Flock of Humans

A first-person, co-op, action, buildy, crafty, roguelike

Flight of the Flock by me! in…2021 maybe? 2022 maybe?

Do you know the Chickie Chickie Beat?

It goes like this:

Hey there [insert child’s name here]
You’re a real cool cat
You got a lot of this
And a lot of that
We all think
That you’re real neat
So come on down
And do the Chickie Chickie Beat!

(and then the chosen kid gets to run on stage and join the group doing the chickie chickie dance which has choreography that goes with the chorus below)

Go LEFT chickie chickie, chickie chickie chickie
Go RIGHT chickie chickie, chickie chickie chickie
Go UP chickie chickie, chickie chickie chickie
Go DOWN chickie chickie, chickie chickie chickie
ALL AROUND chickie chickie, chickie chickie chickie

(then it starts again…)

You get it?

And this repeats until they’ve called maybe 5 or 6 kids up on stage, usually the song leader gets creative after 2 or 3 campers are called out and starts including camp staff or counselors. Then the final verse they always sing, “Hey there [Camp Name], you’re a real cool cat, you got a lot of this, and a lot of that, we all think that you’re real neat, now STAY RIGHT THERE and do the chickie chickie beat!”

You know, because the whole camp can’t go up on stage.

You were likely to get singled out if you were popular, if you were a sad case, or if your mom or dad was a camp staffer.

You might be shocked to learn that 5 years* as a camper, 1 year as a counselor, and 2 years being in charge of the “gofers” (the 9th graders who were too old to be a camper, too young to be a counselor, and were made to do a lot of chores), I was never singled out as a real cool cat with either a lot of this or with a lot of that. I threaded the needle. While I was seldom bullied or left out of things, I’ve never really been Mr. Popular either. Max was fine. Max is fine. And it’s true.

*I got an extra year as a camper, because I was considered mature enough to attend when I was entering 3rd grade, whereas most kids had to wait until they were entering 4th grade!

Again, I wasn’t an outcast, and I’ve always been able to find my brothers, whether on the soccer field, in physics class, at church, in homeshcool theater, wherever. In high school, I probably could have been described as a bit of a teenage misanthrope. I gained some small, ephemeral fame once because, as I’m told, when my big sister was at a party, someone asked her where Max was. She answered, “He wanted to stay home and play Starcraft.”

The most popular guy there then cried out, “Incredible. Max Clark is my hero!”

Something like that.

I wasn’t there, as I’ve told you.

So what’s this got to do with George? Why am I bringing this up? Well, the George connection is still a ways off, but I’m telling you this because most of you know me from the last 10 years as the guy who hosts board game parties, Friendsgiving/Springsgiving/Summersgiving, co-organizes video game meetups/showcases, plays on a bunch of soccer teams, organizes Georgist meetups, started “night school”, leads “fitness at 5”, and more! Not saying I’m now super popular, just that I have been intentional about group socialization.

And maybe actually most significantly, I just spent 8 years of my life working on a co-op video game called Flock of Dogs about riding dogs with your friends. A game where you gather resources with other people, defeat monsters with other people, and then go to a big party at the end with other people.

So what changed? I don’t know. Something…between the ages of 25 and 35, it became clear to me that community is precious. Probably it was like wondering where my wife was and growing sick of online dating. And realizing that I missed being around the moms, dads, and siblings of my friends when I would go over to their house to hang out. I definitely missed mooching and joining in the family dinners without having to do any dishes ahahaha. And you know, while I could play Starcraft all I wanted in my apartment, I missed having parties to ditch.

And so I tried to create community. See my little list of attempts above. They were met with partial success and I did form and deepen friendships.

Then I thought that at least by making an online, co-op video game that players could play from anywhere with internet and join at any time, this would provide a way of reconnecting with my old friends from church, or college, or my cousins.

It didn’t seem like any of the attempts were working quite right though. I just kept getting older and paying more rent. These communities were not robust.

I would think a lot about the groups I was a part of in my youth and what made them work. School, sports leagues, religion, undergirded by moms willing to do a helluva lotta driving. Could something like that be recreated? I read about “third places” and atheists attempting to recreate church-like fraternity. Maybe I could pick up a drinking habit and become a regular at a bar. Then there was a moment when I realized that to find a community that spanned age, gender, race, and allowed for our own rituals, customs, and relationships to develop…the only real way to build this community was to literally build it. That is, the physical structures for dwelling, transit, lesiure, and commerce.

A place where I could walk to the park with my dog, let my dog run around while I kick the soccer ball with friends or kids, run into other friends and kids and grandmas and grandpas, and then cross the street to drink a beer and talk shit about who was the best at kicking the soccer ball. Then on the short walk home, pop into a corner store and buy locally sourced produce from a person whose name I knew and would hold accountable if the milk was spoiled. Then maybe later that night going back out, because a friend invited me last minute to see a band play, and it was easy to attend, because we wouldn’t have to worry about parking, or who’s driving, or if we’ll get stabbed.

My time living in Boston had given a glimpse of all this. I had 5 dear soccer buddies that lived with 0.7 miles of me. I had a dog and a nearby park. I had a roommate who was super into gardening (and hydroponics) and loved to share his produce and other friends who were super into craft beer and did some home brews and shared their beer, and friends who loved music and wrote songs and would love to perform for us…and yet none of us live within walking distance any longer. And we were almost all just straight, white men between the ages of 25 and 35, with a few exceptions.

All my various attempts at community, or the communities I’ve found, have mostly petered out. People graduate high school and go away to different colleges, lose faith and stop attending, then they graduate college move away for grad school, or move away for a job. Then they graduate from grad school and move to a different country for a professorship (or one guy moved to Poland to be a comedian). Other people break up with their significant other and move away or just…don’t come around any more. Others marry their significant other and get pregnant and buy a house with a yard for their kids and their dogs where it’s affordable and safe, which is always at least 30 minutes driving distance farther out from the location where you typically hang out. And once you break the 15 minute transit barrier, hang outs require planning. Other people just can’t get a good enough job to afford rent. Some fools want to make a video game and can’t afford rent. Git gud lol. And some friendships end because there’s only so many spots on a soccer roster. Or worse, a broken ankle/ruptured achilles/cracked skull/torn ACL/third concussion/cancer diagnosis forces early retirement. These communities were fragile and so they shriveled.

In making my video game, it quickly became clear that organizing playtests with all these adults who were “busy” with their “lives” was a giant hassle to arrange. My hope of reconnecting with my old church pals in California, my cousins/friends in Tennessee, or my dispersed college friends never happened. I mean, maybe none of them liked my game, but I’ve tried to arrange online game nights even with “addictive”, “popular”, and “fun” games and it just doesn’t happen easily. (I could go into a whole discussion about the kinds of community that are possible to find in games, how they’re somewhat limited, mostly either from being hardcore into one game, or having a particular group of gamer friends that jump from game to game, but seldom add or subtract members, but anyway...you probably had sorta similar experiences with Zoom hang outs during the pandemic.)

It’s been disappointing and frustrating. And lonely.

If you had met me before I met George, then you’d know my main axe to grind was about how anticommunal adult, American society is structured. And now I’m revealing to you that my secret main reason for wielding my Georgian axe is my frustration with how anticommunal adult, American society is structured.

I think the Land Value Tax + Citizen’s Dividend is the systemic pre-req(uirement) to allow for a flexible, growable, not-too-dense-yet-not-too-sprawled human society to reemerge. It aligns the individual’s aims of creating wealth for themselves and their loved ones with the good of society. It incentivizes the Earth to the highest productive use of its inhabitants, instead of allowing conquerors or owners to sit on their asses and collect.

I think government by sortition is the most resilient method for implementing and then maintaining this liberty. I think the many liberties humans have cried out for over the past 100 years can only be effectively enjoyed if built on the foundational, financial liberty from the LVT + Citizen’s Dividend.

So, I made three resolutions last year: (1) Get a six pack, (2) become a Georgist advocate, and (3) release my damn video game.

Two for three.

What was so important to me about my video game? Why did I spend 8 years on it? Probably a lot of things, but I’ll tell you one secret. You see, dogs with wings don’t actually exist. Flying whales don’t exist. While I do love my fantasy world, I’m actually a human on Earth. And I’m looking for my kind. My flock. To gather resources with. To defeat monsters with. To go to a party with (or maybe ditch it). And while Georgism flopped in the 20th century and my game has flopped in 2024, we now have a new year, but not a new life, us humans. We get one run on Earth. Will we cooperate?

Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar;
Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore!
What future bliss, he gives not thee to know,
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never is, but always to be blest:
The soul, uneasy and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
—An Essay on Man: Epistle I, by Alexander Pope

Happy New Year. May 2025 bring progress without poverty.

Yours truly,
Max

P.S. If you’re not familiar with Georgism, here’s my description. If you’re not familiar with sortition, here’s my description.