Completing my news website trifecta for the morning, check out Ghettopoly, which has to be the most offensive commercial product since that Chinese haberdasher started selling swastika T-shirts. The game’s creator says it’s all for the children:
Wow. Taste the rainbow. No, wait, that’s Skittles. What an asshole, is what I’m trying to say.
Oh, if only Cleve Blakemore were still here…
“You got yo whole neighborhood addicted to crack. Collect $50.”
Wow. The maker was certainly not pussyfooting around.
Worse than the game, which is fundamentally just kind of stupid, is the reflexive push to boycott on the part of the outrage industry. I mean, of course they are welcome to do as they please with their dollars, but 1) they look almost as dumb arguing that Martin Luther King is some kind of superman who should be immune to satire and 2) they are just giving them free press. Lots of it. I’m willing to bet sales will skyrocket after all this nonsense, even if Urban Outfitters chickens out.
Personally, I think those in the race baiting industry do far more damage to social relations than any number of racist boardgames.
It’s pretty amazing that a clothing chain is selling it though. Other than that I agree with you. This CNN article and controversy will help sales like crazy. Chang is going to make a mint off Redneckopoly too.
Urban Outfitters prides itself on being teh edgy. It’s like Something Awful: The Store.
This argument is bound to surface each time a person or a group calls for banning a product, implying that they their interests would be better served if they keep quite about whatever offends them. I think that even if the game’s sales will be increased, its legitimacy is questioned, and a point is made.
There’s no such thing as bad publicity…
Unless you’re Rush Limbaugh.
There’s a lot to be said for popular pressure as a means of containing antisocial extremes. But patently absurd moral indignation, repeated again and again, is almost tragic in its unintended consequences. For instance, leaders that raise moral questions based obviously around protecting their team rather than principle…race baiters, Christian ranters, and all their ilk could learn a lot from the success of those they demonize.
Also, I really don’t think anyone marketing Ghettopoly is all that concerned about the “legitimacy” of his acts.
If something is beneath you, its also beneath your attack.
Which tells you on just what level the attackers of “Ghettopoly” exist.
I intended to attack you for this, but I refrain.
I have to side with Chang on this one. I think through humor is the only way we will ever get past all this race bs. I am not rascist at all, but I think this game is hilarious. I would laugh just as hard at Redneckopoly or WASPopoly, too. If something is funny, laugh at it. Don’t worry about if its PC or not.