Photo by Eric Lafforgue/Art In All Of Us/Corbis via Getty Images
Is everything okay, chess?
Chess. A game mastered by geniuses. A pastime for the intelligent. That thing we all said we’d get good at during the pandemic after watching The Queen’s Gambit. The hobby we all gave up as soon as we could go outside again. It’s a beautiful game, but in recent years it’s also been a hotbed for the absolute weirdest cheating scandals sports and games have ever witnessed.
A new scandal is brewing in the world of Xiangqi, which is known as “Chinese Chess.” 48-year-old champion Yan Chenglong won the most prestigious prize in Xiangqi — only to be stripped of the title days after for “disrupting public order” because he …. well, he pooped in a hotel bathtub.
“Yan consumed alcohol with others in his room on the night of the 17th, and then he defecated in the bathtub of the room he was staying in on the 18th, in an act that damaged hotel property, violated public order and good morals, had a negative impact on the competition and the event of Xiangqi, and was of extremely bad character,” the association said.”
If you think a 48-year-old pooping in a hotel bathtub was going to be the worst part of this story, then I’m sorry to tell you that the world of Xiangqi has also been gripped by an anal bead cheating scandal. As a result of discussing Yan being stripped of the title the governing body of Xiangqi had to address rumors that he was using vibrating anal beads to cheat during the tournament.
“Yan allegedly clenched and unclenched rhythmically to communicate information about the chess board via code to a computer, which then sent back instructions on what moves to make in the form of vibrations, according to reports circulating on the Chinese social site Weibo.”
Tournament organizers have said this is impossible to verify though, which makes sense if you think about it for any amount of time.
Aside from the bathtub poop, this story has eerie similarities to the cheating scandal that rocked western chess in 2022 when it was alleged that Hans Niemann used a similar device to beat world champion Magnus Carlsen.
It leaves us wondering: Is chess alright? Seriously. If you need to talk to us, we won’t judge. Two anal bead scandals in a little over a year, plus some bathtub pooping. We just want to make sure you’re okay.
