Dungeons & Democracy
December 2, 2022 9:27 AM Subscribe
The system is structurally designed in favor of older members with more seniority. Can you, a young member of Congress, survive?
As part of Insider's "Red, White, and Gray" project, Walt Hickey has designed Dungeons & Democracy, a D&D5E-inspired TTRPG "to show you why the system favors gerontocracy".
As part of Insider's "Red, White, and Gray" project, Walt Hickey has designed Dungeons & Democracy, a D&D5E-inspired TTRPG "to show you why the system favors gerontocracy".
I love this idea, but the pages of the book don't seem to load...?
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:46 AM on December 2, 2022
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:46 AM on December 2, 2022
I waste the House Minority Whip with my crossbow!
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:58 AM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:58 AM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
Oh no, it's Robert Byrd! You are stunned for three rounds while a new four-lane bridge is built in a rural county of West Virginia!
posted by credulous at 10:22 AM on December 2, 2022 [13 favorites]
posted by credulous at 10:22 AM on December 2, 2022 [13 favorites]
I rolled a zero for charisma, and now I'm Ted Cruz!
posted by box at 12:55 PM on December 2, 2022 [9 favorites]
posted by box at 12:55 PM on December 2, 2022 [9 favorites]
OOOOOHHHH. I'm excited to share this with one of my students who created a RPG for an urban planning studio class (I think they developed three scenarios!)
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:22 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:22 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
spamandkimchi: can you post a link for the Urban Planning RPG? Or memail me? As someone in an urban planning program, I'd love to see it!
posted by LeRoienJaune at 1:34 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by LeRoienJaune at 1:34 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
Lovely! I so enjoy using D&D metaphors for real-life things ("failed my dex save"). Looking forward to seeing the current D&D popularity boom make that more feasible.
posted by gurple at 2:45 PM on December 2, 2022
posted by gurple at 2:45 PM on December 2, 2022
A game where my household in-joke of "YOU have a Wisdom of FIVE" applies to most of the characters, alas.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:20 PM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:20 PM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
Is there a monster manual?
Nope. Or if there is, your feeble mind is incapable of comprehending the dark secrets inscribed within. The DM is familiar with it, but the DM is Mitch McConnell sitting stoically behind a comically oversized privacy screen, jowls wobbling gently every time he gives a tiny shake of his head to indicate you failed your saving throw.
posted by Mayor West at 5:08 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
Nope. Or if there is, your feeble mind is incapable of comprehending the dark secrets inscribed within. The DM is familiar with it, but the DM is Mitch McConnell sitting stoically behind a comically oversized privacy screen, jowls wobbling gently every time he gives a tiny shake of his head to indicate you failed your saving throw.
posted by Mayor West at 5:08 PM on December 2, 2022 [2 favorites]
This article from October didn't age all that well, considering that the 3 senior members of the House Democratic Congress have just been replaced by much younger leaders.
Also, this term "gerontocracy" often seems to be deployed as a cloak for simple ageism.
A minority of people -- often younger ones, and in some cases, left-leaning ones -- sometimes think that if older elected officials don't do what they personally want, it's evidence of oppression, or a failure of democracy.
But politicians like Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden got their leadership positions by working hard, delivering for their constituents, and earning the trust of their colleagues, year after year, decade after decade.
And apparently a lot of voters like having experienced leaders. Biden was elected to the office he currently holds just 2 years ago. Pelosi and Schumer both easily won reelection last month. In short, they are popular with the public, not some kind of wizened usurpers who have seized power and refuse to relinquish it.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:39 PM on December 2, 2022
Also, this term "gerontocracy" often seems to be deployed as a cloak for simple ageism.
A minority of people -- often younger ones, and in some cases, left-leaning ones -- sometimes think that if older elected officials don't do what they personally want, it's evidence of oppression, or a failure of democracy.
But politicians like Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden got their leadership positions by working hard, delivering for their constituents, and earning the trust of their colleagues, year after year, decade after decade.
And apparently a lot of voters like having experienced leaders. Biden was elected to the office he currently holds just 2 years ago. Pelosi and Schumer both easily won reelection last month. In short, they are popular with the public, not some kind of wizened usurpers who have seized power and refuse to relinquish it.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 5:39 PM on December 2, 2022
I thought we were talking about gerontocracy, the bias against younger people in seniority systems. Younger people don't do well in seniority systems. They are allowed to not like it. It's also ageism.
Our society is also ageist because it really only cares about wealth accumulation, something only done, of at all, when someone is older.
You don't see people complaining about Patrick Leahy, since he makes attempts to communicate with an array of people You hear people complaining about Thad Cochran and Byrd and Grassley, people who get elected on the basis of seniority and getting into Appropriations, and little else, especially if they are from small states. You hear people complaining about supreme court Justices failing to retire, because they don't have to. These things are also ageist.
posted by eustatic at 7:14 PM on December 2, 2022 [3 favorites]
Our society is also ageist because it really only cares about wealth accumulation, something only done, of at all, when someone is older.
You don't see people complaining about Patrick Leahy, since he makes attempts to communicate with an array of people You hear people complaining about Thad Cochran and Byrd and Grassley, people who get elected on the basis of seniority and getting into Appropriations, and little else, especially if they are from small states. You hear people complaining about supreme court Justices failing to retire, because they don't have to. These things are also ageist.
posted by eustatic at 7:14 PM on December 2, 2022 [3 favorites]
The DM is familiar with it, but the DM is Mitch McConnell sitting stoically behind
yea-yea, I found it, an addendum of supreme court demi-liches seems apt.
posted by clavdivs at 8:36 PM on December 2, 2022
yea-yea, I found it, an addendum of supreme court demi-liches seems apt.
posted by clavdivs at 8:36 PM on December 2, 2022
Citations Needed podcast: The Attractive Anti-Politics of 'Gerontocracy' Discourse.
Why does age have to be the focus in this analysis, rather than policy positions and, relatedly, class interests, which exist independent of age? Who does it serve to reduce the causes of U.S. austerity politics and violence to pat, Pepsi marketing-style "generation gap" discourse? On this episode show, we detail how "generations" analysis is ineffectual and, more often than not, misses the mark. We'll discuss how fears of a "gerontocracy" can – if not in intent, in effect – malign old age itself, stigmatize the elderly and, above all, distract from what could be a substantive critical analysis of real, more profound vectors of oppression such as class, racism, sexism and anti-LGBTQ currents.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:02 PM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
Why does age have to be the focus in this analysis, rather than policy positions and, relatedly, class interests, which exist independent of age? Who does it serve to reduce the causes of U.S. austerity politics and violence to pat, Pepsi marketing-style "generation gap" discourse? On this episode show, we detail how "generations" analysis is ineffectual and, more often than not, misses the mark. We'll discuss how fears of a "gerontocracy" can – if not in intent, in effect – malign old age itself, stigmatize the elderly and, above all, distract from what could be a substantive critical analysis of real, more profound vectors of oppression such as class, racism, sexism and anti-LGBTQ currents.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:02 PM on December 2, 2022 [1 favorite]
And apparently a lot of voters like having experienced leaders. Biden was elected to the office he currently holds just 2 years ago.
Oh. I voted for Biden two years ago to stem the rising tide of hammer-to-the-skull fascism. I didn't realize I was granting approval of this narrative as well. Silly me, I guess I didn't carefully consider the consequences of my actions. Must be from that tear gas I inhaled.
But politicians like Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden got their leadership positions by working hard,
Tell me, do Musk and Zuckerberg also deserve their wealth and status too? Because these billionaires worked so hard? We sure seem to "like having" a disproportionate amount of white men in Congress, so is complaining about going against the will of democracy? Is it valid for me to criticize any aspect of the status quo in a meritocracy such as ours, or is that a cloak for simple winner-ism?
posted by AlSweigart at 7:14 AM on December 3, 2022
Oh. I voted for Biden two years ago to stem the rising tide of hammer-to-the-skull fascism. I didn't realize I was granting approval of this narrative as well. Silly me, I guess I didn't carefully consider the consequences of my actions. Must be from that tear gas I inhaled.
But politicians like Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden got their leadership positions by working hard,
Tell me, do Musk and Zuckerberg also deserve their wealth and status too? Because these billionaires worked so hard? We sure seem to "like having" a disproportionate amount of white men in Congress, so is complaining about going against the will of democracy? Is it valid for me to criticize any aspect of the status quo in a meritocracy such as ours, or is that a cloak for simple winner-ism?
posted by AlSweigart at 7:14 AM on December 3, 2022
The article goes into quite some detail about how the structure of our political system works against younger politicians. It's a bit irritating that all of these arguments about systemic bias against the young are dismissed as bias against the senior.
posted by AlSweigart at 7:26 AM on December 3, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by AlSweigart at 7:26 AM on December 3, 2022 [2 favorites]
But politicians like Pelosi, Schumer, and Biden got their leadership positions by working hard,
Tell me, do Musk and Zuckerberg also deserve their wealth and status too? Because these billionaires worked so hard? We sure seem to "like having" a disproportionate amount of white men in Congress, so is complaining about going against the will of democracy? Is it valid for me to criticize any aspect of the status quo in a meritocracy such as ours, or is that a cloak for simple winner-ism?
I mean... you truncated my sentence -- the rest of which was, "delivering for their constituents, and earning the trust of their colleagues, year after year, decade after decade" -- and then made a completely inapt comparison to Musk and Zuckerberg, neither of whom has ever been elected to anything... and then jumped to some kind of nonsequitur about white men.
Pelosi is not a white man. None of the 3 new younger leaders of the House are white men, either. Biden's VP is neither white nor a man... both of which are a first. And none of these people are billionaires. So I don't have a clue what kind of point you're trying to make.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 7:53 PM on December 5, 2022
Tell me, do Musk and Zuckerberg also deserve their wealth and status too? Because these billionaires worked so hard? We sure seem to "like having" a disproportionate amount of white men in Congress, so is complaining about going against the will of democracy? Is it valid for me to criticize any aspect of the status quo in a meritocracy such as ours, or is that a cloak for simple winner-ism?
I mean... you truncated my sentence -- the rest of which was, "delivering for their constituents, and earning the trust of their colleagues, year after year, decade after decade" -- and then made a completely inapt comparison to Musk and Zuckerberg, neither of whom has ever been elected to anything... and then jumped to some kind of nonsequitur about white men.
Pelosi is not a white man. None of the 3 new younger leaders of the House are white men, either. Biden's VP is neither white nor a man... both of which are a first. And none of these people are billionaires. So I don't have a clue what kind of point you're trying to make.
posted by Artifice_Eternity at 7:53 PM on December 5, 2022
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posted by slogger at 9:41 AM on December 2, 2022 [5 favorites]