Beitragvon Toker » 20. Juni 2011, 00:46
ich habe einen beitrag zu dem artikel im bitchmagazine gepostet, der vielleicht auch für diese diskusion von interesse ist. das hab ich natürlich auf englisch gemacht - und jetzt ist's mir zu spät, das alles zu übersetzen. deshalb erlaube ich mir, ihn unüberetzt hier reinzusetzen. ich ofe, ich verstoße damit nicht gegen eine forumsregel :-/
Perhaps you allow me to chime in on your very interesting discussion from the perspective of a white male German, aged 54, politically affiliated with the Red-Green Camp (the cooperation of the Social-Democrats and the Greens in German politics) - and a "hard-core" gamer.
I find Pandemic not unproblematic: To make the possible extinction of mankind by a desease the theme of a game makes me quite uneasy because it toys with a threat that is quite realistically looming on modern civilization.
Likewise Dominion is not unproblematic at all: There's a card called "Witch". As you're certainly aware the stigmatization of women as "Witches" lead to the torture and burning of probably hundreds of thousands of women in the course of European medieval history. But this card doesn't cause me any uneasiness because the concept of stigmatizing women as "Witches" vanished from the European conscious and there's no threat it could rise again and cause the grieve it did in previous centuries.
I think that's also the reason why slavery as part of a game is not causing uneasiness in Europe: Slavery is no more an economic practice and it won't return. Perhaps the fact that the descendants of slaves are living in the USA and remembering their ancestors fate vividly makes it a much more sensitive matter over there?
Could it be that the greater uneasiness colonialism causes in America than in Europe (or at least in Germany; the so called Euro-games are often called German-games because many of them are beeing designed by German authors) has a similar background: Colonialism as a political practice has ceased to exist. The European colonial powers have withdrawn their troops and bureaucracies from the former colonies decades ago. True: The impact of colonialism is still there and much is left to be done to transform the dependency of the former colonies from the former colonial powers into relationships on equal footing. But essentially Europe has disentagled itself from this legacy.
The situation in the Americas seems far more complex to me: All the states that do exist today in the Americas have themselves thrown out the colonial powers that brought the population of these states over there. They themselves are a product of anti-colonialism. But now they live on the very soil of the peoples their colonial ancestors have robbed of their land and almost annihilated. There's no chance they could ever rectify this by leaving and returning - because there's nowehre to "return" to.
Just musings how to explain different mindsets with regard to slavery & colonialism in Europe and America.
To illustrate this difference in perception with another example taken from a game: The # 1 on BGG "Twilight Struggle", a game on the Cold War, features a card under the title "Willy Brandt" - one of the most important German politicians after WWII, a Nobel Peace Laureate - and a hero of my youth. In "Twilight Struggle" this card is a Soviet card - which in game terms means: "Willy Brandt" helps the Soviet cause! A perception that was propagated by his conservative opponents back then - but has long since sunken into historical oblivion.
I'm certainly puzzled by this decision of the game designer. But should I be offended? I'm not! After all it's just a game. History has spoken it's word on the role and the achievements of Willy Brandt. And that's what counts in my opinion. Nevertheless "Twilight Struggle" as a game fully deserves it's # 1 rank on BGG!