Haven’t the indigenous people of Australia suffered enough?

Imagine that you’re an app developer. You think you have a great idea for a game that you want to put on the Google Play store. You consider yourself a reasonable, rational person who wants to be well-informed about the development process.  At some point in the process, you would probably come across the Google Play Developer Program Policies, and specifically this section:

Violence and Bullying: Depictions of gratuitous violence are not allowed. Apps should not contain materials that threaten, harass or bully other users.
Hate Speech: We don’t allow content advocating against groups of people based on their race or ethnic origin, religion, disability, gender, age, nationality, veteran status, sexual orientation, or gender identity.

Upon reading the above content guidelines for Google Play’s app store, you (the reasonable, rational game developer) would probably realize that a game that promotes bullying against lesbians would be prohibited. You’d also most likely realize that a game advocating for violence against disabled people would be a no-no as well. And of course a game that calls for violence against a racial or ethnic group would be absolutely out of the question. But that’s you, the reasonable, rational game developer, and not everyone is like you. No, some people think there is nothing wrong with developing a game like Survival Island 3:

A video game allowing players to kill Australian Aboriginals has been removed from mobile stores after more than 65,000 people signed an online petition against the “racist” app.

The app, Survival Island 3 – Australia Story, tells users that they have to find ways to stay alive in “one of the most dangerous places in the world”, including having to “fight with aboriginals – you invaded their home!”.

The change.org petition, which has been signed by more than 65,000 people since it was set up on Friday, called for the app to be pulled from mobile stores, adding that “killing indigenous Australians is not a game”.

“Selling games that promote racism and negative stereotypes of indigenous Australians is not acceptable,” the petition added.

 

The game was quickly removed from Apple’s iTunes store as well as Google Play, but seriously, why would someone think this was a good idea to create? The Aborigines have suffered significantly over the centuries, from the British invasion through the Stolen Generations to discriminatory outcomes of the Northern Territory Emergency Response. And now someone thought it was a good idea to create a game that employs racist stereotypes of the indigenous people of Australia.  With everything the Aborigines have faced in Australia over the years, decades, and centuries, they deserve reparations, not to be the victims of further racism. Haven’t they suffered enough?

 

 

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Haven’t the indigenous people of Australia suffered enough?
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