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27 October 2017

The ending of Super Mario Odyssey turned me, a feminist, into a meninist

The latest instalment of the Mario franchise is destined to cause Gamergate 2. 

By Amelia Tait

When I first started playing Nintendo’s latest platformer Super Mario Odyssey, I was amazed by the flawless graphics, enchanting soundtrack, and innovative gameplay. By the time I finished, I realised that all women are whores.

Every woman is a succubus, content only to feed off the hard work of kind men like a-me (Mario), always ready, willing and able to cuck you with a Toad. Are all women essentially evil? I couldn’t say, but I know one who is.

Look, I’m a nice guy. I don’t think Princess Peach owes me her body. For decades, I’ve been rescuing her for little-to-no reward. In 1985, she gave me a kiss on the cheek. Eleven years later in 1996, she kissed me again and baked me a cake. It’s no secret that Princess Peach doesn’t put out – the closest we’ve ever got to banging is when I slipped on a banana peel in Mario Kart Wii.

But Princess Peach does owe me something. I have been a nice, good man for years – for what? Nothing? After fighting a literal lava-headed octopus and flying to the moon in Odyssey, I was finally able to save Peach from Bowser, who had kidnapped her and attempted to force her into a marriage. Without me, she could’ve ended up married to Bowser! A classic alpha bro who doesn’t care about women’s feelings!

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Imagine my shock when, after rescuing her and presenting her with a lone, beautiful white flower (at the same time Bowser tried to gift her some Piranha Plants), Peach walked away. She walked away right towards my spaceship – and then she stole it. I understand that viewing two men fighting over her gave her some kind of feminist epiphany, but that bitch flew away and left me for dead on the moon.

I am all for women having agency. I am all for women’s rights. But isn’t it convenient that Peach decided she was an independent woman who doesn’t need a man AFTER I flew to the moon? AFTER I defeated a really angry octopus? AFTER I flew to tens of kingdoms to collect magical moons? Real nice, Peach. Real feminist.

Is it because I’m short?

And another thing: if you didn’t want me to save you, Peach, why did you scream “Mariooooooooo!” all across the kingdoms? Kids were trying to sleep.

I’m used to being friend-zoned, and I’m used to losing out on profitable plumbing jobs because I’m busy enriching women’s lives. But this was a straight up enemy-zoning. Next time Peach is in another castle, guess who won’t be coming to look?

Social justice warriors like Peach ignore statistics and facts. Scientists have proven that in 100 per cent of circumstances, it is Princess Peach who gets helplessly kidnapped – and since records began, Italian plumbers have needed her help just 1 time (and it was a DS spin-off). You simply can’t argue with science. At this point, you might think I am satirising the boys on gaming forums who are spittingly, irrationally angry at Odyssey’s ending. I am not. I have become them. 

And OK, maybe it is partially my fault. Maybe I shouldn’t have done a 3-second dance every time I found a magic moon, wasting Peach’s valuable time. Maybe I shouldn’t have bought this sunhat and flower lei and stopped to take a selfie with a rainbow. And I respect that instead of running to save Peach after she gets captured every week, I should have implemented some preventive security measures around her castle.

But can you blame me? I’m a red-blooded, red-hatted male. I like the chase.  

I’ve known for a very long time that Peach doesn’t love men; she only loves what they can do for her. But over the years, I’ve come to forgive her for being adorably helpless – at least she knew her place. I was content to rescue her for a kiss on the cheek, or at least a squeak of “thanks”. But not anymore. Princess Peach: I will never rescue you again.

All this time I thought “it’s-a-me”. But now I’ve realised. It’s-a-you.

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