Life is Not a Game of Monopoly
By Jim Bauer
@porwest (102877)
United States
July 8, 2025 5:00pm CST
Boy, that's a fun game, isn't it? Who didn't like playing Monopoly? You could pretend to be a tycoon, a real estate genius, and become filthy rich in the process. Only, everyone knew it was just a game.
It was pretend. Make believe. Or, as the Latins would have said, assimulaticius.
The deeds weren't real and when you pulled out your chair and walked away from the table there would be no real estate to claim rents on. No one would accept your demands for payment because...
Everyone knows it was just a game. You never really ever owned anything.
You couldn't step away, scoop up your loot and run to the nearest car dealer with your pink and green and yellow money and buy a BMW.
Because the money wasn't real either. Not a single penny of it. Even if you might have thought it was. Even if you wanted the BMW dealership to play along with you and accept the colorful cash...
In the real world we have strict rules about what's real and what's not. You don't get to pretend and get things your way. You don't get to make someone believe your pretend stuff is real.
And that doesn't just go for a game of Monopoly. It goes for pretty much anything. You can't turn back an odometer and call your car "low miles" when you sell it. You can't copy a Gucci bag and slap their logo on it and sell it.
Not legally anyway.
Because the miles are a lie and the bag is not a Gucci.
Pretend is pretend and real is real. You can play the game while you're sitting at the table. You can even imagine you are a rich tycoon when everyone else steps away from the game and goes home.
But as soon as you walk out the door and step into the real world? You are what you are. Not what you want to be. And you can't force someone else to accept your "game persona" no matter how badly you want it.
Because everyone knows it's a game.
8 people like this
8 responses
@1creekgirl (43806)
• United States
23h
I always hated playing Monopoly with my husband. I'm just not a cutthroat kind of person and he's a terrible winner. He liked to gloat. But like you said, it was just a game.
6 people like this
@LindaOHio (193916)
• United States
22h
But many people are gullible. I remember Monopoly games going on for hours on end.
3 people like this
@porwest (102877)
• United States
9h
Of course, there was a different "theme" I was going for here. But yes. A game is a game and real is real. We get to enjoy the game but we don't get to pretend it's real and get away with it, if you catch my drift. But yes, Monopoly remains to be one of the longest games I ever played. I am sure sales have slipped as attention spans have greatly shortened over the years.
@LeaPea2417 (38025)
• Toccoa, Georgia
23h
I absolutely loved my Monopoly game my parents gave me for Christmas when I was around aged 10. My parents, sister and I played many times. I still had it when I got married and had my two boys. Through the years, my kids and I played it a lot. My husband sometimes would play too. It is the best board game ever.
3 people like this
@porwest (102877)
• United States
3h
I could be wrong, but Monopoly might be THE #1 best selling board game in history. And it devised a brilliant strategy years ago that probably boosted sales as well when it "localized" boards so they could sell different versions as souvenirs.
1 person likes this
@LeaPea2417 (38025)
• Toccoa, Georgia
Just now
@porwest Yes, I had my original game. Then one Christmas, my parents gave my kids a "State Park" version. They had visited a State Park and bought it in the gift shop. My son also received a version of his favorite Football team.
@Vikingswest1 (6490)
• United States
23h
I grew to like Risk more than Monopoly. Couldn't get my armies to follow me out of that game either. People laughed when I threatened them with total destruction.
3 people like this
@RasmaSandra (86751)
• Daytona Beach, Florida
23h
When I had someone to play with I could play Monopoly for hours, Now I cannot find a good online Monopoly game just me against the PC,
3 people like this
@Ineeddentures (9472)
•
22h
" You don't get to make someone believe your pretend stuff is real."
But people do make people believe their pretend stuff is real every day. Because they are plausible. And people are gullible.
People are who they are but, who they are is who they want to be, in their own minds.
They carry it off and live the lie , live the delusion because they can.
It's true that they cannot force someone to accept their game persona
But for every one who doesn't..
There are ten who do.
3 people like this
@porwest (102877)
• United States
3h
The point is you can't force someone to play along with you in the "game." You can say you are whatever you want to believe you are. I don't have to agree, and I don't have to play along. Take that Monopoly money to a bank and try to deposit it, as I provided as an example in my post...
Your bank balance won't change any more than you insisting you are a woman means I won't see you for what you are and call you a man.
As to your ratio, I think you are backwards. The media wants us to believe 10 to 1 will play along. I think it's 1 out of 10. The media ignores the 9 and homes in on the one.
1 person likes this
@LooeyVille (72)
• United States
9h
The Democrats are playing games and wanting us to think it's reality.
1 person likes this
@LooeyVille (72)
• United States
9h
@porwest But of course. They want us to believe that transgenderism is mainstream when really it only represents .00001% of humans. They want us to believe that Orange Man is bad when he's ending wars and boosting the economy and bringing things back to the USA. It's all a shell game to them. They hide the truth (as if they knew what the truth actually is) under a shell but show you the two other shells of lies. Or back to your Monopoly metaphor, they give you fake money every time you pass "go" but it's just bribes for your votes.
1 person likes this
