Is the civ series too eurocentric?

[Kyriakos]

I don't get why people are complaining. Everyone knows the white men did the biggest contribution in the world's history.

On a more serious note, my people (Ottomans/Turks) not being included is annoying. Ottoman Empire had a very prominent role in the history. I hope we get a DLC with a decent UA. Civ V UA was really underwhelming.

Also, Paradox is worse in terms of eurocentrism. In Eu IV there is something called WESTERN tech. You have to WESTERNIZE your country to (more or less) have an equal footing with the Western tech group nations. However, your units are still worse than a western country. There is stupid stuff like "Anatolian Tech", "Muslim Tech" and stuff like that. I mean wtf does that mean, seriously? Other nations pretty much had no chance (except Ottomans who kinda began to fall apart after 18th century).

Tbh, Ottomans should not be in until the second expansion

Anyway, i hear you... Yet at least up to EuIII (which i played) you had to 'westernise' even as the byz empire, and in eu1-2 you could not get in equal tech group with the 'latins' nomatter what, so in that respect i suppose it is an improvement, though still a very bad idea

 

[schlaufuchs]

I don't get why people are complaining. Everyone knows the white men did the biggest contribution in the world's history.

Does everyone know that? I don't think I'd be so confident in making such a sweeping generalization, even if we're assuming it's possible to quantify "contribution in the world's history".

 

[Mouthwash]

My feelings as well. There's a limited to how many variations of "white Christians dudes" you can get through before it becomes a bit repetitive. I'd be quite happy to condense the entirety of post-Classical Europe into "Frankish/Latin" and "Slavic/Orthodox" civs, and while I don't expect a lot of support on going quite that far, I really don't think you'd lose anything much.

Ideally, I'd like much less of a focus on the post-medieval period altogether. It's "Civilization" not "Geopolitics Simulator 3000", so encountering "France" or "America" when I could be encountering the Assyrians or Inca always makes me cringe a little.

But, maybe I'm just bitter because Firaxis seem firmly convinced that the last Celt died in AD61.


The Inca and Zulu were also dynasties. So was Japan, strictly speaking, until 1945. The "Persia" represented in the series is to all intents and purposes the Achaemenids, "Mongolia" the Cingissids and "Ethiopia" the Solomonids. A Mughal civ isn't without precedent, it's simply that in the case of the Mughals, the dynasty is neither conflated with nor subsumed into the broader "civilisation" in the Western imagination, and that's as much because it suited the political ambitions of British imperialists and, later, Indian nationalists, as because it's any substantial way more truthful than the others.

So... you agree with me? Great.

I certainly wouldn't be against defining the civilizations in broader cultural categories; there are already excellent Civ IV mods that do things along that line. Heck, in one they even planned to remove clear-cut identities from the early game by making them identical but giving them a unique, continent-based "culture building" that allowed the construction of unique cultures if other requirements were met, but it never really panned out. (I mean, they actually implemented the culture system, but they never removed the clear-cut civs. So you have this weird thing where you can start a game as Portugal and build Scottish culture, get Scottish unique buildings/units, and all the while never actually build Portuguese culture. What's worse is that you can build multiple cultures, which totally defeats the point of them. I don't want Praetorians and Landsknechts and Redcoats in one civ.)

Anyway, the model used by Firaxis has its own merits. It wouldn't be the same without Portugal's early naval ability, or the Ottoman extra happiness. The Civilization franchise isn't a geopolitical simulator, it's a game which uses geopolitical entities in its theme. Don't tell me you can't see the appeal in out-teching England as the Zulus and razing London to the ground.

The Romans appear to be just the Julio-Claudian dynasty.

Julius and Augustus in Civ IV, just Augustus in V. No prominent Republican leaders like Cicero, Sulla, Crassus, or Pompey. No later emperors like Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, or Diocletian. No legendary figures like Cincinnatus or Aeneus. Not really much of a pan-Roman civ, is it?

Why must it be? Civ IV was limited by the trait combinations, V and the rest were limited by game design. There's no real room for that many leaders, and Julius and Augustus are way too emblematic to be replaced by anyone else.

I mean, would you prefer a Rome with ONLY Sulla, or even both Cicero and Julius Caesar? Personally I'd feel like something was missing.

What "death", though? The existence of distinct cultures, langauges and identities in the Western parts of the British Isles isn't a Victorian invention, even if their identification as "Celtic" might be. If there's anything which distinguishes "Celtic-ness" from "Han-ness" or "Hindu-ness", or even from "French-ness" or "German-ness", it's not a lack of historical basis, it's simply the lack of a common body of literature and institutions to give it the sort of day-to-day weight those identities have acquired.

------------

But, well... So what? The ancient Celts didn't even have a "Celtic" identity, it was imposed on them from outside, but nobody disputes that "Celtic" is an at least occasionally-useful way to describe the ancient Celtic-speaking peoples of North-Western Europe, at least not for purposes of a computer game. So what's so contentious about a modern day, self-identified sense of Celtic-ness?

Funny that you don't apply this reasoning to... well, that country.

Also, Paradox is worse in terms of eurocentrism. In Eu IV there is something called WESTERN tech. You have to WESTERNIZE your country to (more or less) have an equal footing with the Western tech group nations. However, your units are still worse than a western country. There is stupid stuff like "Anatolian Tech", "Muslim Tech" and stuff like that. I mean wtf does that mean, seriously? Other nations pretty much had no chance (except Ottomans who kinda began to fall apart after 18th century).

Since EUIV is literally a Europe-defined historical simulator, I'd say it's more than justified to have pre-defined categories of technological development. I personally don't think it goes far enough. Have you ever seen a European civ actually take and hold any land in India beyond a province or two? (That alone is probably the result of an event or mission, mind you.)

 

[Traitorfish]

Regarding Eurocentrism, I think 18 civs is too small number to have enough variation and arguably leads to Eurocentrism. For example, let's try to limit Europe Civs to just six.

Europe

Greece, Rome, England, France, Germany, Russia *
*(i pulled a CiV and omitted Spain to trim the numbers)

Six civs isn't much right? Well it's still 1/3 of the total. So still Euro-centric by volume right?

Now try to tell my why any of the above Civs should not be in the vanilla 18. Consider the classic, medieval, renaissance, imperial and modern ages. It's not easy to remove one, is it? I only removed Spain because it was already done in previous game.

England, France and Germany could very easily be condensed into a single "Frankish" civ. There's not actually much between them, on a global scale. Slightly different preferences in alcohol, pastries and worship, and you're liable to find as much diversity among three Germans as between a German, a Frenchman and an Englishman. Drop America- if we don't need one England, we can hardly justify two- and you've got three lovely new slots to play with.

Besides, I'd be careful about lumping in Rome and Greece with post-Classical European civs. The very identification of them as "European" in anything more than a geographical sense is itself an expression of Eurocentricism- and in the Greek case, quite possibly in the geographical sense, too.

So... you agree with me? Great.

I certainly wouldn't be against defining the civilizations in broader cultural categories; there are already excellent Civ IV mods that do things along that line. Heck, in one they even planned to remove clear-cut identities from the early game by making them identical but giving them a unique, continent-based "culture building" that allowed the construction of unique cultures if other requirements were met, but it never really panned out. (I mean, they actually implemented the culture system, but they never removed the clear-cut civs. So you have this weird thing where you can start a game as Portugal and build Scottish culture, get Scottish unique buildings/units, and all the while never actually build Portuguese culture. What's worse is that you can build multiple cultures, which totally defeats the point of them. I don't want Praetorians and Landsknechts and Redcoats in one civ.)

Anyway, the model used by Firaxis has its own merits. It wouldn't be the same without Portugal's early naval ability, or the Ottoman extra happiness. The Civilization franchise isn't a geopolitical simulator, it's a game which uses geopolitical entities in its theme. Don't tell me you can't see the appeal in out-teching England as the Zulus and razing London to the ground.

You can have all that without the weird fixation on the early-modern proto-national state, though. UUs, UBs and abilities are picked as much for diversity and balance in the game as because they represent their civ, so there's no reason you couldn't build basically the same game with switched-around civs. What the civs ultimately supply is flavour, and there's a limit to the flavour that can be extracted from eight variations on "white Christians, 1500-1900".

Funny that you don't apply this reasoning to... well, that country.

What, you mean Belgium? Man, #@%£ Belgium. Their waffles aren't so great, and also other elements of their culture, whatever they are.

 

[Mouthwash]

England, France and Germany could very easily be condensed into a single "Frankish" civ. There's not actually much between them, on a global scale. Slightly different preferences in alcohol, pastries and worship, and you're liable to find as much diversity among three Germans as between a German, a Frenchman and an Englishman. Drop America- if we don't need one England, we can hardly justify two- and you've got three lovely new slots to play with.

The term 'civilization' denotes a whole lot more than cake preferences. At least the way I learned it; I don't have a clue what they teach you at Marxism academy.

EDIT: Wow, I just realized how awesome those sentences would be if quoted out of context in a signature.

Besides, I'd be careful about lumping in Rome and Greece with post-Classical European civs. The very identification of them as "European" in anything more than a geographical sense is itself an expression of Eurocentricism- and in the Greek case, quite possibly in the geographical sense, too.

Greece is not, to my knowledge, quite possibly located in the European peninsula.

You can have all that without the weird fixation on the early-modern proto-national state, though. UUs, UBs and abilities are picked as much for diversity and balance in the game as because they represent their civ, so there's no reason you couldn't build basically the same game with switched-around civs. What the civs ultimately supply is flavour, and there's a limit to the flavour that can be extracted from eight variations on "white Christians, 1500-1900".

Huge areas of the Americas are Spanish-speaking and follow Spanish-flavored Catholicism, are populated by descendants of Spanish settlers, and have Spain as a cultural reference point. France has a sphere of influence almost as large in Africa and Canada, and imported liberal republicanism across Europe (heck, the world- the state may not have set up liberal regimes overseas, but liberalism in Africa is still hugely influenced by French ideas). Germany, in whatever form, was the center of Europe from the Holy Roman Empire to the present day. You may as well try to remove China from Asia. And Angmerica is the single most important civilization to ever exist, in global terms.

There's plenty of flavor to be found in these. We all know about British banking and maritime ability, and America's decadent consumerism. How could we leave out Spain's iconic architecture, or its legacy of religious fanaticism? What about Germany's industry and war machine? What about France's radicalism, and its status as the cosmopolitan capital of Europe? What about the Viking raiders, or the Portuguese colonizers, or the Russian frontier spirit? All of these things are indispensable to our modern historical consciousness. I say it the only thing wrong with its variety of flavor is that Poland wasn't included.

I agree about the Netherlands, though. Those guys really are basically England. Why bother with them if you're going to skip out on Scotland?

What, you mean Belgium? Man, #@%£ Belgium. Their waffles aren't so great, and also other elements of their culture, whatever they are.

Yes, I agree. But let us not forgot the countries of Eralis, Laseri, and Raelis, which have never gotten any representation by Firaxis despite having been responsible for most of Western religion and thought.

 

[Ajidica]

The only thing I've learned from the last five pages is that if we are going to treat "China" or "India" as representative of 4000 years of history and very diverse groups yet believe that "France", "Germany", and "England" are worthy of being their own civs; then the Goths should definitely be featured in an expansion pack.

 

[Kyriakos]

Besides, I'd be careful about lumping in Rome and Greece with post-Classical European civs. The very identification of them as "European" in anything more than a geographical sense is itself an expression of Eurocentricism- and in the Greek case, quite possibly in the geographical sense, too.

Does not compute. Even if you mean the asian and african greek cities, those were colonies of mainland Greece, which was obviously in Europe. Besides, Europe itself is not just a greek word but a figure in a greek myth; another female friend of Zeus

That said, if you only mean it in a "where was the epicenter of the greek world" kind of way, then it obviously depends on the time period. In the era of Alexander and the empires following him, the cultural center of the greek world was much more in places like Alexandria (Africa) and Pergamon (Asia) rather than Europe. Then again there were always other centers, eg Syracuse, much like the pre-Alexandrian era had many centers as well (Asia minor coast; those cities were supposedly all founded by Athens, Italy, Thracian coast, Cyrene in Africa etc).

Although you may have only meant that ancient greek people wouldn't see much of a reason to identify with the whole continent of Europe. Well yes, that much is obvious. Almost all Europe was a backward nest of barbarians at the time.

 

[Lexicus]

Drop America- if we don't need one England, we can hardly justify two-

Them's fightin words.

 

[Traitorfish]

The term 'civilization' denotes a whole lot more than cake preferences. At least the way I learned it; I don't have a clue what they teach you at Marxism academy.

That's entirely my point. On the Big Stuff, the stuff by which "civilisations" might be distinguished, the petty-kingdoms of North-Western Europe all rather fade into each other. There's a reason that it did not traditionally seem absurd for the Islamic world to label the entirety of Western Europe "Frangistan", in much the same we group together vast and diverse areas as "Arabia", "India" or "Indonesia".

Greece is not, to my knowledge, quite possibly located in the European peninsula.

The Greek civilisation represented in the Civilization series is not identical to the modern nation-state of Greece, which covered an overlapping but markedly different territory. Both were dominated by the Peloponnese, yes, but were modern Greece extends North into Thrace and Macedonia, ancient Greece extended West into Asia.

Futher, if the Greece depicted in Civilization is not simply the Greece of the Classical period but also of the Hellenistic period, as implied by the repeated inclusion of Alexander as the leaderhead, then most of the Greek world is outside of Europe.

Huge areas of the Americas are Spanish-speaking and follow Spanish-flavored Catholicism, are populated by descendants of Spanish settlers, and have Spain as a cultural reference point. France has a sphere of influence almost as large in Africa and Canada, and imported liberal republicanism across Europe (heck, the world- the state may not have set up liberal regimes overseas, but liberalism in Africa is still hugely influenced by French ideas). Germany, in whatever form, was the center of Europe from the Holy Roman Empire to the present day. You may as well try to remove China from Asia. And Angmerica is the single most important civilization to ever exist, in global terms.

There's plenty of flavor to be found in these. We all know about British banking and maritime ability, and America's decadent consumerism. How could we leave out Spain's iconic architecture, or its legacy of religious fanaticism? What about Germany's industry and war machine? What about France's radicalism, and its status as the cosmopolitan capital of Europe? What about the Viking raiders, or the Portuguese colonizers, or the Russian frontier spirit? All of these things are indispensable to our modern historical consciousness. I say it the only thing wrong with its variety of flavor is that Poland wasn't included.

I agree about the Netherlands, though. Those guys really are basically England. Why bother with them if you're going to skip out on Scotland?

These are all national mythologies, though, not distinguishing features of a civilisation. The reason we think they're important is because we live in their world and have inherited their conceptual universe, not because it's actually true. The British are not remarkable sailors, the Spanish not remarkably good architects, the French are not remarkably cultured. The Germans not remarkably industrious nor the Russiands industriously hardy, it's simply become important for those countries to believe those things about themselves. They used to value different things; tomorrow they'll probably value something else. It's thin stuff to build a game around, at least a game that purports to represent the whole grand sweep of human history.

Yes, I agree. But let us not forgot the countries of Eralis, Laseri, and Raelis, which have never gotten any representation by Firaxis despite having been responsible for most of Western religion and thought.

I dunno, I never read the Narnia books.

Them's fightin words.

 

[whyidie]

Sure the game has gotten better at including non-euro civs, but the game is still extremely eurocentric. The implicit values and goals of the game are very much rested in European ideals and tropes. From the tech tree to the ideas, to the progression towards centralized state apparati based around urban centers to the overall victory conditions. Think about the "ages" of civ5: Ancient Era->Classical Era->Medieval Era->Renaissance Era->Modern Era->Atomic Era->Information Era->Futuristic Era. Each of these eras specifically references Western periodization and also, again, borrows a Western understanding of the general flow of history. Hell even things like "wonders of the world" ultimately come from Western culture.

Exactly. If I were being considered for inclusion, I'm with the Pueblo. We don't belong in your game, we are playing something else.

 

[Leoreth]

The term 'civilization' denotes a whole lot more than cake preferences. At least the way I learned it; I don't have a clue what they teach you at Marxism academy.

Does it?

I think much of the genius of the Civ series relies on civilisation being such an ill-defined concept that everyone still has a vague intuitive understanding of. Here's Flying Pig's post again:

Yes, the Civ series - or at least Civ IV, which is the only one I have - does seem to have a bit of an uneasy relationship with questions about what a 'civilisation' is - there are a couple which seem to be 'supranational' (Native Americans, Celts, arguably Greece since it seems to be based on the Classical period) but the vast majority which seem to be based on political units and to change when those do - hence Germany and the HRE, or Rome and the Byzantine Empire, are separate. Given that we're already being asked to 'believe' that a country can be so micromanaged that no granaries or temples are built and nobody becomes an artist or a trader unless the omnipotent central power tells them to, I'm not sure there's necessarily a problem with the former approach, except that it encourages the sort of oversimplified thinking that you're talking about here.

There is just no definition of "civilisation" that would apply to "Portugal", "Native America" and "Ottomans" at the same time. That's why it works so well as a concept for this game! Because what it really means is "whatever people think should be an actor in a historical game". In other words, people have heard of Rome and Native Americans and Celts and all that, so they want it in their history game. All words with actual meaning just wouldn't work here and clash with at least some choices. "Civilisation" is so nicely devoid of meaning that it goes over fine.

As someone who's actively been in the shoes of deciding what does and doesn't get to be a civ, I think when making a game it's the far superior approach to consider which perspective would be interesting to experience as a player - if it adds something in that regard then it should be included, even if your overall civ lineup ends up inconsistent with any rigorous standard.

I'm a little bit disappointed though that the discussion has spiraled down to the point where people are arguing what should and shouldn't be included when there are more interesting points to consider when talking about eurocentrism. Just don't include Venice and it will be fine.

I mean stuff like:
- the linear view of history as a technological and socialogical progression
- exploitation of resources as the prime mechanism for success
- the supremacy of the state in all interactions between entities in the world
- the emphasis on urban centers
- "great people"
- techs as a thing that exists
- victory conditions that are framed in terms of competition, usually violent

I mean it's all in Owen's initial post basically. Mouthwash has kind of brushed over it with a glib "well it's a game duh what are you going to do", and it's sort of true. Those concepts conveniently lend themselves very well to a game, which is why Civ works so well.

But it's still useful to view these things critically. Part of the reason those things work so well for a game is because they play to tropes that are so ingrained in our way of how we view the world that we don't even notice them any more, even though they are far from universally true.

I don't think it's the job of a video game, especially a mainstream franchise like Civ, to educate people that things can also be differently. But on the other hand I think a game that challenges some of these assumptions could be interesting (and frankly the 4X genre isn't very interesting right now), and at the very least we should be aware of them.

 

[Mouthwash]

Does it?

I think much of the genius of the Civ series relies on civilisation being such an ill-defined concept that everyone still has a vague intuitive understanding of. Here's Flying Pig's post again:

There is just no definition of "civilisation" that would apply to "Portugal", "Native America" and "Ottomans" at the same time. That's why it works so well as a concept for this game! Because what it really means is "whatever people think should be an actor in a historical game". In other words, people have heard of Rome and Native Americans and Celts and all that, so they want it in their history game. All words with actual meaning just wouldn't work here and clash with at least some choices. "Civilisation" is so nicely devoid of meaning that it goes over fine.

As someone who's actively been in the shoes of deciding what does and doesn't get to be a civ, I think when making a game it's the far superior approach to consider which perspective would be interesting to experience as a player - if it adds something in that regard then it should be included, even if your overall civ lineup ends up inconsistent with any rigorous standard.

Thanks for quoting me out of context to make a point that I've been making for like the whole thread.

 

[Agent327]

I feel this thread overlooks a couple of things. First, Civ is a US game played mostly by US residents. It would be somewhat off for such a game to not be 'eurocentric'. Second, Civ has progressed to such a point of laziness (renaming Denmark to Norway and adding 'state church', so it's not a complete copy) that it can easily afford 'eurocentrism'. Why? Because the modding community will automatically correct this. (I'm just mentioning that in case nobody noticed Civ has a very active modding community.) Meanwhile Civ 6 kicked 2 euro civs - but apparently that's not enough for our critics.

Lastly, if a bunch of designers in China made a game like Civ, it's bound to be 'Asiacentric'. Somehow I don't see a site with a thread discussing the 'Asiacentrism' of that game arising. But that could just be my perspective. A funny thing about perspective is that you get more of it the further you step away from your subject.

 

[Leoreth]

Thanks for quoting me out of context to make a point that I've been making for like the whole thread.

You should be less concerned about whether or not people acknowledge your intelligence when parts of your posts appear in their quote tags.

Sometimes I just quote people as a jumping off point to expand on the things they say or to provide a different perspective without necessarily disagreeing. In this case, I emphasised the aspect that the lack of definition is exactly what gives the term civilisation its utility here.

Lastly, if a bunch of designers in China made a game like Civ, it's bound to be 'Asiacentric'. Somehow I don't see a site with a thread discussing the 'Asiacentrism' of that game arising. But that could just be my perspective. A funny thing about perspective is that you get more of it the further you step away from your subject.

So people are hypocrites because of their hypothetical reaction to something that doesn't exist? I'm pretty sure the Asian perspective of an Asian game would be remarked upon by a Western audience.

To give a concrete example, Europa Universalis is not developed in the US, but in Sweden. And I have seen numerous discussions of how the developers have given undue weight to the importance of Sweden over the period, for example with the number of events designed for it.

Your post seems to assume the stance that western people tend to give "Asia centric" games a pass while western games get critiqued for being Eurocentric, and that this is a double standard. The difference is that western audiences will automatically perceive an Asian perspective including its biases in an Asian game, while western biases are generally assumed to be the default and are therefore less likely to be noticed.

Discussions of eurocentrism in western games aren't there to pan the games (at least not in my opinion), but to bring those biases to the fore in the minds of the players.

 

[Traitorfish]

Lastly, if a bunch of designers in China made a game like Civ, it's bound to be 'Asiacentric'. Somehow I don't see a site with a thread discussing the 'Asiacentrism' of that game arising. But that could just be my perspective. A funny thing about perspective is that you get more of it the further you step away from your subject.

I can absolutely see that discussion happening. The difference is, to Westerners, it would be a novel and interesting perspective, rather than something we've seen many times before- five times within this series alone!

Remember, nobody is complaining that Civ I, Civ II or even Civ III were Eurocentric: that was, as you say, to be expected. We'd just imagine that, another three games down the line, they'd have done a better job of shaking things up. They're certainly trying, I can't think of many other games that has included Ethiopia or Indonesia as playable factions, but the fact that the Vanilla Civ 6 list is a step back compared to Civ 5- two more Euro civs and one less Middle Eastern civ- suggests they're not making a priority of it.

After all, Civilization is a series which wears its ambition in its title, in a way that I don't think any other strategy series does. It's understandable that people might wonder if it's falling short of that ambition.

 

[EgonSpengler]

Them's fightin words.

To English and Americans, I should think.

 

[Lexicus]

I mean stuff like:
- the linear view of history as a technological and socialogical progression
- exploitation of resources as the prime mechanism for success
- the supremacy of the state in all interactions between entities in the world
- the emphasis on urban centers
- "great people"
- techs as a thing that exists
- victory conditions that are framed in terms of competition, usually violent

This matches a post I made a while back in the Civ 6 forum almost exactly
The conceptual eurocentrism of the civ series is a far bigger elephant in the room than the mere selection of civs.

 

[Mouthwash]

You should be less concerned about whether or not people acknowledge your intelligence when parts of your posts appear in their quote tags.

Sometimes I just quote people as a jumping off point to expand on the things they say or to provide a different perspective without necessarily disagreeing. In this case, I emphasised the aspect that the lack of definition is exactly what gives the term civilisation its utility here.

OK, sorry.

I can absolutely see that discussion happening. The difference is, to Westerners, it would be a novel and interesting perspective, rather than something we've seen many times before- five times within this series alone!

Remember, nobody is complaining that Civ I, Civ II or even Civ III were Eurocentric: that was, as you say, to be expected. We'd just imagine that, another three games down the line, they'd have done a better job of shaking things up. They're certainly trying, I can't think of many other games that has included Ethiopia or Indonesia as playable factions, but the fact that the Vanilla Civ 6 list is a step back compared to Civ 5- two more Euro civs and one less Middle Eastern civ- suggests they're not making a priority of it.

After all, Civilization is a series which wears its ambition in its title, in a way that I don't think any other strategy series does. It's understandable that people might wonder if it's falling short of that ambition.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA! These days it's only a few steps above Farmville.

 

[thecrazyscot]

There's genuinely interesting discussion going on here...can we not go down any rabbit holes about the quality of individual civ games? Please?

 

[Mouthwash]

There's genuinely interesting discussion going on here...can we not go down any rabbit holes about the quality of individual civ games? Please?

Yes, you're right, apologies. All four Civ games have their upsides and downsides, and it's not my business to determine which of them ought to be played.