# The Games We Play By:: [[Ross Jackson]] 2023-03-06 As a child perhaps you experienced playing the game Monopoly. This is a game of market dynamics in which one attempts to increase real estate holdings and avoid jail. The point, as the name suggests, is to increase one’s real estate holdings to the point that one person owns all the property. Whereas it is constructed differently, the game Risk! is similar. In Risk! one is the leader of an army attempting to control all the territory; global domination. These games are not simply competitive, they are hyper-competitive. The point of these games isn’t to win but to entirely decimate one’s opponent in one’s victory. What could be the point of these games? What type of society is made through a focus on cultivating this perspective as desirable? Self-focused, myopic, and unsympathetic; there is no shortage of characteristics that could emerge. Maybe the point of life is total victory over others and these games do well to prepare us to move forward. Maybe the point of life is to enjoy the collaborative solidarity we can achieve with each other. If it is the latter, the games we play make it more challenging to see the humanity of others as we attempt to vanquish them under our total and complete power. #### Related Items [[Games]] [[Competition]] [[Solidarity]] [[Life]] [[The Human Condition]]