After games that have very serious subjects, or may be strongly emotional, it is a good idea to take some time after to unpack the experience together. Some groups might need a quick break, some might want to start right away. Some groups might not want to have a debrief at all. If this is the case make sure everyone is enthusiastically unanimous about opting out. If even one player seems to need closure, ask the group to stay for just a few minutes - for your sake.

Your job as the director is to set the tone of the debrief, and to ensure people feel safe and heard. Also, pay mindful attention to how people are participating. Balance the needs of quiet and chatty players: don’t let enthusiastic players monopolize the discussion or override the emotions of others. Don’t let the debrief go on any longer than required.

Once you start, quickly review each of the following points with the players before starting:

- We are more important than this game: Even if the game is over, our commitment to support each other is not.

- Presence: We ask all players to stay for the full debrief. No one will be forced to participate any more than they are able, but everyone should stay present if at all possible.

- Make space for quiet players: If players cannot or do not want to answer a question, they can simply say: ìPass.î When a player wants to pass they should be allowed to do so without pressure. When a player has passed, come back to them at the end of the round in case they want a second chance. If not, that’s OK ñ move on.

Note: If you have a very silent player and you think they may be experiencing distress, it’s a good idea to emotionally check on them one-on-one after the debrief is over.

- Emotions: Not everyone may be in the same headspace after the game, or have had the same experience. A player may feel disappointed, bored, blank, angry, relieved, or a wide mix of emotions. Set the expectation that it is OK to feel whatever it is that they are feeling. As the Director, make a safe space for that; intervene if any player tries to negotiate another playerís emotional response (e.g. ìI donít understand how you could be bored after that...î).

Ask these questions, and go around the table letting everyone answer one at a time. Donít forget to participate yourself:

- How are you feeling now that the game is over? Is there anything you need?

- Describe something that was difficult to deal with, and how it is staying with you.

- Describe something someone else did that you appreciated in the game.

In 1943 alone - in the year the Rosenstrasse protest took place - 500,000 Jews were killed in the Holocaust. We have just spent four and a half hours in playing this game. In that time, back in 1943, more than 250 Jewish lives would have been lost.

Nonetheless, we found writing this game hopeful and inspiring. Ordinary women stood up against the Nazi regime, and the Nazis blinked. The Nazis are often cast as the ultimate evil and the ultimate oppressors. If they can be resisted with non-violent protest, it suggests the possibility of resistance to autocratic, oppressive regimes worldwide.

At the same time, we were reminded of the rarity of such protests. Ordinary people were far more likely to collaborate with the Nazis in persecuting Jews than to protect them. Without the active assistance of civilians from Poland, Austria, France, and many other countries, the genocide of Jews would have been impossible. Ordinary citizens supported anti-Jewish measures, stole Jewish property, reported Jews who attempted to hide, facilitated the processing of Jews, and actively participated in massacres. The story of Rosenstrasse is a story of hope, but also a powerful indictment of those who assisted with genocide.

It is, perhaps, easier to tell hopeful stories that cast the player as the hero. But in doing so, we must not fall into the denial of complicity. Today, Polish government ministers publicly deny mass murders of Jews committed by Poles. A large-scale study showed that French citizens are far more likely to claim family involvement with the Resistance than is historically plausible. The United States casts itself as the savior of the Jews, while their racist and anti-Semitic immigration policies in part motivated the Final Solution. Part of the story of Rosenstrasse is that these women stood up for their husbands, but they did not stand up for other peopleís husbands, and wives, and children. In writing this game, we notice this, and we remember.

There is also the impulse to cast threats to Jews as taking place only in the past. The Nazis were defeated, so goes the story, and now Jews are safe. This is not true. Since World War II, over a dozen countries have conducted successful campaigns of ethnic cleansing against Jews, using a combination of state-sanctioned murder, economic persecution, forced conversion, and expulsion. Jews face ongoing threats even in liberal Western democracies. 51% of racially motivated crimes in France target Jews, who are only 1% of the population; over a quarter of the American hate crimes recorded since the 2016 election target Jews, including bomb threats against preschools; and 60% of Swedish Jews are afraid to be publicly identifiable as Jewish. Within your own countries and communities, Jews are still not safe.

This game is meant to inspire players to stand up to authoritarian oppression in defense of the vulnerable, but it is also meant as a reminder that Jews must still be included among vulnerable groups. Anti-Semitism does not operate like other forms of oppression; it casts Jews as disproportionately and dangerously powerful, and therefore often excludes them from the protection of collective action. Additionally, in most Western countries Jews do not currently face the xenophobic hatred directed at immigrants and refugees, particularly Muslim ones. It is therefore easy to cast Jews as people from whom solidarity is expected, but to whom it is not extended. For our non-Jewish players, we hope this game challenges you to include Jews in your activism.

There is a Jewish moral principle, lo taíamod al dam reíecha. One must not stand by while others suffer. Through collective resistance, may we all embody this principle in the months and years to come.

Moyra Turkington and Jessica Hammer

Kaplan, Marion, Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany, Oxford University Press; June 10, 1999

Koonz, Claudia, Mothers in the Fatherland: Women, the Family and Nazi Politics St. Martin's Griffin; September 15, 1988

Stolfus, Nathan, Resistance of the Heart: Intermarriage and the Rosenstrasse Protest in Nazi Germany, Rutgers University Press; February 1, 2001