400 offensive words have been banned from Scrabble, causing furious backlash from the Scrabble community.

Scrabble owner Mattel has removed derogatory terms, including numerous racial slurs from official lists.

The move has been slammed by members of the World English Language Scrabble Players Association, with three prominent members quitting in protest.

Founding member Karen Richards told 6PR’s Liam Bartlett it is “very upsetting”.

“It’s put politics into a game where it never was before,” she said.

“The whole thing is a public relations exercise.

“Not being able to play them in scrabble doesn’t remove them from a dictionary, they are still there if kids want to go and look it up.”

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