A GAMER’S VIEW OF THE NEWS
No, this is not a movie review, not even of Wag the Dog or Primary Choices. Instead, I was
struck the other day by just how much the recent news from Washington, D.C. reminded me of some
gaming situations. You know what I’m talking about here. The Intern-al Affair. Zippergate. (Boy, you
thought your Gamemaster was pretty unimaginative about coming up with people and place names—
American journalists have been stuck in the “gate” rut for more than 25 years now!) I won’t go into more
explicit details about the allegations—you know what they are and there could be some younger readers of
this article. (If you don’t know what they are or what they mean, go tell your parents that reading comic
books has gotten you interested in following the intricacies of politics and you want to know more.) The
connection to gaming that got me interested in writing this up has less to do with the allegations, than with
the manner of Bill Clinton’s supposed denials.
Listen to what Clinton says in press conferences, what he allegedly told Monica about his gifts to
her, and how he phrased things when reviewing the situation with his secretary and I am sure you will
know what I’m talking about, because we’ve all either been in or seen the situation in a gaming session.
No, there are no compliant interns in AD&D—I’m talking about a PC having to deal with an unwanted and
non-removable Ring of Truth, which compels the wearer to always literally speak the truth, even if he
doesn’t want to. As we know from gaming, the unhappy wearer of a Ring of Truth does not act like Jim
Carrey’s character in Liar, Liar (an extremely good movie by the way, even for those who are not Jim
Carrey fans) and go about blurting out whatever comes to mind, no matter how outrageous. No, most
gamers with a character stuck with a Ring of Truth do their very best to say things that are literally true, but
do not convey the information that is really being sought or the complete picture of what they are
compelled to reply to. In short, their answers are slimy and smart-alecky and they always seem to have one
eye on the Gamemaster, not so much making sure they don’t stray from the truth as staring him into
agreeing that they have literally complied with the conditions of the cursed Ring of Truth.
So when the President says “These allegations are false. I never had sexual relations with that
woman. I never told anyone to do anything but tell the truth.”, the press and any gamer worth his salt are
set to wondering what “substantially similar” allegations are true (after all he denied a “twelve-year affair”
with Gennifer Flowers, but supposedly later admitted under oath he had sexual relations with her) or what
women other than “that woman” he may have had “relations” with (whatever he thinks that means) or what
he may have suggested or implied to potential deponents and witnesses. I doubt that anyone in Junior High
English class ever thought those stupid sentence diagramming exercises, drills to identify and clean up
pronouns with ambiguous antecedents, and assignments to look up and dissect dictionary definitions of
commonly used words would ever come in so handy in day-to-day life as they are now.
If someone tried the semantic gamesmanship of which Clinton is so fond—remember his
responses of “I never broke the laws of my country” and “I never inhaled” to allegations of marijuana
use?—while wearing a Ring of Truth in a game, the Gamemaster would probably eventually have to take
the gamer aside and explain the nature of Truth. Truth is complete and forthright and, by its very nature,
revealing. Why do you think witnesses swear in by promising to tell “the truth, the whole truth, and
nothing but the truth”? Because the judicial system doesn’t really want any pussyfooting around what it is
institutionalized to find (except, of course for the exclusionary rule for evidence resulting from an improper
search or seizure—but that is another rant).
One way to think of truth is in terms of character alignment in AD&D. Truth is Lawful Good.
Bill, I’m afraid, is Chaotic Good. He wants to do the right thing and really believes that the ends (his
running the country his way) justifies the means (doing what he needs to do to get and stay elected). By the
way, I see Bob Dole as Lawful Neutral (the process is important, but people should have the freedom to
choose their path). Al Gore is more Neutral Neutral—boy, does he sound druidical in some of his
environmental speeches.
The really odd thing about all of this is that most people don’t really want a Lawful Good
President any more than they want a Cavalier leading the gaming party. Presidents and politicians lie
sometimes—in fact, they need to lie sometimes. Military and espionage plans require secrecy to be
effective (I am still amazed some reporters gave George Bush problems about lying about what day the
Gulf War might start—any gamer knows you look to the cycle of the new moon for likely ground attacks.).
Diplomatic and legislative negotiations require finesse and some bluffing—if everyone said exactly what
points of a deal were and were not important up front many business and government deals could simply
never happen. And, yes, politicians make campaign promises which they know they can never fulfill. The
conundrum in the current situation is that people suspect the President of lying about a matter which is non-
essential and distasteful and in a context which is inappropriate (under oath in a judicial proceeding) and
that makes them uncomfortable. As to the context, I’ll stick with the position I had back in the Watergate
days—that a sitting President cannot be compelled to testify by the Judiciary, nor can his closest advisors
and his Secret Service people. Yeah, I know that’s a slap at the Truth, but an effective government is
something that a major nation should consider having—let the fallout for stonewalling reporters’ questions
be purely political, not legal and constitutional. Given that politicians are human and probably even more
imperfect than average and given that they are inclined to protect themselves and their friends (a fairly
normal response in times of uncertainty and crisis), it may be the only way to allow government to
function. I’m not saying that this is good or perfect, just that most of what politicians do is pretty
understandable if you think about it. (Even Watergate—of course Nixon was paranoid about losing the
slam dunk ’72 election; he was, after all, the victim of probably the only fixed presidential election in the
U.S. in the twentieth century (many political historians believe that the Kennedy/Nixon election of 1960
was the result of ballot-stuffing in Illinois, which tipped the balance).) Thinking ahead of time about the
human frailty of politicians could also incline the press and public to more scrutiny before politicians get
elected, rather than after. And let’s face it, before election is a better time to investigate and judge
someone’s character. You be the judge. Do Clinton’s statements have the “ring of truth” or does he sound
like a weasling PC wearing a Ring of Truth?
Two other aspects of the current situation are worth noting from a gaming perspective. First, the
tendency to attack when caught in an awkward or embarrassing situation is classic, both in politics and in
gaming. Hillary’s “massive right wing conspiracy” is good fun, but any gamer knows it to be a figment of
her imagination. It’s hard to get six characters bound by history and a common objective to cooperate for
an adventure, much less splitting of the treasure at the end (ever play or run a Living City event?). How a
group of disparate conservatives with varying agenda and egotistical self-aggrandizement as a motivation
can coordinate an effort to topple Clinton (thereby strengthening Gore’s chances in the next election) is
beyond me. It is the stuff of web-page conspiracy theorists and Paranoia rounds. Second, as unbelievable
as it may be, all of the articles about “good looking interns”, “flirting”, and definitional squabbles about
what does and does not constitute “sexual relations” (one suggestion—it might be sexual relations if either
(a) you wouldn’t do it with your mother in the room or (b) it would get at least an R rating from the movie
people) suggests to me that role-playing gaming has a more mature view of sexual equality than does the
American public or its government. Oh sure, I’ve seen plenty of fantasy art of buxom babes in skimpy
armor. Hey, there are even good looking women at GenCon parading about in chain-mail bikinis (and they
have “big links” one gamer/mom informed me in shock—I somehow think this sentence will do more for
GenCon attendance than Science Fiction Saturday). On the other hand, female characters are more and
more prevalent in tournament play (including plenty of party leaders and “strong” female role-models),
games or character sheets which focus on women being relegated to “traditional roles” are treated with the
same derision as Elf/Dwarf racial animosity by both the PCs and their players, and role-playing games
(unlike even non-contact sports) are not separated by gender. Maybe our nation and government could
learn a thing or two from gaming.
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