on crossword blogs, alongside off-color jokes about hypothetical titles for a Melania Trump memoir, a debate raged. Jenni Levy, an internist and a writer on the review site Diary of a Crossword Fiend, applauded how Hoelscher’s puzzle “passe[d] the crossword Bechdel test.” But Levy bemoaned a “missed opportunity.”
“I went through looking for men’s names with mounting excitement: What if there weren’t any?” she wrote. Alas, 66-Across, DEE, was clued as “Billy ___ Williams,” not as the letter or the grade. Responding to Levy’s lament, a commenter wondered: “Why is it desirable/necessary to have women’s names predominate in crossword puzzles … I ignore the male/female body count.” Levy’s response was a perfect, full-throated call to arms for inclusivity in the crossworld:
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
“who dictate.” Feminists did what now?
If you’ve done a NYT crossword recently then you know they are laden with more gay propaganda.
He might consider that those who might score best on it, wouldn't bother attempting in the first place.
I'd like to see the "spell-check" used for it.....
RWPP
Our nation has it WAY to good.
Make up your own flipping crossword.
Who said the people who write them have to censor themselves?
If you don’t like their words, do your own.
This noxious screed reminds of all those who screeched about Wonder Woman complaining she should be a dyke woman of color.
MAKE UP YOUR OWN. Stop attempting to censor everyone else!
Well it’s something that requires a rather large vocabulary. Something larger than Racist, Homophobe, Xenophobe, GlobalWarming, Diversity etc
I really can’t say FU to these people enough. I’m thinking about getting myself diagnosed for terret’s syndrome after this coronavirus thing blows through...
True, paucity of language is a plague in itself.
I returned to school after I retired to launch another career. I was chastised for using “big” words in my writing. Fortunately, there were several other men and women in the classes who were retired and taking them for fun who also used “big” words.
Fewer words means less ability to formulate and discuss concepts and ideas.
Orwell lives! (But not for long)
As if anyone needed further proof that the motto of liberals/progressives is: “There is no lower limit to our stupitidy.”
Would love to work on a non woke, liberal progressive elitist, racist, transgender, gay and lesbian, islamaphobic, xenophobic, anti-Semitic, non diversity, non pc, radical left, dimwitted congress A holes crossword pussle
I enjoy the occasional crossword puzzle. Yes, many of them are intentionally/obviously or subtly themed. That’s part of the puzzle. Now we’re looking for bigotry/racism/sexism or whatever in our puzzles? Hey, if you want to look at biases in entertainment - why not look into the rampant pro-homosexual agenda in mainstream entertainment? Leave crosswords alone. Sheesh. If you look hard enough, and through the right lens, you can find something wrong with just about any work in any field. Hey, I’m sure the comments in the code I write would probably offend someone. You see I assume if you’re reading my code you have some basic understanding of the language, algorithms, hardware architecture, etc. so the bar to understanding what I’m doing is pretty high. No, I will not dumb-down my code nor my comments.
“Fewer words means less ability to formulate and discuss concepts and ideas.”
Agreed, in part.
Snooty-snoot, High Fahlutin, Wordy Word bunk is not always the best path to reach folks.
Language must be appropriate and relative to the target audience. When discussing technical ideas, every industry has their own tech-speak. For those well-versed in that sub-culture, tech-speak is an effective shorthand to get ideas across. For newbies, it can be undecipherable. Same material, two different audiences.
Klaatu Barada Nikto for those of a certain age makes sense. Discussing the use of name, names and naming in Ulysses makes sense to Joyce fans.
Like Rawing the Pooch. If you get it, ya’ll be nasty.
The Atlantic used to be a great magazine. Presently the only difference I see between it and most lefty blogs is the spelling and grammar is better.
It seemed pretty far to the left by the eighties.
I do a lot of crosswords. Personally, I find it offensive when the answers (or clues) contain foreign words of any kind, let alone malapropisms and neologisms that are the result of linguistic laziness.
Ms Levy’s hostility to black men is duly noted
I want crossword puzzles that most reflect the English language first and Western Culture second.
I don’t think I would be particularly interested in a puzzle that concentrated on obscure women’s physical parts, new or old designer clothes, or group’s/ Of course, other words in a crossword can lead to a correct result and I’m not against learning new words.
But globalization and female words CAN POSSIBLY lead to more separation between the genders and what comes next. Remember when you first learned what ‘breeder’ or “bagging” referred to?? Terminology for female camels crossed by Indian word for Transgender person is getting way too far afield in my opinion.
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