I See Your Gender Neutral Card Deck And Raise You A Nina From Pasadena

A Dutch woman has created a gender-neutral playing card deck, which gave us a reason to clean up some other gambling games and terms.
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Jeff is a veteran journalist, working as a columnist for The Trentonian newspaper in Trenton, NJ for a number of years. He's also an avid sports bettor, online casino, and DFS player. He can be reached at [email protected].

Gender Neutral Card Deck
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Finally.

Finally someone with (gender neutral) cajones has done something about the centuries-long sexual inequality contained in a deck of cards.

Indy Mellink, a 23-year-old Dutch woman, was teaching her younger cousins about card games when it dawned on her: Why is the king worth more than the queen?

“If we have this hierarchy that the king is worth more than the queen, then this subtle inequality influences people in their daily life because it’s just another way of saying, ‘Hey, you’re less important,’” she said in a Reuters interview. “Even subtle inequalities like this do play a big role.”

As a result, Mellink created a new deck of cards, in which the kings, queens, and jacks have been replaced with cards representing gold bars, silver coins, and bronze shields.

She’s sold 1,500 decks to date.

And to this I say … huzzah! It is high (or low, whichever) time we as a species recognize kings are no better than queens (although jacks can bugger off, the bastards).

Now that I think about it, there are a lot of other card games and gambling-related terms that could probably use a white (or black) washing … here’s 15 of them.

Card Game Woes

To start, there’s a quartet of card games that are extremely problematic, and I’ve taken steps to correct them.

Crazy Eights: Obviously unacceptable. Should be renamed “An Individual With a Psychopathology Eights.”

Uno: An affront to non-Spanish speakers the world over. Clearly should be called “Eins Et En Un Uno Un Unus Odin Jeden Eis Yksi Bat Ekab Moja Wahed.”

Old Maid: To be called “Sexy and Single at 50” from here on out.

War: What are we teaching our children? Rename it “Diplomacy” and move on.

Pinochle: It just sounds porn-y, like something your wife never heard of but you bring up one night and she’s like, “How do you even know about that?” and you’re like, “I mean, I dunno, the internet?”

Poker Needs A Cleanup

Then there’s the whole world of poker terms. Lotsa issues here. In no particular order, then …

Straight: Clearly needs to be changed to “cisgender heterosexual,” as in, “Welp, with a nine on the river, looks like the nuts is a cisgender heterosexual.”

The nuts: Best to use “non-gender specific genitalia” here, thereby making the above, “Welp, with a nine on the river, looks like the non-gender specific genitalia is a cisgender heterosexual.” A mouthful, to be sure, but we’re living in an inclusive world. Get used to it.

Ante: Upsetting uncles for decades. No easy fix. Sending this back to committee.

Blind: I mean, come on.

Big blind: Now we’re making fun of visually impaired people with higher than average body mass index scores. 

Chopping the blinds: (breathing deeply into brown paper bag)

Short stack: It should be “little person stack,” but if we’re being honest, that just sounds worse.

Full house: Insulting to the rest of ABC’s old T.G.I.F. lineup, thus “Perfect Strangers,” “Step by Step,” or “Family Matters” are all acceptable terms, though we here at USBets are partial to calling it an “Urkel,” as in, “Urkel, gold bars over silver coins.”

If you’re still reading, here’s a few more

Then there’s a few phrases from other gambling pursuits that some folks might find offensive.

Snake eyes: The Association of Snake Supporters (A.S.S.) pointed out in a press release that snakes are not the only creatures that have two eyes. They ain’t wrong. Let’s just go with “eyes” moving forward.

Nina from Pasadena: Never even heard of this one (it’s betting that the next roll in a craps game will be a nine) until Nina from Pasadena wrote in (with accompanying Polaroid picture) and said, “I’m a 10, sugar.” The Polaroid confirmed this self-assessment, though it’s currently missing after landing on Adam the Intern’s desk.

And lastly …

Handicapper:  Um … well … OK, you know what, how are we still getting away with this one? To be fair, the etymology of the word would allow us to use it still, but it has become a pejorative to people in the disability community and thus not in use anymore and …  we really should probably stop using it. Gonna take the “L” on this one.

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