The Inside Jeopardy! podcast addressed the controversial clue from Jeopardy!’s October 28 game.
Last week, four-day champion Will Wallace, a game design director from Austin, Texas competed against Ian Taylor, a food sales rep originally from Cleveland, Ohio and Heather Ryan, a health program director from Binghamton, New York on the trivia game show. There was a category named “Complete the Rhyming Phrase,” where a bespectacled Heather selected a clue for $400.
The clue read, “Men seldom make passes at…” and Will finished the rhyme with the answer of “Who are girls who wear glasses.” As host Ken Jennings went to inform Will that his answer was correct, he spoke on the problematic element of the rhyming phrase. Ken had said “Yeah, a little problematic. Sorry Heather,” and Will agreed, simply saying, “Very.”
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Heather just responded incredulously to the clue and its answer as she looked to the side to where the audience resided. At the time, Jeopardy fans were outraged by the clue and for Heather. One fan wrote on the Jeopardy! subreddit for the episode: “Rhyming phrases category was awful, especially the sexist clue.” Another said: “‘Yeah, a little problematic’ Ken. Um, then why didn’t you bring that up to the writers before the game?”
Inside Jeopardy!’s hosts Sarah Whitcomb Foss and Buzzy Cohen talked about the controversial clue and the backlash on Monday, November 4, episode of the podcast. They explained where it came from and bemoaned the response it garnered.
“I think many people out there thought the Jeopardy! writers wrote this, or thought this,” Sarah said. “But in fact, Dorothy Parker wrote this, about 100 years ago, in a 1926 book. We were just simply filling in the category.”
Sarah went on to talk about how major publications covered the situation and their headlines. Cohen added his own anecdote of being asked about it in person by a stranger.
“Can I tell you, someone ran up to me in a coffee shop and was like, ‘What was this going on with the glasses, making fun of the glasses?'” Cohen said. “I was like ‘What are you talking about?’ Wild. We gotta read more.”
“And Ken in the moment was like, ‘Oh gosh, woah thats harsh’ to Heather, because he was just being a host in the moment.” Sarah further said.
Cohen agreed, chiming in that Ken was “having a little fun.” Sarah concluded the conversation by saying “sometimes the clickbait is too much” and how her husband brought it up by sending her an article.
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