The humorless nags, er, well-meaning and enlightened activists at Commercial Alert have worked themselves into a lather over Hasbro giving its venerable Monopoly game a commercial makeover.
Five tokens in the updated version introduced last week are branded products—an order of McDonalds French fries and a cup of Starbucks coffee, for example.
Fret not Monopoly purists: The classic version is still available.
But for the delusional take on Monopoly’s latest makeover, look no further than Commercial Alert, a self-proclaimed defender against “invasions of the commercial culture into our lives and families.”
“Shame on Hasbro for hawking junk food and caffeine to children,” said Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, in a statement. “Hasbro is toying with the health of our children. Maybe it thinks that the childhood obesity epidemic is just a game, but parents know better.”
But wait. There’s more.
“Hasbro has undercut one of the prime virtues of its own product,” said Jonathan Rowe, issues director of Commercial Alert. “Whatever else one thought about Monopoly, at least it conveyed to kids the importance of savings and investment. Now the game is touting consumption instead. Maybe Hasbro should rename it ‘Huckster Haven.’”
Conveyed the importance of savings and investment? Pshaw!
And get a load of Rowe’s title: issues director. Just a guess, but we’re thinking Hasbro isn’t the one with issues in this scenario.
Have these people ever played Monopoly? If they have, clearly they were always the first ones out and were off in another room doing who the hell knows what while the final two players tried to crush each other.
Monopoly is predatory capitalism in its most base form. We only wonder why Hasbro didn’t commercialize its pieces before.
Here’s an idea: Let’s get Hasbro to make a version of Monopoly just for the folks at Commercial Alert. The tokens could be little pieces of tofu, cartons of soymilk, and the like.
Imagine the hours of family fun:
Zak: I get to be the celery!
Sara: Awe, you always get to be the celery! Ok, then I get to be the Pilates machine!
Instead of passing Go to collect $200, players could pass Pause and Meditate to get reassuring words from the other players. Rather than going to jail, players could be sent to work for the Evil Transfat Corporation. Oh, and what we would do with that luxury tax.
And instead of charging rent to players who land on their property, owners would ask for “whatever you feel comfortable paying. After all, it was only chance that I was able to buy Park Place and Boardwalk. How much money do I really need?”
Message to Commercial Alert: The concept behind Monopoly is clearly beyond your grasp. It is a game of capitalism. In real life—you know, that place where people work and get paid for it—advertising is a fundamental part of capitalism that makes your astronomically high standard of living relative to the rest of the world possible. Might we suggest you move to Cuba? We hear crass commercialism doesn’t invade people’s lives down there.
The humorless nags, er, well-meaning and enlightened activists at Commercial Alert have worked themselves into a lather over Hasbro giving its venerable Monopoly game a commercial makeover.
Five tokens in the updated version introduced last week are branded products—an order of McDonalds French fries and a cup of Starbucks coffee, for example.
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