Simulations

Simulations:

An interesting claim from The American Prospect:

I eventually got the hang of The Sims, the best-selling computer game in history, and my Sim self became productive and happy. She always reached the top of her career, her children always did well in school, and she always had enough money for a comfortable simulated life. Another pattern emerged as well, one that I feel powerless to stop: My Sims are conservative. I'm in complete control of them, but for some reason their lives aren't anything like the life I consider ideal in the real world. I'm a feminist graduate of an all-women's college who has vowed to never change my name or end my career to raise children full time--though I would never undervalue the work that many women do in their home. By contrast, my Sims rarely remain single long into adulthood. My wives always take their husbands' last names. They don't just have children; they bear lots of them. And they leave their careers to take on the lion's share of care-giving duties.

The idea here seems to be that the simulation is flawed in an anti-liberal way. An alternative interpretation is that the simulation is accurate: these are the rational choices for maximizing success in life, and the liberal program largely exists to make other choices sustainable.

That's not necessarily a bad thing -- there are several goods that may justify our arranging our society so that capitalism doesn't rule every single corner of it.

Now, I haven't played any of the games she mentions, but I expect that Ymar can fill in for me as our video game 'subject matter expert' (SME). With him to rely on for findings of fact, then, what do you folks think about this article and its claim? Are these games biased against liberals (and if so, can that be justified by her concept that it's to make them salable in poorer, less-populous red states)? Or is it just capitalism that is against liberalism (which would make more intuitive sense, as a good part of the liberal movements arose in opposition to problems resulting from capitalism)?