In 2006, Citigroup brokered a complicated mortgage investment deal that it knew would fail. A year later, the bank bet against its investments and pocketed $160 million. Its investors lost millions, but Citigroup deflected responsibility by telling them the deal was handled by an independent manager. When fraud charges were brought up, Citigroup further deflected any wrongdoing, neither admitting to nor denying the allegations. In spite of this, the bank agreed to pay $285 million to settle their charges. But that's how life works — you win some, you lose most. Citigroup, however, doesn't abide by the natural laws of life, but instead plays by the societal constraints of life in what is essentially "a game about life." The Citigroup CEOs responsible for the fraud used grey area "glitches" of American society to their advantage, dolling out the settlement costs to everybody with shares in the bank. This means not only did some wealthy congress members have to pay for the misdeeds of certain members of Citigroup, but as did several working class people with their pension funds. Those responsible for the fraud managed to escape the responsibility of their crimes and any actual punishment, instead levying the punishment on people who had absolutely nothing to do with the deal. It's sucker punching at its most low down and dirtiest.
Writing for Kill Screen, A.E. Benenson not only admits he plays dirty, but claims "sucker punches" are the true nature of sport. In his lead, Benenson uses the controversial Mayweather vs. Ortiz fight to frame his position. "The rule sets of sports do not supplement the codes of conduct in real life, but replace them," says Benenson. To him, exploitation of the rules is the ultimate form of sportsmanship and play. "Some would call Mayweather's strategy 'unsportsmanlike,' but wasn't his sucker-punch actually the ultimate sportsmanlike move?" writes Benenson. "His instantaneous appraisal of Ortiz's mistake was nothing but a virtuosic navigation of the rules of the sport." His feeling is that Mayweather took advantage of a "glitch" in order to win the game, making him the superior player of the sport. Here Benenson mistakes knowledge of the rules with an expected conduct of sportsmen. Sportsmanship refers to fair play and conduct, and while Mayweather technically did nothing wrong within the rules of professional fighting, a good sport he is not. This goes doubly for Benenson.
"Just as a sport is a game version of some other Real Thing, a sports simulation is doubly a game: we aren't playing the real sport, but a videogame about the sport. The rules of the videogame are not the rules of the sport," says Benenson. This is the kind of mentality that defrauds investors, punches you when you're apologizing and quits early in online matches to steal your win and retain his own record. In this mentality, playing cheap is all well and good when playing a game which abandons the rules and ethics of the real world. I'll concede, however, that the professional sport of boxing doesn't endow a rule or right to sportsmanlike behavior. It is encouraged, and in some cases enforced, but never expected. In any game, whether the game of life or sport, rule breakers and benders are to be expected. It is unavoidable. For that reason we create new laws and establish rights for our citizens or players. But rights can be violated by breaking the rules, and somebody has to be punished. More often than not that somebody is the entire sport.
But Benenson isn't playing in a professional sport. So as he sees it, the glitches in sport videogames enable a new "creative play" that a simulation of real sports cannot. "[They] bring you closer to the uncanny moment of improvisation between human and system, the gleeful leap into the gap between a game and its model—the real thing of videogaming. Sticking to real life over the rules of the game isn't how to be realistic; it's how to get set up for a sucker punch," says Benenson, eloquently advocating cheap shots. Admittedly there are gamers who call themselves professionals, but most of us play recreationally, meaning for fun. As Benenson puts it, "we aren't playing the real sport, but a videogame about the sport. The rules of the videogame are not the rules of the sport." Therefore, simulations or not, games shouldn't be played realistically. What he forgets, however, is that when played in this recreational manner, the game becomes a form of pure play, of enjoyment. Playing the game in an exploitative manner that supersedes the rules and exists "in the gap between a game and its model" violates the most important right that all game players have — the right to fun.
Benenson doesn't play the game, but plays the loopholes of the system. It's a style not unlike the Citigroup CEOs who cheat their way through life and punish others for their behavior. It exists outside of the rule set, but inside "glitches" that make it legal, but despicably so. Is this sort of sleaziness sportsmanlike? Is capitalizing on failed mortgages and penalizing the innocent sportsmanlike? When someone manipulates the rules of a game to their own benefit the entire society of gamers have to pay for it, whether it’s watching as your pension fund goes down the toilet or the watching the enjoyment from your favorite game slip away.