BLACKS & WHITES
Del Mar, California: Communications/Research/Machines, Inc., 1970. Board game based on Monopoly, Blacks & Whites was intended to demonstrate how the odds are stacked against black people in society by having a different set of rules for each race in the game. White players start with $1 million, blacks with $10,000, and each race has different opportunity decks. While whites can buy property in any part of the board, blacks are limited to certain areas until they accumulate at least $100,000. They are outright banned from property in the “suburban zone.”
The board is divided into eight neighborhoods, which include Lesser Suburbia, Upper Integrated, Inner Ghetto, and Older Estates. According to the rules: “When a white player goes bankrupt, he is out of the game, psychologically defeated. When a black player goes bankrupt, he goes on welfare and collects $5,000 from each white player.”
The board game turned out to be one of the most controversial of all time and even merited an article in Time magazine: “…The game was developed at the University of California at Davis by Psychology Department Chairman Robert Sommer. It was conceived as a painless way for middleclass whites to experience - and understand - the frustrations of blacks. In Sommer’s version, however, the black player could not win; as a simulation of frustration, the game was too successful. Then David Popoff, a Psychology Today editor, redesigned the game, taking suggestions from militant black members of “US” in San Diego. The new rules give black players an opportunity to use - and even to beat - the system…”
The game is complete and includes: a playing board, a pair of dice, five plastic white and four plastic black player pieces, play money, a complete set of deed cards, opportunity cards and cardboard pieces, and a set of directions. Housed in the original pictorial two-part box, which is still sealed in the original shrink wrap. Small nick to the front panel, along the left side; else as new. Item #80295
Price: $350.00