So, not just Scrabble but the derivative mobile app game “Words With Friends” had a similar unannounced purging of “offensive slurs” and other words from its lexicon sometime last year. (Along with some kind of expansion of two letter words, including abbreviations ahd “residuals”, that had not and to me ought not to be allowed, but hey, this game is not Scrabble.)
For example, I noticed that a few three-letter words I’d formerly played with some regularity, such as GYP, ABO, and LEZ, had been removed; I hadn’t actually known that ABO was a Australian slur for an Aboriginal, nor had I thought LEZ was a slur beyond being a contraction of LESBIAN (which can be a “slur” by attitude of the speaker/writer, and which word is still in the WWF lexicon).
I noticed with some amusement that FUCK was removed, but not SHIT. And that SHIKSA, which was discussed earlier in this thread for its removal in Scrabble, remains in the WWF lexicon as of this writing.
On the other hand, today I was surprised to be disallowed from playing the word RAPISTS (and it was a 90+ point bingo, too!). I can only assume this is under the category of “trigger words”?
And yet, checking the in-app dictionary, I can see that similar words for violent or abusive crimes are still allowed: MURDERER, ARSONIST, PEDOPHILE, SLAVER.
One more thing: it so happened that I was playing a blank tile for the letter R, and so I checked other letter values to fill its role in playing my bingo. And… PAPISTS was accepted. This word is definitely a slur and has led to people being identified and murdered in Northern Ireland even in our own lifetimes (well OK, I’m 50 years old, but like within the past 25-30 years).
I’m guessing it’s still in the lexicon where RAPISTS is not because this is based on some kind of “did enough people email with a complaint” thing?