RESCUING KNOWLEDGE, A Cagliastro Project

The games however are quite odd as they are meant to fit into a sociological correctness of the time, New York, 1918, and by the nature of their language and physicality, they are much more personal, much less "correct" than games we would suggest today. Today, people are fearful of touch, and contact is heavily regulated. Touching a fellow party guest may land one in a labyrinth of litigation in the modern world. However, it is perfectly fine to virtually slaughter a whole village of people in a video game, yet not so acceptable to touch a fellow player in a party game. This book was quite an eye opener on the subject of correctness and how, from era to era, those rules change dramatically. There are physical games herein such as one where young men hit each other with sticks while shrouded by a sheet, another where a thimble is hidden and "the victim" is humiliated for other's amusement by being called upon to search for the thimble hidden on the floor, having "the victim" find it with their teeth. Moving on, there are games utilizing anonymity... In the DUMMY GAME, a girl is asked to stand with her back to the group - someone throws a ball at her and she has to turn and guess who did it. It is kindly suggested however that the ball be soft and that it not be thrown at her head. A simpler game is the Hidden Nose in which girls must stick their noses through a hole in a newspaper and others must guess whose nose is whose. In an even more foreboding game a man playing the part of a Bachelor encourages spinster sisters to get in the car, "his Ford", with him. If that is not destabilizing enough, a Mock trial is considered a good party game in this, Ice Breakers... These games may seem odd to those of us enduring a life in a time so modern that the highest caliber universities are requiring "safe zones" in which no ones' feelings are hurt, and in which the outcome is that is that Halloween costumes must be regulated as to not cause emotional trauma amongst the intellectually bound... Of course there are "happy mediums" of that which is acceptable, however, that being said, one can learn from works such as this as to how the human acceptance of individualism has been spoken of as evolving, and yet, in this broadly painful episodic gut wretch of political correctness, and in a time when those who are PhD focused must be sent home with a placemats telling them how to discuss matters at the dinner table, one wonders if the world could not benefit from a few, less politically correct games... SORCERESS CAGLIASTRO