WARNING! SPOILERS FOR MAY 9, WORDLE BELOW…
After users raised concerns about two solutions, the New York Times acknowledged that it had changed Monday’s Wordle answer.
According to Times bosses, the answer was changed from “fetus”, last week.
This was after the Supreme Court leaked plans to repeal Roe v Wade, which guarantees American women the right of an abortion.
The Times acknowledged Monday that it could not completely eliminate the original answer for the fetus from its system. However, some players still had the option of this solution.
The paper issued a statement saying: ‘Some users may see an outdated answer that seems closely related to a major recent news event.
“At New York Times Games we take our responsibility as a place for entertainment and escape. Wordle should be distinct from the news,” it says.
“But, because the Wordle technology is currently in use it may be hard to modify words already loaded into the game.
We switched the word for as many problem solvers last week as we could because we had discovered that it would appear today. If you refresh your browser, the old version won’t be displayed.
“But, but we know that not all people will do that. Therefore, the question of how to solve an old puzzle is being asked.
“This is completely unintentional, and a coincidence” – Wordle’s original response was uploaded to Wordle last year.
New York Times executives released a statement revealing that they had changed today’s Wordle answer – “fetus” – because it was too politically charged after players complained about not being able to see the wordle.
Wordle was bought out for an undisclosed seven figure sum at the end of January from its creator, British software engineer Josh Wardle
This change is occurring amid protests against a Supreme Court Draft decision, which would reverse the historic Roe v. Wade decision, which granted women Constitutional rights to have an abortion.
The change in answers comes just one week after Politico first released a leaked United States Supreme Court draft decision that would overturn Roe v. Wade, with Chief Justice John Roberts confirming its authenticity the next day.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the opinion: “Roe was clearly wrong right from the beginning. Roe and Casey should be overruled.
“It’s time to listen to the Constitution, and to return the question of abortion to the elected representatives of the people.”
Liberal Democrats immediately took to Twitter to protest the release of it. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez tweeted that Senator Joe Manchin was preventing the vote to codify abortion rights into law. Sen. Bernie Sanders however suggested that ending filibuster would get it through.
All over the country protests have erupted, both for and against the draft.
Security guards were called in to help with the chaos. High fencing surrounded the Supreme Court Wednesday evening, as anti- and pro-abortion activists clashed.
Five conservative justices of the court have signed on to the decision
Justice Samuel Alito, pictured above, originally wrote it. He stated that “Roe was inexplicably wrong right from the beginning”.
Still, the Supreme Court seems poised to enact the decision – which would eliminate a women’s Constitutional right to an abortion, as the Washington Post reported over the weekend that the five justices who signed onto the opinion stand by their votes.
Justices Samuel Alito (Clarence Thomas), Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh are some of those who support Roe V. Wade and removing women’s Constitutional right for abortion.
Chief Justice John Roberts, meanwhile, still seems to oppose the decision – written by Justice Alito – and is trying to get Justices Barrett and Kavanaugh to take a more incremental decision before the Supreme Court formally announces its decision in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case.
In December, he reportedly stated to his colleagues that he would uphold state law and draft an opinion which would preserve Roe and 1992 Casey v Planned Parenthood. However, the conservative justices are more interested in any decision that will overturn Roe.
The Washington Post reported that he will not give up his efforts. People who know him say he has been preparing his opinions in the hope of drawing at least one new conservative justice to his side.
The Post claims that if this were to occur, it would save Roe and Casey’s decisions, but severely limit their protections.
In the meantime, though, Barrett and Kavanaugh are still expressing their support for the decision, which will be opposed by Roberts and the Supreme Court’s three liberal justices. Accordingly, it would pass the Supreme Court 5-4.
Not for the first time, it means there are two possible answers that Wordle players can potentially get on Monday, frustrating fans of the game
Some Wordle fans took to Twitter to voice their confusion – one user, @yescaptain, said: ‘Hey @nytimes – WTF? My wife gets ***** and I get FETUS’
Some Wordle fans took to Twitter to voice their confusion – one user, @yescaptain, said: ‘Hey @nytimes – WTF? My wife gets “shine” and me get FETUS.
Referring to the American spelling, another user, @ameenab2003, said: ‘Not spelled properly anyway. It contains 6 letters so it shouldn’t be on the list.
According to the New York Times, there are two possible answers Monday. However, it stated “that this is an extremely unusual circumstance”.
But this is not the first time this has happened since the takeover – in February, the original answer for Wordle #241 was changed from ‘agora’ to ‘aroma’ because the former was deemed too obscure.
Wordle #284 in March was also changed to “harry” from “stove” for the same reason. Both instances were confusing for some people, but they still got the original word.
Wordle has successfully removed several offensive words, such as ‘lynch,”slave, and ‘wench. This was disclosed earlier in the year.
NYT employees felt these words were too offensive, so they needed to be eliminated.
MailOnline spoke with Jordan Cohen, NYT Communications Director: “We’re updating the wordlist over time to remove obscure terms to keep the puzzle available to more people as well as to remove insensitive and offensive words.
The New York Times purchased the immensely popular game in January 2022. This is its Manhattan headquarters.
Fibre (most likely because it is the British spelling, not the American spelling), and more curiously, puppy are some other removed words.
BoingBoing reports that NYT also took out offensive racist and sexual slurs, such as ‘pussy,’ and ‘whore, from its list of accepted guesses.
It’s been just over three months since the NYT acquired Wordle, the hugely popular puzzle created by Wales-born software engineer Josh Wardle.
Wardle designed the game to please his girlfriend Palak Shah who is a lover of word puzzles.
At the beginning of November, the simple game – which involves guessing a five-letter word in six tries – had only 90 players; now there are 300,000 who play it every day, the NYT has said.
Since Wordle’s takeover, fans have expressed fears that it will go behind a paywall sooner or later, like much of the NYT’s website
NYT said that they will initially be free for existing and new players.