I know Pride Month is over but I really want to share a super cool queer story about how a little mushroom became a trans icon
This is Amoonguss.
Amoonguss is a Grass/Poison type Pokemon introduced in Generation 5, in Pokemon Black and White.
Amoonguss has always been considered one of the strongest support options for VGC, which is the official competitive circuit of Pokemon. This is because of its good bulk, decent typing, and access to the powerful moves Spore and Rage Powder.
In 2024, Wolfe Glick (a YouTuber, competitive player, and trans ally), was building a team for the European International Championships, the largest in person event at the time with almost 1000 players in competition. Wolfe built a team around Amoonguss, using the move Sludge Bomb on his Amoonguss, which was an option not many players respected but proved to be very powerful.
Wolfe's team was very strong but, in the end, he was one win short of continuing in the tournament and was eliminated just before the top 16. Since Wolfe knew the team was strong and wanted to do the team justice, he signed up to attend the last tournament of the format, the Orlando Regional Championships using the same team.
Wolfe managed to make it all the way to the finals, where his opponent was Neil Patel. Just before the tournament, Patel was exposed online for making several very transphobic comments. Going into the finals, Wolfe was absolutely the favorite to win.
Pokemon tournaments use best 2 out of 3 sets, so Wolfe needed to win 2 games to win the finals, and the matchup wasn't easy.
Patel won game one by making aggressive predictions and getting just a bit lucky.
Wolfe won game two after just two turns by reading Patel perfectly.
After a long, drawn-out game 3, it was Patel's Chien-Pao and Urshifu, two of the strongest Pokemon of the format, versus Wolfe's Landorus and Amoonguss. Amoonguss put Chien-Pao to sleep the previous turn with Spore, allowing Landorus to pick up the knock out before being taken out by Urshifu. It's now Urshifu versus Amoonguss, a normally unwinnable matchup made possible by Wolfe's abnormal choice of Sludge Bomb on his Amoonguss. Amoonguss puts Urshifu to sleep and starts using Sludge Bomb, but Urshifu wakes up and deals a lot of damage with Surging Strikes, but not enough to KO. Another Surging Strikes leaves Amoonguss with enough HP that whether it lives another move is unclear but probably not likely. One more Sludge Bomb will KO Urshifu, but Urshifu outspeeds Amoonguss and will attack first. The entire tournament will be decided on if Amoonguss can live the attack.
And Amoonguss lives.
The Urshifu faints and Wolfe wins the tournament.
Because Amoonguss was the Pokemon that won against Patel, especially after his transphobic comments, several people including Wolfe considered Amoonguss to be trans icon.
I just think this story is fun and super exciting.
Trans rights are human rights.
If you want to hear about this story more in depth, with more explanation behind the battle and the tournament, I recommend watching Wolfe's video on his YouTube channel. There's also an excellent video by the YouTuber cecilly explaining in more detail how Amoonguss specifically is a trans icon.
