| Ghettopoly is a Monopoly parody released in 2003. Invented by David Chang, it uses Monopoly-like mechanics
in the atmosphere of a caricaturized American ghetto.
Some thought the game was "tasteless" and "offensive" due to its racial overtones; for example, the name of Malcolm X was intentionally misspelled as "Malcum X."
In defense of the game, supporters have argued that the board game is scarcely more racist in its portrayal of America's
minority ghettos than certain more accepted elements of popular
culture, such as popular hip hop music. Some have even classified the
game as social criticism.
That a game in the Monopoly family should function as social rhetoric is not unusual. The ancestor of Monopoly, The Landlord's
Game, provided harsh critique of the land-renting elite, while its enormously popular descendant encouraged capitalism (and was
banned in many Communist countries for that reason). Some have said that
Ghettopoly also qualifies not as racist mockery, but Monopoly within the sort of dark, self-deprecating social criticism
characteristic of the rap generation. Indeed, what many find most inflammatory about Ghettopoly is not the game itself, but that
its inventor was an "outsider," a middle-class Asian man.
In October 2003, Hasbro sued
David Chang over the game's similarities to Monopoly. The expected outcome of the lawsuit is unclear. In the past, Monopoly
derivatives have been ruled to be not in infringement, since Monopoly actually evolved for decades in the public domain before Parker Brothers, now a Hasbro subsidiary, popularized it.
The game was pulled by Urban Outfitters, its retailer. Chang is
still marketing the game without their support, and intends a sequel known as "Redneckopoly."
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