Nexus Mods decides to allow an Oblivion Remastered mod that changes 'body type' options to male/female, declares it's not 'a battleground for broader cultural or political debates'

One of the very, very small changes in Oblivion Remastered is a switch in the character creator from "male" and "female" bodies, as it was in the original, to "body type 1" and "body type 2." It's the sort of thing that would likely go entirely unnoticed were it not for the distressingly predictable explosion of outrage from the usual corners of toxic gamerdom—and, in short order, the creation of a mod that brought back the original male/female body options.

For a few days, Nexus Mods made a point of removing the mod, called Body Type Selector, whenever it was uploaded (and reuploaded), because of course these guys can't take "no" for an answer. But now Nexus has changed course and decided to allow the mod to stand.

The reason, according to a community notice on the mod page, is that the mod itself doesn't violate any policies—and that the previous uploads were taken down not because of their content, but because of "the uploader's behavior." The account of the original uploader was banned, but the mod (or a functionally identical one) resubmitted by another user has now been allowed to stand.

"To clarify: The mod was not taken down because of its content," the notice says. "As stated in the ban notice, it was removed due to the uploader's behavior. In the comments, the uploader expressed an intent to incite drama and endorsed an external site explicitly designed to host inflammatory content. This kind of behavior directly violates our community standards.

"We recognize that mods like this can bring sensitive discussions around gender and identity to the forefront. While these are important conversations, our platform exists to support creative expression in modding, not to serve as a battleground for broader cultural or political debates. What we will not tolerate is trolling, harassment, discrimination, or any other form of toxicity that these discussions may provoke."

So let's just cut to the chase. It's a flimsy excuse for a crappy decision: Stating that the problem isn't the mod but "the intention of the author" is patently ridiculous, because the mod is literally the primary expression of that intent.

The ban of the author's account cites Nexus Mods' policy against "files that remove gender identity including pronouns from a game that have been intentionally put in place by a game developer, when the removal is clearly to be divisive or cause hostility within the community or marginalise specific group(s)" (emphasis mine). But that in itself is absurd because why else would you remove pronouns or other indicators of gender identity except as an anti-trans statement?

Justifying the change as restoring the game to its original state doesn't hold water either, since we're on the topic. You're literally playing a remaster—literally a changed, updated version of an old game—and the move to "body types" is minute next to the revamped graphics, leveling system, voice acting, and everything else we've detailed. If you want the original experience, you can pick up the original game for $20 on Steam or GOG. Put your money where your mouth is.

What makes this change in direction all the more disappointing is the fact that Nexus Mods has taken strong progressive stances in the past. A Spider-Man Remastered mod that removed Pride flags was quickly banned, as was one that removed pronouns from Starfield, and another that erased a queer relationship from Baldur's Gate 3.

And Nexus made no bones about why those mods were removed. After taking down the pronoun-removing Starfield mod, for instance, Nexus Mods said, "We stand for diversity and inclusion in our community and the removal of diversity, while appealing to many, does not promote a positive modding community." Similar statements were made about the Spider-Man and BG3 mods.

So why does the Body Type Selector mod get a pass? Maybe anti-trans sentiment ranks a little lower on the pole than other forms of queerphobia on Nexus Mods, or maybe the moderators are just getting tired of the whole moderating thing. Whatever the reason, the bottom line is that Nexus Mods seemingly recognizes that this Body Type Selector mod exists as a dogwhistle for transphobes, but doesn't seem to care as long as the mod author doesn't explicitly say so.

That's not great, and based on the reaction to the cave-in on social media I suspect Nexus Mods may be about to learn a lesson we all should've absorbed long ago: Appeasement doesn't work.