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Jack Thompson Claiming Games Industry in Collusion with DoD
mytrip brings us a Wired blog about Jack Thompson's recent press release, which claims an "unholy alliance" exists between the gaming industry and the U.S. Department of Defense. Game Politics also has a discussion of Thompson's main points. From Wired:
"Jim Blank, the head of the modeling and simulation division of the U.S. Joint Forces Command, says that commercial games don't meet the demand of the military, adding, 'first-person shooter games really don't apply in this environment.' Blank's point is that game-like simulations are a valuable tool for training soldiers in situations that would be too expensive to simulate in reality."
Yes, they use video games to train. Yes, they use video games to market to recruits. Yes, they are in the business of war.
Somehow adding video games to the mix makes it more unholy than it already was?
Whatever. Will someone just shoot this guy already?
...and we're coming for you, Jack. We're all out to get YOU, Jack. Boo!
It's a plot. They're in it with the Reverse Vampires and the RAND Corporation.
...that you, since you have been attacking computer games as the spawn of evil itself for quite some time now, want to say that the DOD and thus the United States of America is bad and threatening our children, should your elaboration be interpreted in this way, yes?
Just for the record, of course...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The DoD is just copying what the aliens already did. I heard that if you do really well in the alien video game, it sends a signal out and pretty soon a talking spaceship lands to take you away to fight evil aliens.
See, the game is just a simulation of the real fight and the aliens need to find someone to save them. If you are the best, they come get you to go fight their war using the fabled "Death Blossom" maneuver.
(Not to be confused with the fabled "Turd Blossom" maneuver used many times over the last seven years by the Bush administration.)
Hasn't he been disbarred yet? Seriously if it was you or I going on like this month after month we'd probably at least get a month commited for evaluation. He's got something wrong with him and instead of looking inward to see what it is he projects it outward and thinks everyone needs to be saved from the demons that plague him.
Shh.
And the QUEERS! They're in it with the aliens! Do you know what they're doing to the SOIL?
AACK! JEWS! JEWS AND KOOPA TROOPERS!
RUUUUNNNNN!
Seriously. How has this man not been clubbed like a seal yet?
What will the extreme left wing, anti-war, anti-military establishment, conspiracy theory maniacs that are pro-pornography, pro-simulated violence in video games do? DoD using video games with subliminal messages to create new breed of professional military recruits and only Jack Thompson, evil video game critic to stand in the way. It's like being a Republican and realizing the only candidate that believes in what he's saying is Ron Paul. Guess the Democrats got that with Kusinich (sic). They both kind of remind me of Ross Perot, but I ramble....
Really, folks - which is a simpler explanation for these graphs:
Violent crime rate
Video game sales
That (presumeably violent) video game use correlates with a massive secret drive towards violence, that is somehow counterbalanced in the overall violent crime rate, or that this (now) extremely common form of entertainment is at worst, on average, a similar factor in people's lives as movies or books?
True, the ever-shifting and politically influenced definition of violent crime may have shifted definition over the years too, but I highly doubt any theories on that line would be able to mask the accusations Thomson makes about the use of video games in society.
In order to match Thomson's account to reality in any way, you'd have to start making up any number of wild inventions to force the facts into place... kind of like what he's doing here.
Ryan Fenton
So he's saying that because I've played Call of Duty 4 and other high-profile FPSs this year, now I want to join the Army???? That's the last thing I would ever do! Unless he can prove that video games are hypnotizing America's youth to do this stuff, I DO NOT WANT TO HEAR IT. Guess Thompson is bored with himself, seeing as he ha NO BAR LICENSE!
... Tycho and Gabe were running out of material. Thanks Jack!
Two points: First, War as glamorous and consequence free... Wow, I don't think that I ever heard about anything like that in movies that I've watched for my entire life and many of the books that I've read. Seriously, didn't this moron ever watch Patton? Secondly, correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that the VT shooter was established to have not been a gamer. Granted, Fox News (never one to let the facts get in the way of their "reporting") opted to have him on right after the shooting, before any facts had been established, so that he could talk about how games were responsible for it. As I recall, however, the shooter's roommates said that they'd never seen him play any games. I really wish that the main stream media would out this guy publicly.
Regards, Ian
And thats why they invested into and created their own game. :)
Its called Americas Army. Pretty damn realistic as well if you ask me.
A very good tool to get new recruits
Norris Normal - Who am I?
The Last Starfighter. I love that movie.
Jack Thompson is someone best ignored. I think it is better to stop making headlines every time he goes off his rocker, and let him not be heard, than to give him free publicity for his stunts.
"Microsoft killed my company, I hold a personal grudge. I don't use Microsoft products and neither should you."-JWZ
WTF is a "correlation" between the DoD and the game industry?
This guy must have a secretary, because he's obviously too stupid to type his own editorials.
The only news here is that anyone bothers to publish his rants.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Yeah, well America's Army used to run on Linux, thanks to Ryan Gordon (Icculus), but today it only runs on Microsoft Windows. To me, America's Army lost it's "that's cool" factor when they changed it to Microsoft Windows-only.
=\
Just because you get modded "insightful" on Slashdot doesn't mean you actually are in real life.
This guy makes wacky pronouncements over and over again which amount to nothing. Why publicize him even further? Slow news day?
~S
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This. Is. JACK THOMPSON!
I'd like a "-1 WTF??" moderation choice right about now.
some people are in serious need of a real life,
and i'm not talking about the gamers.
If there's an "unholy alliance" involved here, it's between Jack Thompson and Satan.
On the other hand, having such an obvious loon leading the charge against video games is probably a good thing. It's not hard for anyone to pick up on the fact that not all his dogs are barkin'. If the anti-violent-video-game crowd really want to have any chance of success, they should muzzle this idiot now before the rest of them get thoroughly discredited by association.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Isn't there supposed to be a point where these people disappear from the conversation after their actions prove they're not relevant?
I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
Most importantly, Video games don't do that with any accuracy at all. They can show you what it looks like, they can help you learn the approximate timing, they can maybe remind you to keep looking around for more bad guys and not just focus on the one in front of you. But that is all. At best it shortens the training time needed in the real world training course, much like a football coach has a "chalk talk" in a classroom before you suit up and take the field. Worse, too much application of simulation can induce negative training, in short, teaching them to do the wrong thing in order to win the game.
As for the Industry taking cues from the DOD, I wish they would. For starters the Physics models used in gaming are a joke and have been for years. If police and soldiers and criminals in real life could run like they do in games, shootouts would look like the Superhero Olympics. Every car chase would be the Indy 500 Cross Country Demolition Derby. If the aliens ever show up, they'd have good reason to want humans stomped out, we'd be too dammed dangerous! No, Game designers might get ideas from military scenarios (Call to Duty 1 - N anyone?), but they aren't using real situations. And if anyone could even vaguely show the FPS games were imprinting "Go Army" on any brains, major heads would roll. The fact the school shooters were using the games just shows how "out of it" they were. They didn't know the games weren't useful or accurate for training, so they used them, which somehow means the games were responsible after all.
Thompson is just taking out some ire on innocent bystanders for doing something he already hates. Yet another example of a political control freak.
Behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now, and let us slay him... and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
It apparently took him years to realize that America's Army is out.
I am pretty sure that was meant to be funny, but the truth of what is really being said is startling.
He is anti-american, like so many other neo-cons. The reason they want to change so many things of such consequence is they do not like the US. They want a new country with their rules in place. Something much more akin to the fundamentalist Muslim countries or Mussolini's government. A place where their ideals and beliefs reign supreme without that bothersome interruption from people who would think or believe differently.
I guess the scary part for me is that at one time, when I started learning about the neo-cons, I agreed with much of what I had learned. It was not until much later when I started seeing through the lies that I really got a grasp on what they stand for. It almost lends plausibility to those who believe they are trying to create a new world order. Because it sure seems like they are.
InnerWeb
Freud might say that Intelligent Design is religion's ID.
If he's speaking out against the Department of Defense, a branch of the government, doesn't that mean he's in league with the terrorists?
/. could take care of an other?
Could it be, that one of the most complained about things on
The Patriot Act gets Thompson tossed in Guantanamo for an unspecified period, then there's one less problem to worry about.
Probably too good to be true, but we could dream.
Wow, all thats missing is an attempt to sell me P3|\|15 3|\||_4R6/\/\3|\|7 pills and to notify me I'd won the Nigerian Lottery...
"I may be full of crap about this game, and I may be wrong, and that's fine." -Jack Thompson
I don't think that Jack Thompson's problem is that there's collusion between the DoD and the gaming industry. I think the problem is that there's DELUSION between Jack Thompson and reality. Being insane can be quite a hard pill to swallow. (in before Jack Thompson sues me for calling him a crazy person)
No portion of this post may be rebroadcast without the express, written consent of Major League Baseball.
i guess its a lot easier to throw around a term like "neo-con" that dumbly lumps people into a group then to actually parse each individuals perspective in the group as to their beliefs.
please don't think that i am a "neo-con", or defending that particular POV. i guess in this current cycle of election-mania i felt the need to vent about the oversimplification of political rhetoric that bombards us daily from the news outlets.
never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
The guy is an absolute nut case, and is totally irrelevant. He is about to be disbarred, has made numerous clearly paranoid statements in the past, why the hell does his ridiculous ranting gain credence by being submitted to /. time and time again?
The next time someone submits a Jack Thompson story, please make the headline the following: Jack Thompson Bleats Again.
And the body of the text can be: Jack Thompson, well-known corrupt and insanely-paranoid former lawyer, makes another outrageous statement.
Do you explain Far Side comics to people, too?
Small amounts of lead can stimulate people to behave in a more violent way. The majority of the decrease occurred in the early 1990's - roughly the age when when kids who were no longer exposed to leaded gas were in their teenage years. The vast majority of violent crimes are committed by men, aged from 13 to 40. So once the unexposed kids grew up, they diluted the violence pool so to speak, and have been lowering the rate ever since.
..........FULL STOP.
How long before Jack Thompson is sharing a cell with Jonathan Lee Riches?
Maybe Riches can sue him for trademark infringement.
Jack Thompson:Deep End :: Quick Brown Fox:Lazy Dog
The movie's older than a college senior. There might be a few people on here who don't get the reference.
Jack?
Try competition -- seems to me the DOD is writing their own games in competition with commercial manufacturers.
What a nut.
More Caffeine. NOW
Huh? Nobody is questioning that Jack Thompson shouldn't have a right to his opinion, however misguided that may be. We simply object to his harassment of anyone that disagrees with him (much as we disagree with the TSA's harassment of, well, just about everyone.)
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
What business is that?
These people, on the other hand, have a very definite goal in their life and death: To establish the rule of Islam.http://www.answering-islam.org/Index/S/suicide_bomber.html/
no?
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Jack is breathing air that could be used by someone more deserving. Gawd, I just wasted five minutes of my life reading more of Jack's delusions. But, like a traffic accident on the freeway that you can't not slow down to gawk at, I couldn't resist the urge to see this head case's new, improved, extra-strength paranoid hallucination.
Next on Oprah! People who have been recruited by the Star League...
-- The Genesis project? What's that?
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
There's so much comedy on television. Does that cause comedy in the streets?
-- Dick Cavett (1936 - )
If Call of Duty taught me anything (which I doubt), it'd be that war a crap thing to be caught up in as death can come at any time from someone you hadn't noticed hiding in a bush or a doorway. This random "died from being in wrong place at the wrong time" with no respawn is probably more likely to convince people of the benefits of couch-potatodom than it is to get them to sign up.
At least after being killed on the screen you can respawn a few times before crossing the floor to the fridge to extract another beer while you comtemplate the fact that you earn more sitting in your office than a soldier does in Iraq without having to put up with being shot at. On the other hand, if you are still at school and can't tell the difference between a game and reality you're more than likely better off in the army as they're probably getting pissed with soldiers who go "off message" on their blogs.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
OK, I'm not a military man, but it seems to me that the first and most important lesson you want to teach troops is how not to die. Knowing how to squirt death around (preferably at the other guys, not your own side) is fine, provided you aren't dead or injured.
What video games teach is that you can do pretty much anything with impunity. The worst thing that happens to you is a sore thumb. If you use games as traning tools, you could well end up with a bunch of soldiers who think they are invincible - they'll soon learn otherwise.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
No no no. See, when you really need to worry is when you find the military in collusion with shower curtain manufacturers. That never ends well (even if there is cake).
There are these game makers in an unholy league with a gov agency. A lawyer than attacks them with monster guns. Of course, you have to kill the lawyer, since you know that he is in league with the others and is just faking it.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
What the brass doesn't understand is the underlining fundamental difference between using virtual reality to train solders and using traditional means. The army is always fighting the last war. They don't understand the new war until they lose. It doesn't matter which country or which army. As long as you are in the business of ripping apart meat (killing enemy soldiers through body incapacitation like bullets or IEDs) for the benefit of the rich, the flag or holy book that you use is of secondary importance.
The new war is a different in that it is a permanent war. It is never totally lost or won. It continues for as long as it makes profit for the rich, who never touch the meat. In many cases, the actual soldiers never leave the battlefield. Their 'tours of duty' are extended until they are either dead, blown up, or insane.
In the new war, a side never wins. Only an individual solder wins. And he/she only wins when get their 'tour of duty' ended without having themselves killed, maimed, or driven insane.
The internet is the only tool that makes the new war different for the old wars that the army (or al-quaida, same thing in the new war) is still fighting. Virtual reality permits the soldiers to contact each other *in virtual reality space using MUDs and other on-line multi-person games) regardless of what 'side' they are on (sides don't matter in the new permanent war) and arrange separate peace micro-treaties on a neighborhood or local basis. Virtual reality is one of the few tools that soldiers have that allows them to win the war (returning home intact). Virtual reality allows the soldiers of each side to identify each other side's gung-ho psychopaths and to ensure that these guys are the ones that get killed in the meat world.
This vastly increases the chances that the soldiers that are on-line in the games will win the war (return from the war zone intact and as a certified 'war hero') while still creating enough violence and mayhem in the meat world to convince the rich and the brass that the war is still progressing to a 'winnable solution'.
It will only be after the army loses the current war in the meat world that it will realize the extent that virtual reality and video games are training soldiers to survive and win the current war.
i guess its a lot easier to throw around a term like "neo-con" that dumbly lumps people into a group then to actually parse each individuals perspective in the group as to their beliefs.
We tried that. And they said "those liberals can't agree on anything."
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Since military simulation s/w is big business, it wouldn't surprise me that the DoD steers contracts to organizations that they consider friendly.
Have gnu, will travel.
Kinda like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galaxy_Quest
Why is it "unholy" for the military to better train its soldiers, to enhance their survival rate and effectiveness? If anything, our country does not do enough to protect, train and support our soldiers. This is especially true for the disabled vets who are coming back from Iraq without limbs. Regardless of the cause we should always support the men and women who are just doing their jobs. His entire premise is based on the notion that soldiers are evil, which they are not. They exist to protect our country and to implement orders from superior officers. When it comes to conflict or war, the issue then becomes how the soldiers are *used*. Then his argument becomes valid. And there is only one commander in chief (except for the Clintons -- keep an eye on that 22nd amendment)...
You fail it.
Keep in mind, Jack started this anti-game crusade after he discovered his son was playing them. So like any batshit crazy parent void of reason, instead of actually acting like a sensible parent and monitoring his child's activities, he's attacking the whole industry like a mother grizzly bear separated from her cubs. I guess he thinks it's easier to sink the video game industry than teach his kid the difference between right and wrong, good and evil, fantasy and reality...actually, I'm not so sure he can tell the difference between those last two. Here's hoping somebody adds a "Jack Thompson's Grave" level to Dance Dance Revolution until we have the real thing to get down on.
Essentially, this is how you should look at that first graph: "Mr. Ferris makes one of the biggest errors in statistics by not accounting for other factors that changed over the same period. In fact, I could plot the same graph showing a steady increase in youth incarceration rates beginning in the mid-1990s, but it would be equally flawed (although somehow I doubt that it would get as many diggs). The point is that an analysis of crime needs to use multivariate regression. Simply making a two-dimensional plot and attributing the subsequent drop in violent youth crime to playing video games, as some people have unfortunately done based on this graph, is simply wrong when more significant factors like economic conditions, youth incarceration, and passage of state laws that try children as adults dramatically increased over the same period. In fact, it's theoretically possible for exposure to media violence to cause a small increase in violent youth crime and yet to observe the same downward trend when these other factors have a larger and negative influence on violent crime rates. Just my two cents. " My personal opinion is to agree with you, but your analysis of that data is too simplisitc.
Dear Mr. Thompson From the desk of the millions of normal people who play games: Much like you, we were deeply disturbed by the actions of the shooter at Virginia Tech and feel terribly for the families of the lost. However we deeply resent the fact that you have totally bypassed the issue at hand and chosen instead to scapegoat the electronic entertainment industry. Perhaps instead of blaming videogames (which are clearly not your area of expertise [teamxbox.com]) we should instead delve a little deeper in order to find what causes these depraved/deprived individuals to take such drastic measures. Your "proof" of a link to video game violence is tenuous at best - equivalent to such joke statistics as bread creating murderers [snopes.com]. Statistical correlation is not proof of cause and effect but beyond that, you have failed to even show a statistical correlation, instead bringing up the specific examples where the statistics say what you want to prove. Like naysayers for the past several centuries, you see the advent of a new form of entertainment as the downfall of society. Novels, the waltz, radio and television have all been targetted in the past and so far civilization has emerged unscathed (but not unchanged). Perhaps this is the issue; you (and millions of right-wing conservatives) are afraid of what the future may bring. Who knows what changes the liberalization of the West may bring? In short, we feel that you are doing nobody any good - you are attempting (and luckily failing) to take the attention away from the actual issues (which in the case of the VT shooting are as of yet indetermined). Signed, Gamers of the world. P.S. While we harbour you no malice, I wouldn't suggest you attempt any retribution - we have all been trained on "murder simulators" . . .
There's an impressive amount of denial in here, but that's not surprising. It is hard for anyone (particularly a relatively educated group like Slashdot readers) to accept the fact that they are being influenced by ANYTHING out of their control. No one wants to feel like a puppet. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you feel about it), there is an enormous research and publication record documenting that you *are* being influenced by the media, whether you accept it or not. The military is influencing you through a variety of media, including video games. Jack Thompson may be an idiot, but that doesn't mean that his comments in this area are fundamentally wrong.
Here are a few critical points--
1. The military and the entertainment media have colluded for as long as there have been militaries and entertainment. There's nothing new, and certainly nothing intrinsically American about this concept. The military has always been ready to work with a big-budget movie if it is expected to portray the armed services in a positive, heroic light. Why do you see active-duty uniformed servicepeople as contestants on reality TV shows? They were granted leave *specifically* for that task! Take a moment and consider how stupid our military leaders would be to miss an opportunity to use the mainstream media to their advantage. Given this, it's not at all surprising that the military branched out into video games a long time ago.
2. Saying "I played Americas Army and I don't want to go to war any more than I did before" is a useless comment. First, its anecdotal. The DoD is playing a numbers game on the scale of MILLIONS of people and could care less whether you, in particular, were affected. Second, you probably wouldn't even be able to detect if you had been influenced - there's plenty of research that demonstrates that people will misattribute attitude change to internal factors "I just changed my mind" instead of external factors (remember, no one wants to be a puppet). Finally, the DoD doesn't need you to turn into some kind of outstretched-arm zombie lurching down the street to the recruiter's office. They are looking to bring about a very small change in your attitude towards the military. If they were able to just make the average Joe 2% more likely to join the army, that would result in a huge boost to their recruiting efforts.
3. Clearly, Jack Thompson is a lightning rod. He's stumbled onto a very real issue that was discovered by many before him, and he's frankly damaged the cause he's picked up simply by associating his name with it. Still, criticizing Thompson is not the same as criticizing his premise, which underneath the sensationalism is quite sound.
If you think the DoD isn't colluding with the video game industry to boost recruitment and introduce people to the principles and idioms of the armed services then you're just kidding yourself. It's certainly happening, and it's probably a necessary tool for them to use in this age. If you're a parent, you have to decide whether you want to let your kid watch commercials on Saturday morning and then demand Cocoa Puffs in the grocery store. If you're a gamer, you have to accept that certain kinds of games *WILL* manipulate your attitudes towards the military. I'm an avid gamer myself and I don't really mind that I'm being manipulated a bit here and there. I encourage the rest of you to come to terms with these facts and make an educated decision on what you're comfortable with.
You think that's bad? When you're fighting in a video game for the earth, you may not even realize you're fighting a real war in real time! "Death Blossom" has got nothing on the "Little Doctor".
What's startling is that people confuse neo-con thinking with free market. neo-conservativism is (when looking at it from a purely economic point of view) anything BUT free market. It's anti free market and anti free speech.
About as un-american as I could imagine, to be blunt.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
huh? is right since you obviously didn't read the post. come back when you get a fifth grade education.
You can't take the sky from me...
10 When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. 11 If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. 12 If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. 13 When the LORD your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. 14 As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the LORD your God gives you from your enemies. 15 This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.
You can't take the sky from me...
doesn't he realize that the people he alienates aren't kids. That practically everyone that grew up during the 80's is old enuff to understand how much of an idiot he is? That by attacking video games he attacks an entire generation.
Balderdash!
I think we all need to start sending jack flowers again, it will feed his paranoia and make him even more entertaining
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Lumping all that share characteristics under a label is a pretty good definition of "adjective", and "noun". It's what those words are for. It's only dumb to use that label in invalid ways. We have lists of invalid ways.
Criticizing a group for characteristics its members actually share is one thing.
It's an entirely different thing to condemn an entire culture based on its most contemptible products.
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
A really good (and free) movie on this subject is The Power of Nightmares. If you haven't seen it and are interested in learning more about the similarities between neocons and muslims, I highly recommend it.
http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares
Pain lasts, kid. Its how you know you're alive. Sometimes I think this growing up thing is just pain management-TheMaxx
"Something much more akin to the fundamentalist Muslim countries or Mussolini's government" Nicely dodged Godwining there ...
But the Cake is a lie...
There were a lot of things I confused neo-conservatism with before I delved into its deeper darker secrets. I have/had friends who were/are neo-cons, and I was *educated* about what the think the movement really means. From what I have seen in the public, and all the little things they pull, I believe them. It is so similar to the party that started WWII, but is not as far along on the path to absolute rule. Sometimes, I felt as though what I was hearing was a means of controlling people to see things a certain way by keeping everything off balance in such a way as to blame certain groups around them. The term conservative is a wonderful term for fiscal management in the goals of no/very low debt and solid money management. The term of compassion is a wonderful societal term in how to deal with people.
It is a shame that the Clinton administration was able to achieve more fiscal propriety than any of the republican governments in many decades. I would love to see the national debt slashed to allow taxes to be slashed. I would love to see a tax cut for all of about one fourth and the rest of the third that would have been used to pay the debt to benefit medicine and children.
But, that would take a consensus amongst a majority of Americans as to what we can reduce spending on, or a bill limiting pork, but I have no idea how to do that. There are many things that I would love to see different in our government for our society that I think would make us a much stronger and healthier society without taking away freedoms or rights.
InnerWeb
Freud might say that Intelligent Design is religion's ID.
Hmm... I hear what you are saying, but I am looking at the neo-con movement's self-proclaimed agendas and actions. I would think that that would pretty much define a group, though individuals in it might differ. I am not talking about Christians and Muslims vs Fundamentalist Christians and Muslims. I am only talking about fundamentalists.
InnerWeb
Freud might say that Intelligent Design is religion's ID.
Jack Thompson is the new Paris Hilton. Basically, an blubbering idiot with a lot of publicity says something publicly and everyone jumps on it. Can we just ignore this nut case from now on?
And forget to tell him it was fiction again?
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
... the US Open?
Isn't his underlying point (that video games make killers out of innocent youths) undercut by the simple fact that he's still around to make it? He's pissed off more gamers than just about any other person I can think of, so if all gamers are videogame-trained killing machines, how could he possibly still be alive?
... He certainly seems to be off of it.
In Exodus from the Hebrew it is - You shall not murder.
Exodus 20:13
In Deuteronomy 5:17 - You shall not murder.
The many examples in the Old Testament of killing sanctioned by God, are quoted in defense of the view that "murder" is more accurate. Furthermore, the Hebrew word for "kill" is "" - "harog", while the Hebrew word for "murder" is "" - "retzach". Ten Commandments " " - "lo tirtzach", No Murder.
So, if someone is breaking into my home and I kill them, I've not broken the commandment.
Really, his public statements make for great entertainment. I get a good chuckle out of his nutty conclusions. I wouldn't say ignore him, but rather just don't take him seriously ;-)
It's true no man is an island, but if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie 'em together, they make a good raft.
He also walked into the city flanked by dancers waving palm trees and singing his praises, despite knowing that his life was in danger (which would have better encouraged sneaking into town). He once stated that he came to turn brother against brother, to start a fight over the true place of the world. He encouraged nonviolent resistance - such as, shaming your debtor by giving him both your outer and inner garment and walking home naked. Jesus was a pacifist, in that he believed that violence was not the answer, but he knew when to get involved. Interpret "turning over tables" as you wish.
Libertarians somehow believe that private businesses should be stronger than governments but weaker than individuals.
What takes years of hard training with older generations is now less hard thanks to years in front of a computer at home when young.
The average young person off the street can use Windows and has great game reflexes.
The DoD would want to see this "positive" trend to continue.
The "dehumanization" aspect of killing a lump of pixels is also a great plus.
Link the brands, army cash and ppl.
The brands may change hands but the cash flow and ppl do not. Try http://www.zombie.com/about.htm [zombie.com] or
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002472860_convoysim05m.html [nwsource.com] ct.
Yesterday games are todays "Convoy Skills Engagement Trainer"
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The US military has been promoting American style football for years since it is the best tool they have to make soldiers starting at a very young age. It teaches respect for the command structure and teamwork as well as the lesson that not everyone is cut out to be the leader. Back in the days in the Army Navy game was big, they were tweaking the rules that later ended up in collage and pro football.
While the graph does not prove that video games reduce crime, what it does prove is that any supposed crime-inducing or violence-inducing effect of videogames must be so small that it is completely swamped by other social and demographic factors influencing crime rates.
The first modern game consoles (consoles capable of displaying 3D graphics such as are required for first person shooting games) were the Sony Playstation 1, the Sega Saturn, and the Nintendo N64, all of which are omitted from the graph. The Playstation 1, released in 1994, enjoyed particularly massive sales, selling over 100 million consoles. The Playstation 2 sold only about 20% more than this as of 2007.
Seeing that most games these days are about killing and maiming FPS'es, RTS'es etc This is really something i have suspected a while. Games have turned into a psy-op for whoever wants the youth prepared for whatever great war they want to unleash ..
...But it has Clevernickname in it! That alone is reason to see it.
... and I just posted a reply to CleverNickName in the Star Trek visor sale story in which I told him to Shut Up Wesley, at great risk to my otherwise untarnished karma. Oh, the glory.
Actually, it would be more accurate to say that the game industry ripped off the DoD. The first gamers mined a lot of the early work on distributed simulation from SIMNET, one of the early military networked simulations, and the Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) work. You can look up some of the early papers from DoD sources in the SIGGRAPH proceedings and elsewhere.
Games and DoD M&S have a somewhat standoffish relationship. The fact is the commercial side is much, much better at some things (massively mulitplayer, persistent, rendering and artwork, game engines) and really bad at some things (realism, tie-ins to actual terrain databases, real-world modeling of cities, etc). The problem is that if the games teach bad habits, it's "negative training". Jumping up and down in one place may work in a game, but it gets you killed in Iraq. This is widely regarded as a Bad Thing. Commercial games, despite their bling, have very little positive training value and a lot of negative training value.
The challenge for DoD is to pick up some of the commercial technologies and put them into simulations that have some training value. There are various efforts out there to do that, and the DoD has on occasion purchased licenses to game engines for simulations. The gamers look on this as a potential revenue source, but the match isn't always that good. The DoD typically has very long product life cycles, measured in years or decades, while anything older than six months is ancient to the gamers.
America's Army was not intended to be a "training" game. It was a strategic communications game. Few 17 year olds have much experience with the military; many don't have uncles or fathers who served, so the military is a giant unknown. The purpose of the game was to communicate core values of the Army and to give a somewhat realistic view of what's involved in the army. You don't just pick up a weapon and go shoot someone. You have to qualify on it. Likewise the textures were taken from many of the actual training areas a recruit would see. That said, they found at least one portion was useful as training: the marksmanship portion, which realistically showed you sight picture and breathing.
Unless you think the military should be abolished for moral reasons I don't see what's wrong with promoting it as a choice for young Americans. Is Jack Thompson saying that the Army shouldn't exist?
What are you smoking? This doesn't happen. You're just making shit up. I won't even ask you why you believe that sides don't matter.
It has been theorised that how people treat animals is indicative of how they might treat other people. A young person who tortures a cat, for instance, is seen to have something wrong with him.
It would be interesting to see how long before these ideas begin to apply to computer simulations - as "games" are becoming more and more like simulations, especially in the war/FPS genre.
Call me over-sensitive, but I personally feel a wee bit disturbed playing a game like Crysis where human faces are so realistic. The more photo-quality the faces are, the less likely I am to play the game. It just feels icky.
Crysis is especially problematic, as I didn't like the whole "gook" mentality. I'm causasian btw. I found it embarassing and wondered two things: a) how Asians in general would react to it, and b) if it was politically inspired (with regards to North Korea specifically). It was a bit over the top.
Do we actually fear this nutjob is going to get anything accomplished? Perhaps someone still believes he has some semblance of a valid critique? Does it flatter our sense of being misunderstood?
What's the deal?
I'm highly impressed at the four Japanese words you learned from watching anime. Maybe next you could learn to use them in a meaningful context.
"If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage." Deuteronomy 13:6-10
The only thing keeping Jack Thompson around is the way everyone reacts, media jumps on him and splashes his words around knowing damn well that people like us lot will fill forums endlessly debating and analysing his words.
How about when he says anything we just not say anything back, then the media will stop caring and he'll retire and play GTA or one of the many other games he really loves deep down inside.
'Unholy alliance'? I get the feeling this is all a game to him, a computer game to be exact. In reality he's just a computer game addict in denial.
I was just thinking about it and maybe they should, well not collude as much as fund a joint venture. The overlap between games and military sims of all sorts is blurring and sure there not the same thing but they do share a foundation. It could even help to bring down the costs of engine development as well as give the military a base to more easily modifiy the tech for their purposes. As a bonus i bet something like stalker would have been easier given access to military firearms tests , just a thought
Well, Bart, your uncle Arthur used to have a saying: "Shoot 'em all and let God sort 'em out."
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_Three_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Section_3:_Treason for a more modern version. Carries the death penalty in some cases, but usually not with stones.
There are differences in the world religions (which is what we were talking about). Maybe not in practice so much (that's a personal problem the human race seems to not be able to shake) and precepts seem to have a way of being "interpreted" into whatever humans want to do to each other anyway, but if you look at the "authoritative" source texts with a proper translation and using the right historical context as your "light," the differences emerge. The old testament says, "do not kill (murder)" but it also says to stone religious traitors, and that it is OK to defend the Jewish homeland. In Ezekiel even women and children are killed for "non-belief"... Hebrew women and children though. Gruesome, but according to the source text, God was "cleaning up" so to speak and purging "traitors" to Israel. This was a specific act commissioned by God, rather than a blanket commandment to kill "non-believers."
The Qur'an says:
Prophet! Rouse the believers to wage war. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will subdue two hundred: if a hundred, they will subdue a thousand of the disbelievers: for these are a people without understanding.
And in the Bhagavad Gita Krishna tells Arjuna that he must fight his war because (after explaining many yogic truths) that to not fight, to not do his duty, would lead to chaos and then all truth would be ultimately lost. There is an order to things that must be preserved, according to Krisha, so as Arjuna is a prince and a warrior, he must fight.
Yet Ghandi said
There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for.
And most Muslims abhor terrorism in the name of Islam.
And Christ did this:
But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her. Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"
"No one, sir," she said.
"Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."
Which to me, is kind of like agreeing that selling atomic secrets to the enemy is wrong and should be punished by death... yet out of humility, fear of God, and an understanding that I am very much not
Perhaps he missed this neat little piece of documentary work on the Discovery channel over the last five weeks. The video game owes it's existence to the military, and now the industry is repaying the favor. Both will benefit in the long run and will result in both better games and far more realistic simulations for training. It's an absolute win-win scenario where everyone who participates gets something worthwhile from the experience.
8==8 Bones 8==8
i guess in this current cycle of election-mania i felt the need to vent about the oversimplification of political rhetoric that bombards us daily from the news outlets.
Communist.
I thought this guy was facing disbarment a while back. It just blows my mind that people still look for quotes from him on the game industry. Blaming societal woes on video games is just another new modern day equivalent of "the devil made me do it".
Unless you mean "National Budget Deficit" (which is completely different, but frequently confused) then I don't think we have a National Debt, considering all the money other countries owe the USA. Secondly, why should we have to wait to reduce the national debt and/or budget deficit first before we get a tax break? Tax revenues went up under Bush's tax cuts. Of course, he screwed it up with allowing and engaging in pork-barrel spending with Congress, but the moral of the story to me is that cutting taxes was a good thing. The problem is rampant spending.
Thompson is as far from a neo-con as Joe Stalin.
Neoconservatism is a hybrid of liberalism and conservatism. It's a pragmatic and moderate approach, by design. Neo-con != Zionist. And there are virtually no neo-cons working for the president anymore. Colin Powell was a neo-con. Jack Thompson is a populist gasbag plain-old conservative.
please show me these proclamations from the "neo-con movement".
I don't think you'll find many fundamentalists who are neo-cons. You're using a label instead of debating the merits. You're trying to stigmatize a term to use it in demagoguery.
We all should accept that Jack Thompson is a censor, and does not understand individual liberty. I imagine any neo-cons out there accept that. I believe it would be much better to just condemn the specific bullshit Thompson is proposing, whether proposed by a liberal, conservative, anarchist, satanist, botanist, or arsonist.
After all, the loudest mouth in censorship was Tipper Gore for a long time, and Hillary Clinton has been one of the most, if not the most prominent voice in that direction lately. Is the neo-con tent so big as to accept those two? If not, is there something about neo-cons that makes their deeds worse or is it something about Tipper Gore that makes hers better?
I think we're all being turned against each other. People are voting against the other political party like it's a contest for a trophy. People aren't listing or thinking about what candidates are proposing, they are checking to see what alliance the candidate belongs to.
Which is horrible for society. Surely, Jack Thompson really wants you and I to hate each other if our politics are a bit different so we have a harder time arguing against him. Moonbats will label Thompson a neo-con and neo-cons will justifiably ignore the attempted attack. And vice versa. I could easily call Thompson a Hillary follower.
Would make more sense to be a little more specific.
Hillary Clinton is not someone I would vote for (and no, I am not saying she is a neo-con). And, I encourage all my friends not to as well. I know she means well, and she has many positive things to contribute, but she seems impatient, unyielding, power hungry and to be living from an agenda of faith (not religion, but that she is right). Protecting children is good, as is universal healthcare and other hot topics for her, but I am not comfortable with the way she has worked in the past, nor am I at all assured that she would be anything of a politician like her husband was. Some might see that as good, some might not, but even his opponents respected his diplomatic ability. If he had never had a relationship with Monica, his presidency would have ended very differently, but he screwed up.
Most neo-cons I know have a vague understanding of individual liberty, so long as it is in agreement with their position. If not, then people need to change or be changed. Kind of reminds me of the quote from Anikin Skywalker talking to Padme while hiding on whatever that planet was in Star Wars II (I have children, and they love those movies). Almost a preview of things to come, not just in the movie, but in real life.
I agree we are all being turned against each other. I think it makes great sense when you look at how power is being sucked up into a few places. As long as the average person hates the other opponents so much and as long as negative campaigning reigns supreme, the meaning and utility of elections will continue to decline. As long as this continues, then more and more of the power will be left in fewer and fewer hands.
WikiHas several references and a simple, but very light introduction. There are many aspects that I agree with, but when you get to the no-negotiate, we are right by Godly decree attitude, I start to take a major shift in attitude away from that. In the end, all anyone I have ever known to be a neocon wanted was a better world for everyone, but a world that was better by their own definition(s), not anyone elses. That tends to make them much like most other parties, but not as accepting of other peoples' views perhaps.
As far as what people I know have said, I can not quote directly, as I did not write it down. Maybe I will take the time to get them to write about it someday. One of the problems for now is the lack of a National NecCon Party (like Republicans and Democrats), but since they operate from within the republican party, and seem to have started with a group of *liberal intellectuals* that migrated from the Democrats, they might not have their own party. They tend to see the access to the religious right as a benefit they do not want to give up.
One of the major ways I differ is in economics. I do not believe a government should have large debts, more than it can pay off under a normal tax base and normal expenditures in a few years. I also am not comfortable with debt as a large portion of our money supply (M3 I think it is called). Both of these concepts are largely supported by neo-cons, and are a direct reason why the national debt is so high. As the amount of debt increases, so does the amount of money in the system. It has a lot to do with banking laws and how debt is issued by banks, but it does allow for another means of economic growth that I consider very destabilizing.
On the social front, I believe in universal health care availability, not provided by the employer, with private health care firms mixed in. I think the health care issue in this country (the US) is serious. It ruins people's lives and the current set of rules causes serious fina
Freud might say that Intelligent Design is religion's ID.
National Debt, not national balance sheet. The national budget deficit is how much we are sliding back on the overall national debt every year. When you look at a business or government to see if it is healthy financially, you do not give full wait tot the debts it is owed, you keep those as a separate sum and consider them with a liberal dose of salt.
Yeah, tax revenues went up
But, it is like credit cards for the family. As the debt goes up, so does you obligation just to pay the interest and that translates back into higher taxes. So, yeah, revenues are up, but so is the amount of money that is owed by the federal government. ow, an interesting thing happens as all of this debt is created. The money supply is increased. (In college, you might have heard of this part as M3, but I went to college decades ago, so who knows what they refer to is as now). M1 is hard currency. M2 is checks and credit cards.. short term debts that very temporarily increase the overall money supply. M3 is long term debt. Debt is not actual money in most cases, but money is actual debt. It sounds really screwy, and to me it is, but it has some very real and interesting effects. One is it increases the money supply (much like what the Fed is trying to do by adjusting the Fed's rate). By increasing money supply, it has its second effect, more overall income, and thus more income tax revenue, as well as a higher likelihood for inflation. This sounds good, right, more overall income? Well, that depends on where the income rally happens, in the hands of many or just a few. Because in the hands of a few, the income is normally not translated to much into taxes or a societal benefit, though it is a societal obligation (repaying the debt). As another effect, having a larger pool of money pushes down interest rates on debt, as their is a larger abundance of that resource, and therefore less of a ratio (demand/supply ~= price). In theory this makes all debts less expensive and allows people to borrow more to do what they want/need, and allows more money to be created. This is what led up the great stock market crash before WW2. New rules have been put into place to help prevent that kind of disastrous result again, but if we did experience a reduction in loans, and thus a lack of continuous increase in money supply, then the whole system would be very likely to collapse again.
So, while you are correct that in hard numbers, there is more revenue, you need to realize that a major part of that is the huge federal (over 9 trillion) and national (approx 45 to 50 trillion last time I checked) debts. A significant portion of these debts represent actual money in the current money system. So, the increased debt actually artificially increased numbers like NGP, NDP and such. What really impressed me during the Clinton years was the congress, and the presidency working together to reduce the deficit, attack the debt and not have to increase debt. The reasons the housing fallout has so many people at the top worried is the debt/money supply ratio. If the debt falls apart, the amount of *digital* money is reduced correspondingly, and that has a negative feedback effect on the whole system. It all works if no major part of it falls apart, but if a major part (say 2%) falls apart, then the whole system could unravel into another great depression. And, this explains why the PRC (China) has been so welcomed in the world business community as a nation. Think about how much there expansion will do for creating new debt and money. The effects of cheaper labor are tiny compared to this. Though, the cheap labor aspect is nice, it only effects production of items, and that can be done anywhere. The production of debt on a massive scale could be carried for decades if not centuries by the Chinese mainland. That is why London is the center of world banking. They figured it out early in the game, and have tried to control it ever since.
If ther
Freud might say that Intelligent Design is religion's ID.