I've been aware of it slightly, but not in much depth, so some of this might be incorrect.
The Original limerick:
Here lies Firedorn, a hero in his bed
He once was alive, but now he's dead
The last woman he bedded, turned out a man
And crying in shame, off a cliff he ran
Which has now be replaced by:
Here lies Firedorn, a bard, a poet
He was also a card, but most didn't know it
A poem he wrote in jest was misread
They asked for blood, so now he's just dead
Which is apparently a replacement written by the person who wrote the original.
Here is a
thread on Obsidian's forum discussing it. Here are a couple of samples:
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So the SJW nazis who hate women, minorities, men, and everything else get their way again. These evil punks are about power, control, and slavery.
How long til we see 'outrage' about husband murder, referring to women as 'fire whores', rape, racism, and a whole bunch of other nasty stuff?
DOES. NOT. MAKE. SENSE.
These people have no morals.
They aren't about equality. I AM ABOUT EQUALITY. Why is Obsidian anti equality?
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Take a peek at her response, now she feels powerful that she made Obsidian change something, it was never about trans people, it was ever about outrage, it is about making a company backpedal to their desires. Do not pity them.
I also must say it's pretty funny how much anger there is about a "vocal, oversensitive, offended minority" when I probably wouldn't have even heard about this if not for those vocal complaints about that minority... Tom Hatfield's tweet on that front is rather amusing too:
"Total Biscuit literally recorded a 12 minute rant because a woman with 660 followers didn't like a joke"
The rant also starts by kindly informing the listener that TB has never heard of transmisogny, which is a useful warning going into it.
Reddit thread discussing it. Lots of comments about "outrage culture" and outrage about "censorship".
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It's pretty clear that the limerick was making fun of some idiot for running off a cliff. I mean, his gravestone certainly wasn't honoring him.
Let's assume that the guy was a transphobe, and that's why he died. Obsidian has now set the precedent that you can no longer make fun of transphobes for being retarded, lest some offendatron misinterpret it and throw a hissy fit. Best to not say anything about transphobes at all, right?
Good job, Obsidian! Nice to know there are some things we just shouldn't make fun of.
The above post has +59 upvotes.
My initial reaction upon reading the original limerick wasn't that the joke is at the expense of transphobes, and I don't think that it's "pretty clear" that the limerick is doing anything very different from the sadly run of the mill "HAHAHA, stereotype" type of "just a joke" that a lot of people seem happy to vigorously defend when its aimed at certain minorities. The stigma doesn't seem there yet in the way that it is for 50's humour regarding race for example. The same people (speaking acecdotally) seem happy to point out that there is an apparently obvious difference, but to me it just seems a question of social context. It's like they aren't totally aware that blatant racism in the past wasn't seen exactly how it is seen now.
Obviously the racism of the past is different from current forms of discrimination, because
everyone knows it was unnaceptable, but current forms of discrimination aren't so socially stigmatised as past forms of discrimination now are, so they must be different...Ugh. I'm finding it difficult to eloquently summarise what I mean.
The new limerick essentially seems to be "It's just a joke guys, what an overreaction, it's political correctness gone mad"... The removal of a limerick is apparently "asking for blood". The blame is put on people who have misinterpretted the limerick. Personally, I'd be looking at the "poet" who writes something that gets his point across so poorly that its so easily "misread". Of course, personally, I'd also remove the limerick on account of it maintaining its rhyme scheme by resorting to such an awfully contrived phrase as "crying in shame, off a cliff he ran"... Know that Yoda wrote limericks, I did not.