Have you ever wanted to see a grown-ass man complaining to the EU parliament about having to play as a Black man or queer person in a videogame? If your answer to that question is ‘yes,’ then allow me to invite you to enjoy this video of the European Parliament’s recent debate on Stop Killing Games, during which an actual, real European politician took the podium to tell everyone what’s really killing videogames these days: The fact that he had to play as a Black samurai in Assassin’s Creed Shadows.
The debate, the latest step in a process that somehow went from “YouTube guy is mad” to “YouTube guy is making detailed and compelling presentations to the European Parliament” in just two years, went about as you’d expect. Most speakers acknowledged that videogames are both mass media and art with meaningful and enduring cultural impact, and expressed support (or at least sympathy) for the goals of the Stop Killing Games movement.
Some were more cautious than others. Piotr Müller, an MEP (Member of the European Parliament) from Poland, for instance, said he supported the initiative but added that “we need to be cautious now to over-regulate the market. The games market in Europe still needs to be able to develop so that the European sector can continue to grow.”
Czech politician Ondřej Krutílek rolled out the ol’ ‘you don’t actually own your games’ argument to more or less defend the status quo, there was a bit of hand-wringing over the impact of games on impressionable children—we’re never really going to get away from that, though some games are definitely cause for consternation—and Catarina Vieira of the Dutch GroenLinks party made a GTA 6 joke, so props for that.
But of course, no group chat about videogames is complete without a derailment into the weeds of right-wing conspiracy theory, and this one was provided by Milan Uhrik, a Slovak MEP and leader of the far-right Republic Movement. Striding to the microphone like a man who’s been waiting in line at a Comic Con Q&A just a little too long, Uhrik declared, “Wokeness and aggressive monetization is destroying videogames!”
“You wanted to talk about what’s destroying videogames here in the European Parliament. Alright, I will say it out,” Uhrik continued. “One thing that is definitely destroying videogames is the crazy, woke ideology and political correctness which is being forced into the games.”
He then went straight into comments that would get him banned from the Assassin’s Creed subreddit: “For example, if we want to play as a samurai, obviously we want to play as a Japanese warrior and not to be forced to play as a Black person warrior or female warrior as it happened recently in Assassin’s Creed. Or to play as a queer character, without any other choice. This is an issue, really, for players.”
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Is it really, though? Some people take issue with this sort of thing, sure, just like some people take issue with basic human rights for LGBTQ people or vaccinations for children—people like Uhrik, for instance, a former member of the neo-Nazi ĽSNS politicaly party in Slovakia, who left in 2021 along with other members to establish the totally not-Nazi Republic Movement.
Uhrik’s new party comes off as slightly less overtly Nazi than his old party (which I imagine was the point), although it holds comparably awful positions (anti-immigration, anti-LGBTQ rights, anti-vax, anti-EU, pro-Russia, you know the drill) and is still widely regarded as fascist. Another Republic Movement founding member, Milan Mazurek, has denied the Holocaust and was convicted of hate speech in 2019, while founding member and vice-chairman Ondrej Ďurica used to front a neo-Nazi band called White Resistance.
Anyway, back to the point: That’s where the complaints are coming from, which may be something to keep in mind when you hear the same complaints coming from somewhere else. Is this “an issue for players,” or is it just an issue for, y’know, these guys?
Uhrik did, almost as an afterthought, touch on the actual matter at hand. After decrying “never-ending microtransaction, insane pay-to-win, or even gambling loot boxes, like in casinos,” he said, “These practices have to be stopped, as well as [the] practice when a company shuts down [a] game server right after you purchase your favorite game.”
In a more detailed breakdown of the positions taken by each MEP and party in the Stop Killing Games subreddit, SKG director general Moritz Katzner said, in full diplomacy mode, that Uhrik “was supportive in tone, but in my view somewhat missed the point.” Others agreed, although somewhat less tactfully:
The debate itself is merely one step forward on a long journey, and what will ultimately come of it remains to be seen. Katzner said the European Parliament shows “clear support” for the effort, while the commission itself “continues to be mixed.” But even if the commission opts for a non-legislative response (which parliamentary commissions so often do), the goal remains to “make sure SKG can still become reality” through other means, including legal action and pushing for regulation in individual countries.
The full debate, which runs just under an hour, can be seen on the Europe Echo YouTube channel.
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