GHETTOPOLY

[Squaredancecalling Steve]

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (AP) -- Cheap Trick Avenue instead of Boardwalk? Hernando's Chop Shop instead of Reading Railroad?

Black leaders are outraged over a new board game called "Ghettopoly" that has "playas" acting like pimps and game cards reading, "You got yo whole neighborhood addicted to crack. Collect $50."

Black clergymen say the game, the brainchild of a Pennsylvania man, should be banned, and have called for a boycott of Urban Outfitters unless the company stops selling Ghettopoly in its chain of clothing stores.

Urban Outfitters has not publicly commented on the issue, and did not return a call seeking comment on Wednesday.

"If we are silent on this issue there is more of this type to come," the Rev. Robert P. Shine Sr., president of the Black Clergy of Philadelphia & Vicinity, said at a sidewalk rally Wednesday in front Urban Outfitters' corporate headquarters in Philadelphia.

Shine displayed the game board, with properties including Westside Liquor, Harlem, The Bronx, and Long Beach City, and squares labeled Smitty's XXX Peep Show, Weinstein's Gold and Platinum, and Tyron's Gun Shop.

Players draw "Hustle" and "Ghetto Stash" cards with directions like, "You're a little short on loot, so you decided to stick up a bank. Collect $75," and "Steal $$$ if you pass Let$ Roll."

The creator of Ghettopoly, David Chang, did not immediately answer e-mails or phone calls seeking comment about the game.

On his Web site, Chang is unapologetic, and promises that more games -- Hoodopoly, Hiphopopoly, Thugopoly and Redneckopoly -- are coming soon.

"It draws on stereotypes not as a means to degrade, but as a medium to bring together in laughter," Chang maintains, adding, "If we can't laugh at ourselves ... we'll continue to live in blame and bitterness."

But the Ghettopoly board depicts figures labeled "Malcum X" and "Martin Luthor King Jr." -- intentionally misspelled -- noted Rev. Glenn Wilson, pastor of Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church.

"This is beyond making fun, to use the caricature of Dr. King in this regard," Wilson said. "There's no way that game could be taken in any way other than that this man had racist intent in marketing it."

The Philadelphia black clergy and Men United for a Better Philadelphia were just the latest to protest the game. In Chicago, the Rev. Michael Pfleger, pastor of St. Sabina Catholic Church, called for a boycott of Urban Outfitters. In Florida, the St. Petersburg and Hillsborough County chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People urged the company to stop carrying the game.

"I was outraged. We called Outfitters, we wrote them a letter, we held a press conference, but we've had no response," Pfleger said Wednesday.

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Copyright 2003 The Associated Press.

[Pete C]

Well, I'm all for freedom of speech, but talk about tasteless. I find it amazing that a major clothing chain could have agreed to carry this.

I yearn for the good old days of Class Struggle.

[Monte Smith]

There is no way that a generation raised on Dr. Dre records and films like Undercover Brother or Friday can find the satire of GHETTOPOLY offensive.

[Monte Smith]

Of course I am severely underestimating the lack of sense of humor of some people.

[mke]

Originally posted by Monte Smith
There is no way that a generation raised on Dr. Dre records and films like Undercover Brother or Friday can find the satire of GHETTOPOLY offensive.

I assume the reverends cited were not raised on Dr. Dre.

[Monte Smith]

I assume that as well.

[Brian Olewnick]

Pete, I seem to remember the Class Struggle game being promoted around the loft scene in the late 70's. Does that ring a bell? I see that it was created by an NYU professor, so that seems to fit.

[Pete C]

According to the site I found it was created in 1982. Bertell Ollman teaches Political Science at NYU. He's a big guy with a big, bushy beard. Looks like a Marxist.

[Brian Olewnick]

Originally posted by Pete C
According to the site I found it was created in 1982. Bertell Ollman teaches Political Science at NYU. He's a big guy with a big, bushy beard. Looks like a Marxist.

Yeah, I saw that. But I'm pretty sure, in fact, that it was featured at a Bartertown fest that took place at NYU in 1977 or 78, where Breuker's Kollektief also performed. Maybe it took him until 1982 to convince Avalon Hill to publish it.

[Pete C]

I think you're right. I think that was the date of "commercial" release.

[walto]

As I have heard propounded gravely from the many many many Georgist minions around the world, "Monopoly" was originally a rip-off of a game (was it "anti-monopoly"?) invented by a female single-taxer.

[RainyDay]

I would be a lot more forgiving if Mr. Chang had a board game depicting Asian culture. He talks about "laughing at ourselves" but I don't see him laughing at Asians.

On the other hand, if the good reverend is so offended by this board game, why isn't he speaking out as loudly about the disgusting hip hop culture that glamorizes exactly what Mr. Chang is profiting from? It isn't like Mr. Chang made this s*!t up.

[jesus marion joseph]

If Mr. Chang ever does do an Asian version of Monopoly (Chinopoloy?), he might want to use the name of a gift shop I saw many years ago in Banff, Alberta, owned by an Asian man named "OK Gift Shop" (that was the shop's name, not the owner's).

[bluenoter]

Now that I've remembered which chain Urban Outfitters is, I'm even more surprised, in a way. They want to be "edgy," and they cater to a very young clientele, but like Benetton, they stress their hip multiculturalism in their ad campaigns.

[Juju]

This is a classic freedom of speech case, period. You can't ban an idea, and anyone who tries therefore makes that idea even more popular. 2 Live Crew case in point. Anyways, hasn't George Carlin taught us anything about the nature of words?

[moneyp]

Originally posted by Squaredancecalling Steve
Players draw "Hustle" and "Ghetto Stash" cards with directions like, "You're a little short on loot, so you decided to stick up a bank. Collect $75,"

Not much of a bank, was it?

[bluenoter]

George Carlin is a privileged WASP male. He doesn't know jack about the nature of words, and many people above a certain age don't consider him a profound philosopher rather than a somewhat reactionary comedian.

P.S.--"He doesn't know jack" is an idiom. Please don't tell me that it should be "he knows jack."

[graypencil]

Freedom of Speech allows you to yell "bullshit" ( or worse ) in church ..

Good taste ( and judgement ) tells you it's not cool ...

Therefore, freedom of speech issues aside, Ghettopoly
is just another tasteless offensive piece of crap
put out there for the market to decide its fate ..

Much worse IMO, are these video games that allow ,no..actually encourage
kids to shoot people to pieces ( complete with exploding
heads, blood spatter , sound efx ) with all manner
of automatic weapons ...

[Pete C]

Originally posted by bluenoter
P.S.--"He doesn't know jack" is an idiom. Please don't tell me that it should be "he knows jack."

I knew Jack, and he's no Jack.

[Juju]

Nice to see you everyone getting their blood pressure all in a tizzy over a game. Most people have the ability to make the distinction between fantasy and real life. Some who purport to be rational people do not, and are exactly the kind of people Carlin sounds off about. I'm not surprised you didn't take kindly to Carlin views sinch you seem to fall into his categorization. Words never hurt anyone. It's the ideas behind them that do. How you choose to act out those ideas is the determining factor, and those factors are best determined by a good upbringing, despite the boardgames you play.

Having said that, a bad idea is a bad idea and that board game is just that, bad.

[steve(thelil)]

On the one hand, there's freedom of speech which absolutely protects it.

On the other hand, there's saying stuff that could offend for no good purpose.

But back to the first hand, if we all believed really strongly in free speech as both a right and the best way to further intelligent discourse, there's also "What's the big fucking deal ?" and "How can discourse progress if we get so caught up on minor shit like is a board game offensive?"

[Jazzzoline]

Now I wonder why nobody is offended by the game Monopoly itself, a game that values "money" overall.

A new board game came out a few years ago. It was the "cooperative" and "working in team" version of Monopoly.

[shrugs]

Was this inspired by Dr. Dre's song "The $20 Sack Pyramid"?

[Al in NYC]

Sure the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech means that the government can't stop Mr. Chang from marketing his game, but it certainly can't (and shouldn't) insulate either him or Urban Outfitters from charges of offensiveness and extreme bad taste. I don't think the above-cited reverends are out of line at all for calling this game what it is: an insensitive and foolish exercise in profiting from pretty revolting and remarkably unfunny racial humor. Does that mean that I think the game should be banned? No. However it does mean that I hope Urban Outfitters finds themselves with many fewer customers soon.

I'm with Rainy too in thinking that if Mr. Chang really wants to laugh at himself he should have put out a game called "Chinatownopoly" complete with wacky cracks about filthy restaurant kitchens, mystery meat (why are there no stray cats there?), rude employees, tourist shop ripoffs, those hilarious gangwars of course, and maybe a few live chicken-killing jokes, or perhaps something really funny about slanty-eyes and being short, how about a few "ching-chang-chong" dialect jokes, or maybe some good ol' "no tickee no shirtee" laundry humor, and there's nothing I love more than some illegal stowaway or sweatshop jokes.

David Chang -- what a self-serving self-justifying asshole (using MY freedom of speech)

[Juju]

Never fails to amaze me how fiercly defended freedom of speech is until a group of people are offended. More often than not, the offended party isn't even the intended target as in this case. Why can't thugs and playaz have their own game, what, doesn't "the man" have enough room in his stores for their games? It's a double-edged sword.

BTW, Carlin ain't Protestant.

[Al in NYC]

JuJu -- no one here is talking about taking away Mr. Chang's freedom of speech. But freedom of speech in no way protects someone from being called a sleazy lowlife racist scum, nor does it protect insensitive witless "edgy" marketers from being castigated for pandering to these views or from being boycotted.

[Juju]

FWIW, I never shopped at that sucky store and never will, I tend to support local commerce. I would never buy that stupid game, and think that the real Monopoly is just as offensive to the average working man. But you must separate your personal politics from our God-given rights.

"But freedom of speech in no way protects someone from being called a sleazy lowlife racist scum"

Say what you want, that's my point. They're just words anyway. You only listen to them if you choose.

"nor does it protect insensitive witless "edgy" marketers from being castigated for pandering to these views or from being boycotted."

This was my next point, but you beat me to it.

I got into this argument with a friend of mine who was pissed that a court ruled in favor of keeping the Washington Redskins name. I pretty much outlined my argument here. Despite its deplorable reference, you can't kill ideas, and the very act of doing so only strengthens them.

I see this played out every day in Topeka, KS, where Fred Phelps is allowed to spread his hate. But that's his right, and to fight it only empowers him, that's the devil's plan. I, on the other hand, would rather kill him with love.

There's better things in the world worth fighting against than this, to me it's the WTO, and just by mentioning the game here, the schmuck already garnered the attention he was searching for.

[jesus marion joseph]

Originally posted by mone peterson
Not much of a bank, was it?

It's a ghetto bank.

[RainyDay]

What Al said, both times.

[walto]

The Monopolization of Monopoly
Lizzie J. Magie
by Burton H. Wolfe
©1976 The San Francisco Bay Guardian
The Monopolization of Monopoly
The $500 Buyout
by Burton H. Wolfe
©1976 The San Francisco Bay Guardian
Once that was done, Parker Brothers began negotiations to buy up the games that superseded Darrow's copy of Charles Todd's Monopoly set.
Naturally, Lizzie J. Magie's game was first. That absolutely had to be bought. Dan Layman's lawyers explained to him that nobody could claim a patent on a game called Monopoly since it was a direct development from The Landlord's Game. Layman's onetime college frat brothers, Fred and Louis Thun, got the same advice from a lawyer friend of theirs when they considered trying to patent Monopoly as they had developed it. What other conceivable advice could be given Parker Brothers management by their own lawyers?

So, Parker bought out Lizzie Magies's game. Bought it from her for $500 flat - no royalties - and a promise to manufacture some sets under its original title, The Landlord's Game. Forty years later Parker Brothers president Barton told the story of it in his sworn deposition taken as part of the Anti-Monopoly lawsuit proceedings.

"We knew that Charles Darrow had based his game Monopoly on both The Landlord's Game and possibly something of this kind [referring to Dan Layman's Finance]."

So, Barton met with Lizzie Magie, he testified, and asked her if she would accept changes in her game. According to Barton's recollection, she replied like this: "No. This is to teach the Henry George theory of single taxation, and I will not have my game changed in any way whatsoever." For John Droeger of San Francisco, the lawyer taking his deposition, Barton explained why in his opinion Lizzie Magie answered that way: "She was a rabid Henry George single tax advocate, a real evangelist; and these people never change."

Barton's frame of reference for that evaluation? The classic one of inherited wealth that is contemptuous of everything but unmitigated capitalism. He was born with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth, the scion of a wealthy family in Baltimore; graduated from Harvard; became a trademark lawyer in a firm started by his grandfather; and won the top job at Parker Brothers not by working his way up, but rather, as he himself has admitted in interviews for magazine publication by "marrying the boss's daughter" (Sally Parker).

The boss was George S. Parker, who founded Parker Brothers in 1883. As soon as Barton married Parker's daughter, in 1932, he was named assistant treasurer of the company. Two years later Parker let him take over the presidency to manage the firm while Parker stood by as chairman of the board.

Since Lizzie Magie would not agree to changes already made and on the market, Barton promised her production of her own Landlord's Game in return for singing over all rights to it. She made no demand that Parker Brothers stop manufacturing the revised game, Monopoly. She made no demands that any specified steps be taken to popularize her Landlord's Game. She was a little old grayhaired Quaker woman. She was delighted that Parker Brothers - king of the games business, popularizer of Ping-Pong, Mah-Jongg, and jigsaw puzzles - was going to manufacture and sell her effort to teach single tax theory in a fun way. She had no idea the king was almost bankrupt and intended to save himself by reaping a fortune from one of the peasant's inventions.

A reporter for the leading afternoon daily newspaper in the nation's capital, The Washington Star, wrote about Lizzie Magie's game in an unbylined story published Jan. 28, 1936. By that time she was Mrs. Elizabeth Magie Phillips of nearby Clarendon, Va. As part of the story interview, the reporter asked Mrs. Phillips how she felt about getting only $500 for her patent and no royalties ever. She replied that it was all right with her if she never made a dime so long as the Henry George single tax idea was spread to the people of the country.

The story in the Star was headlined "Designed to Teach - Game of Monopoly Was First Known as Landlord's Game." It would be the one and only time in four decades of newspaper and magazine articles about Monopoly that the game's true origin would be publicized. From then on, Parker Brothers made certain, through a rigidly controlled publicity program, that every story about Monopoly to appear in print would state Charles Darrow invented it. Forty years had to pass before another journalist would take up where the long forgotten Washington Star reporter left off and put the equally forgotten Lizzie Magie's name in print again.