Derpygate · 9:19pm Apr 14th, 2012
I wanted to write something about this for a while, and I know some people have been waiting for me to comment because of how much my fiction has shaped their view of Derpy/Ditzy as a character. I shared my thoughts as they came in the various pony threads on RPGnet, but I never made a single, thought-out post here, mostly because of a combination of a busy semester at college and a pretty horrible cold. By the time I felt coherent enough to tackle it, the internet seemed to have passed it by. So that's why you haven't heard from me about this before now, if you cared.
When it started with the episode being pulled from iTunes, I, like many others (including the always-brilliant And That's How Equestria Was Made!), assumed it was Apple's doing. Hasbro had approved the episode for air; the unaltered episode continued to be available on the website; as I recall, the version available on Comcast's On Demand still had the original voice; they did nothing to halt or slow the release of the Friendship Express DVD. All signs pointed to Apple having a fit. When the episode went back up with the name edited out and the voice changed, I was annoyed, but continued to assume it was to appease Apple.
But then, slowly, more information started to trickle out. A Hasbro exec implied that the decision was internal. Amy Keating Rogers shared her thoughts on the subject. I still don't know if Apple had anything to do with the change, but it was becoming clear that it wasn't just to mollify them.
And now, according to another RPGnet poster, the repeat of The Last Roundup that just aired on The Hub was the altered version.
So that's the final nail in the coffin. As far as Hasbro's concerned, the changed version is the official one.
And I'm pretty goddamn pissed off about that.
I should clarify some things here. I sympathize greatly with Ms. Rogers, and I understand why she wouldn't want any ableist language in the show, intentionally or otherwise (I wouldn't either), and that her son's condition surely makes her more sensitive to such things. I just never thought "Derpy" was ablelist in the first place. Yes, in my fics, it's used as an insulting nickname, but it comes from a joke Ditzy herself made. The whole "derp" meme got its start with pictures of people with wonky eyes or weird facial expressions; that's why she was named such by the fans anyway, because of the crooked eyes the animators put in as a gag. Admittedly my own experience is purely anecdotal (but then so is everyone else's), but outside the context of derp-eyed images, I've always understood the word to mean a moment of stupidity, a failure to think, or a clumsy botch of a routine action by an otherwise intelligent person.
But that's just the name. Opinions clearly differ on what "derp" means and whether it's ableist, and I'll cut Hasbro plenty of slack for wanting to be cautious. Appearance of impropriety, etc. Besides, I can see that there could be unpleasant legal issues with them using a fan-created name, plus the evidence that "derp" itself might have originally been coined by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. So cutting the name, fine. I always preferred Ditzy Doo anyway, and I think Lauren Faust even suggested that connection.
No, what really pisses me off is what they did to her voice.
No way in Hell was Derpy's original voice ableist. It was cute, charming, adorably goofy, and had a tinge of regret when she'd realized the damage she'd done. We even know Tabitha St. Germain's specific inspiration for her voice work, straight from the unicorn's mouth. She's a wonderful voice actor, and she did a wonderful job on a tiny part when she could've easily gotten away with phoning it in.
And then Hasbro went and threw the baby out with the bathwater when they changed the episode. The replacement is vapid, devoid of character or charm, and sounds even dumber than the original. There's no indication in her tone that she has the awareness of her errors Tabitha's original had. She sounds like a stereotypical airheaded blonde.
So that's where I stand on the Derptroversy. In bowing to pressure from a small subset of the fandom, Hasbro has changed the show for the worse. This blowup has left the series, in my opinion, measurably harmed. The fandom probably burned though a lot of their goodwill with the company with this, and the chance of any future shout-outs like that has likely nosedived. But my anger towards those "fans", and especially towards Hasbro, is dwarfed by the sympathy I feel for Tabitha St. Germain. They took her wonderful voice work and tossed it in the goddamn trash.
She, and Derpy, deserved to be treated better than that.
On behalf of the brony community, Tabitha, I'm sorry.
I wish I had more to add, but that's pretty accurate. No good all around, here.
Yeah...I can understand how some people can prefer the new voice and all, but I agree wholeheartedly with your thoughts on this matter...
It's just sad, really, that in trying not to offend people they made something that imo is actually offensive--portraying her as actually stupid and incompetent, and changing RD's tone so it seems she's treating Derpy with kid gloves...If I was going to label either version an offensive portrayal of someone with a mental disability, that seeks to marginalize/dismiss them, it'd definitely be this one...
I honestly don't know how anyone could type this out better. kudos to you. I fell in love with Derpy when I heard her original voice.
well, this was refreshing,
My sympathy for tabs, it like spending hours working on a specific meal set and having your boss take a taste and throwing the whole meal, plates and all into the garbage.
I work in a professional kitchen
Well said indeed. I was kind of po'ed at the changed of Derpy's voice myself.
I don't consider the offensively censored version of episode to be canon.