Slavery-Simulation Game Outrages Parents in Phoenix

Want to learn about slavery? Put down the history books, forget about teachers and just step into the life of 14-year-old slave Lucy King as she tries to escape from a Kentucky plantation. Sounds like a good idea, doesnโ€™t it? Well, no, itโ€™s not. And parents in a Phoenix school district are outraged. Suggested Reading…

Want to learn about slavery? Put down the history books, forget about teachers and just step into the life of 14-year-old slave Lucy King as she tries to escape from a Kentucky plantation. Sounds like a good idea, doesnโ€™t it? Well, no, itโ€™s not. And parents in a Phoenix school district are outraged.

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The Phoenix Elementary School District apparently has no idea how the โ€œMission US: Flight to Freedomโ€ video game, funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Humanities, made it to the districtโ€™s classrooms, but district parents are not pleased that something they feel trivializes slavery was used as a learning tool.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hq_HkLm6eDg

โ€œI found out about it last week, when my son told me what happens in the game,โ€ Deโ€™Lon Brooks, whose seventh-grader attends Emerson Elementary, told the Arizona Republic. โ€œI was just like, โ€˜No. Not at all. Thatโ€™s not going to work.โ€™

โ€œAs a parent and as someone who grew up under civil rights [movement] members, I couldnโ€™t allow my son to be subjected to that without my permission,โ€ Brooks added.

The simulation game was launched in 2012, and although it isnโ€™t the first slavery video game, itโ€™s the first to have been made with public funding.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSnNR_jIIuE

District spokeswoman Sara Bresnahan said that so far, out of the 13 schools in the district, she knows of only one seventh-grade class that has used it. Since finding out about the game, the school has blocked streaming access to it.

The makers of โ€œMission USโ€ say the game โ€œimmerses players in rich, historical settingsโ€ and โ€œempowers them to make choices that illuminate how ordinary people experienced the past.โ€

Thereโ€™s nothing like having a choice in your own adventure slavery game. Please press 1 if you want to stay a slave, or press 2 if you want to escape!

Read more at AZ Central.

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