Right-wing activists can’t joke about renaming a chess piece
Right-wing activists are crying foul and accusing Chess.com of religious persecution. The hysteria was caused by a poll post from Chess.com, which asked other chess enthusiasts to rename the bishop piece.
The Chess.com official X account posted a photo of the bishop piece and captioned the post, “Accepting new name ideas for this piece.” What seemed an innocent joke poll immediately took on an extremely right-wing turn. Ultra-religious folks came out of hiding, offended that the chess website would do such a thing to the precious bishop.
One triggered conservative activist wrote, “Why are you trying to erase the word bishop?” Others, refusing to engage with what they think is nonsense, just reiterated that they want the piece to stay named “bishop.” Meanwhile, anti-Semites came out of hiding and wrote that the post was “extremely Jewish.”
These were not just a small number of comments. The conservatives engaging with the poll couldn’t make light of the joke. Renaming a chess piece is enough to trigger a breakdown these days, apparently. Surely, nobody expected a fun board game post to become fascist rage bait.
Needless to say, other X users were morbidly intrigued by the delirious reactions. Many less excitable social media users thought the reactions were over the top. Another X user wrote regarding the phenomenon, “I’ve never seen so much right-wing paranoid mass psychosis under a single silly a** tweet.” The same user then suggested the piece be named “bu—plug.” Crass as the suggestion may be, you have to admit that the resemblance is uncanny.
Can’t take what they dish out
Thankfully, some people understood the joke and wrote responses like “pretzel.” But more are whining about “cultural erasure” than laughing at the harmless joke. To describe them as “melting” snowflakes doesn’t cut it. They’re going nuclear and spouting radiation at minority groups they feel threatened by. Clearly, the only issue they’re willing to care about is a non-issue—a literal joke. Hate, not love, thy neighbor, seems to be their mantra.
It’s almost comical that these fanatics decry “cultural erasure” and then simultaneously throw racial slurs in the same breath. These are the same people, no doubt, who collapse over renaming a chess piece but refuse to refer to transgender people’s pronouns or names respectfully. They would laugh at deportation ASMRs but revile a meme post about a board game. But sure, the real-world problem is a gag post about chess.
Regardless, these ludicrous reactions prove that these right-wing activists are just as obsessed with policing speech. A word of advice: cry harder.
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