Warning, the following rant is a bit long and terribly uninteresting:
The following article will be considered archaic by any gamers or industry types in the audience (so all of you then). After all, any gamer worth his salt can defend his favourite hobby (or in some cases, his profession) at the drop of a hat. These days it isn't so much as a purposeful action, or a deliberate argument, as a simple instinctual reaction. That isn't so much because of any bias or irrationality within the community, although that certainly exists, it's that the arguments used to attack gaming have been stagnant for years. As stalemates go, this is a particularly exhausting one. Pundits, parents' groups and others put forward a well-meaning but wholly ignorant argument based on bad data, misconceptions, or political agendas. Gamers, in turn, respond in either two ways: the same thoughtful and scientific arguments which have remained unassailable and undeniable for nearly a decade, or impotent and ignorant rage. Unfortunately, that makes the discussion less optimal than a one-sided slaughter of truth over overt lies. It becomes a three-way between the ignorant, gamers and ignorant gamers. An endless rock paper scissors if you will. Truth beats lies, nerd-rage negates the effectiveness of truth, lies are merely encouraged by nerd-rage.
Now, I'm not the first, or tenth, or millionth person to suggest this. Again this article isn't breaking much new ground. Numerous figureheads within the industry have called for a more introspective solution to gaming's public relations trouble. Get everyone from the community and industry on the side of truth, make sure we all keep our cool and we win by default basically.
The trouble is, I have a hard time believing ANY industry could actually do that. I refuse to believe that movies, at one point in their history, had to defend itself as an industry against the actions of its more disturbed and stupid fans. A man shoots the president because Jodie Foster told him to? The headline reads: ?What a wackjob?. Not, ?Movies are horrible subliminal message machines?.
It's not the money, Games have plenty of money. So that's not enough to get people to look the other way.
It's not that fans of games are any more dangerous. I defy you to find any evidence of that.
No, I have a terrible thought.
Games have to be censored, for a long, horrible period. They have to be completely gentrified and horrible restrained, possibly for decades.
Movies had the age of Hayes Code / McCarthy. Comic Books had the Comic Code Authority.
People only release a medium from restraint after they can see, first hand, how ineffectual and stupid said censorship is.
I just don't see any other way around it. Our society seems to only learn things the hard way.
The following article will be considered archaic by any gamers or industry types in the audience (so all of you then). After all, any gamer worth his salt can defend his favourite hobby (or in some cases, his profession) at the drop of a hat. These days it isn't so much as a purposeful action, or a deliberate argument, as a simple instinctual reaction. That isn't so much because of any bias or irrationality within the community, although that certainly exists, it's that the arguments used to attack gaming have been stagnant for years. As stalemates go, this is a particularly exhausting one. Pundits, parents' groups and others put forward a well-meaning but wholly ignorant argument based on bad data, misconceptions, or political agendas. Gamers, in turn, respond in either two ways: the same thoughtful and scientific arguments which have remained unassailable and undeniable for nearly a decade, or impotent and ignorant rage. Unfortunately, that makes the discussion less optimal than a one-sided slaughter of truth over overt lies. It becomes a three-way between the ignorant, gamers and ignorant gamers. An endless rock paper scissors if you will. Truth beats lies, nerd-rage negates the effectiveness of truth, lies are merely encouraged by nerd-rage.
Now, I'm not the first, or tenth, or millionth person to suggest this. Again this article isn't breaking much new ground. Numerous figureheads within the industry have called for a more introspective solution to gaming's public relations trouble. Get everyone from the community and industry on the side of truth, make sure we all keep our cool and we win by default basically.
The trouble is, I have a hard time believing ANY industry could actually do that. I refuse to believe that movies, at one point in their history, had to defend itself as an industry against the actions of its more disturbed and stupid fans. A man shoots the president because Jodie Foster told him to? The headline reads: ?What a wackjob?. Not, ?Movies are horrible subliminal message machines?.
It's not the money, Games have plenty of money. So that's not enough to get people to look the other way.
It's not that fans of games are any more dangerous. I defy you to find any evidence of that.
No, I have a terrible thought.
Games have to be censored, for a long, horrible period. They have to be completely gentrified and horrible restrained, possibly for decades.
Movies had the age of Hayes Code / McCarthy. Comic Books had the Comic Code Authority.
People only release a medium from restraint after they can see, first hand, how ineffectual and stupid said censorship is.
I just don't see any other way around it. Our society seems to only learn things the hard way.
