Pokemon card tournament DQs player for laughing while saying his preferred pronouns

A nervous Pokemon TCG player claims he was disqualified from the Charlotte Pokemon Regional about he laughed while giving his “preferred pronouns.”

Makani Tran lost out on $800, two flights, and time off school after his time at the Charlotte Pokemon Regional was cut short for a bizarre reason.

In a Twitlonger, the youngster revealed that his weekend turned to tears before he could even make a move against his opponent, Alex Schemanske, one of the US’s best players, on stream.

According to Tran, as he walked over to the stream area, a judge asked him what his preferred pronouns were and seemed to fumble over his words. That’s when the trouble started.

Pokemon card player disqualified after pronoun kerfuffle

In his post, Tran said that his nerves got the better of him when asked about his pronouns, leading him to respond, “Um he or him or uh.”

Tran claimed that he struggled to think of a third pronoun and felt embarrassed as he tried to do so, resulting in him nervously laughing a bit.

After Alex shared his pronouns without issue, Tran followed up by resharing his, but once again awkwardly laughed. This resulted in the Pokemon card judge taking issue with how Makani replied.

“Okay, just wanted to check to be safe. I go by they/them so don’t be a jerk about it,” the judge reportedly said.

A bit into the match, Tran and Schemanske were pulled off stage by the head judge and told that another match would be streamed instead.

It turns out, the way Tran had answered the pronoun question had caused some issues. After admitting to awkwardly laughing due to nervousness, he was disqualified.

This is probably a dangerous tweet for me.

Should Makani have been DQ’d? I don’t think so.

But remember y’all, this isn’t an excuse to attack inclusivity/people’s identity. Also remember that judges are, by the rules, completely unable to share their side of things. https://t.co/Xy8OJiYJM1

— Alex Schemanske (@aschemanske) March 27, 2023

“The judge said that while he believed that I had no bad intentions, it didn’t matter because at the end of the day, someone was offended and upset,” Tran added.

For his part, Alex Schemanske even noted on Twitter that he didn’t feel his opponent should have been disqualified, but added that judges are unable to share their side of the story.

i am actually at a loss for words i don’t even know what to say right now. Thank you all so much from the bottom of my heart this means the world to me i’m so grateful for all the support i’ve received and i’m just amazed. Love all you guys and again thank you for everything ❤️ pic.twitter.com/7RcEWLeipw

— takani mran (@FishNugget4) March 27, 2023

Luckily, this story does have a bit of a happy ending. After the disastrous DQ, a Go Fund Me was set up to replace Makani’s expenses and it’s already surpassed its goal of $1,500 by over one grand.

It’s not clear if changes will be implemented to prevent issues like this from happening again, but at least the young star will be getting reimbursed.