So have we put this Mass Effect sodomy simulator bullshit to bed yet? We've had to correct a television and a radio quack. I really hope anyone else who attempts this slander will look at these two prior failures and not even try it.

"gamers are perhaps the single most intense subculture on the Internet — fiercely protective of their pastime and at ease with the byways of cyberspace…"

Damn right we are. However, the true news is that she fesses up on Fox News; which may not happen.

Oh Oh, i find it absolutely ironic that she complained to Amazon about it..

We admitted we didn't read her book and just posted BS

She admitted she didn't play Mass Effect and just posted BS.

Guess we're even

This is a great victory for the gaming community!

Don't fight yellow journalism with urine.

Guerrilla warfare doesn't work when the battle is for the moral high ground. Spamming email, Amazon, AIM, MySpace, or whatever may make you feel better in the short term, but will do more harm than good in the long run, since if we're going to make any SIGNIFICANT headway, we need assistance from those who are neutral.

They want to paint us as uncivil, childish trolls who don't fit in with the overall society. They WANT you to pull crap like that. You may win a few battles, but they're guiding you into an ambush. If we show ourselves to be uncivil, childish trolls, then the neutral will take the opposing side, giving them the majority.

Think about the American Civil Rights Movement in the 60s. The progress that was made GOT made because Martin Luther King, Jr. encouraged people to let their opponents bring themselves down with their awful tactics. The neutral parties saw the church bombings, crowd hosings, mob lynchings, and everything else, and was offended, repulsed, and willfully joined the Movement. It should be the same with us. Let them lie, slander, and whatever else. All we have to do is show these falsehoods with a calm, clear, loud voice. Right now we've got the loud and maybe the clear, but we're severely lacking in the calm.

Just like Gabe from Penny Arcade has said, if you want to hurt a channel, do not attack them directly, that just gives them fodder for their show. No, if you REALLY wanna hurt them, attack their sponsors. Aaaaaand here’s a list of Fox News’ sponsors and their contact addresses:

http://www.debone.com/boycottFoxNewsSponsors.html

Feel free to call, write and email them saying how we will not support a company or product that in turn supports a station full of sensationalist liars.

this is only the begninning, any book she publishes will be brought down and her radio show will soon be off the air. Gamers do not stand for the lies that ingorant people spread. first it was Jack Thompson, now Her. when are we finally going to stand up and say No More! We are tried of a past time we love being accused of all the Human Injustice in the world. Games didnt cause a kid to shoot up his school, Games dont casue more violence towards our fellow man. When will the ingorant people learn to stop opening the mouth and inserting there foot. Oh well I guess we will never know.

Are we really surprised? Yet again another woman who puts not just one, but both feet in her mouth before checking out the facts.

She spoke from a position of ignorance.

[...] As a post script to the entire Mass Effect affair, some small bit of justice has been served. In large part due to the reaction of the gaming community, Cooper Lawrence has actually spent some time with Mass Effect and retracted her statements. Here are some links with the proof: NY Times Game Politics Destructoid It is unfortunate that she let Fox News use her thusly and didn't do her research before shooting off her mouth, and many of her points about games and ratings will no doubt linger on as problematic, but we can still say 'score one for gamers'. __________________ Last 10 Songs Played / This Weeks Top Artists / All Time Top Artists [...]

Even Jack Thompson thinks there's nothing wrong with Mass Effect. Since when has he taken our side?

A good friend of mine is a psychologist who's had the "pleasure" of meeting Ms. Lawrence, Dr. Phil, and other well-known psychologists, and according to her, they're all the same, a bunch of arrogant, obnoxious fakes who make millions pretending to know a difficult profession.

Even if it was cold calculation on Lawrence's part, I'd love to see her as an 'innocent' victim in a shitstorm campaign aimed at McCallum and Fox. She is sort of cute and - more importantly - she is not a gamer. That would give the whole initiative a human face.

She has a website:

http://www.cooperlawrence.com

She also has another book listing that you can comment on here:

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9781...

She deserves to be run out of town!!!

This has made my day.

This is good news to hear. I hope that in the future, Miss Lawrence will do a little research and not be Faux News' "kneejerk expert" again.

We don't know all the specifics, like how much of her stance was hers and how much was Fox News', but good on Cooper Lawrence for admitting her mistakes - something too few of us in this world are capable of.

Quick! Everyone go give her 5-star reviews on Amazon to show we appreciate her apology :P

You know, I was almost going to stop watching the video just based on the sound of her voice (nasally), and not because of her "facts".

Maybe next time she should form her own opinion before going on the air..
It's great that she apologised but a lot of damage has already been done and
I guess the NYT readers aren't really the same demographic as FAUX News.

And we will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy our brothers! And you will know we are Gamers, when we lay our vengeance upon thee.

On behalf of myself, apology accepted.

That's very good of her to do that, but Fox News is 50% of the problem in this situation, and I don't see them changing their ways. When you appeal to the lowest common denominator, you don't have to...

"Before the show I had asked somebody about what they had heard..."

This is what passes for research these days? She asked someone else what they had heard? That isn't even second-hand information.

It is indeed Winter-een-mass, happy Winter-een-mans to all!

This just shows, that as a community, when we unite we can make changes. It's just a question of time. Most gamers aren't kids anymore and a lot of us contribute significantly to society in our respective fields. Gamers are also craftsment, soldiers, doctors, politicians, journalists and lawyers (we need more gamers of those last three, not the JT lawyer type, the Fixed News journalist type or the "protet the children, squash people's rights politician type but real stand up types).

I'm I am glad that Lawrence admitted she was wrong but I'm not surprised she came out as she did on Fox News. U.S. residents have all my support when they try to changes the news media for something that is not biased or sensationalist. I'm just glad I don't have to worry about this here, yet.

I'll accept her personal apology if she promises to never again call someone 'darling' in a condescending tone. It's nauseating.

At this point I don't see why angry gamers shouldn't bash her books on Amazon without reading them. At least when we are asked if we read the book we can say "No" in a way that's not insanely condescending. And we won't even call her "darlin'."

"You're right Ms. Lawrence, I didn't read your books. Someone told me they sucked and there was a new study out by the University of Maryland that said chick lit merged with pop psychology isn"t terribly good."

Fine, fine, we shouldn't be bitter. There should be more repercussions to her career than gamers saying apology accepted, though. She could at least apologize on Fox News and see if she can't get the rest of those idiots to join in.

"Misspoke"? How about lied?

The least she could do was admit that it was a lie. When you misspeak, you don't portray yourself as an expert and act like you know all about the game. Hopefully, at the very least, Mass Effect will be behind us now.

Sorry about the double post...

I also feel Cooper Lawrence deserves absolutely no sympathy- if she had ANY integrity she would have refused to come on the show to speak about something she knew NOTHING about.

All she wanted was exposure which makes her an ATTENTION WHORE.

In addition, her blatant man-hating feminism (the fixer-upper man?) also demonstrates she is no better than a garden variety bigot. Would a white supremasist (sp?) ever get on the air? Man-hating feminists are no different.

Ah. Sweet justification. It's so genuinely rare to see internet outrage affect more mainstream media.

Yeah I would like to see her go back on that show and renege her statements on air, a different audiance watches Fox News than the one that reads the New York Times, she needs to tell the truth to the same people she lied to, otherwise it's like running over someone in your car and apologizing to someone else.

At least she gave up that crap. Hope the next pseudo-expert think twice before to spit any crap like this again.

Cooper really made a mock of herself, and I really hope more people learn from this. If you don´t like children to play videogames, at least don´t lie.

oh how i love vendettas and how they always bring out the guilty

For true recompense, Ms. Lawrence should donate the fee that she received for appearing as an "expert" on the show, to a game charity such as Child's Play. And in the future not accept the offer to appear as an "expert" unless she has the time required to fully research the topic in question.

Always good to hear an apology over this sort of thing.

No point in bothering her any further; Fox News is the real problem here.

One other thing:

As infuriating as false news reports can be, it's important to remember that speaking out of ignorance is not the same as lying.

When Lawrence tries to ad lib her way through a topic she isn't prepared for, that's different from, say, Bill O'Reilly deliberately misquoting his own guests. You end up with a false statement either way, but one's more benign than the other.

Of course, either way, journalists have a responsibility to get it right — but it's clear that Fox News has no interest in getting it right, never has, and Lawrence is small fry compared to that.

Don't be like the one obsessive, creepy guy who's still spamming Kevin McCullough. The anger directed at McCullough and Lawrence has made all the difference it's going to. Let Fox News know what you think of them.

OMG! She even admitted she's seen worse on prime time tv!

Wow, This news made my morning. I didn't see this coming...

Anyway, I agree that it's time to let her go and rip "Faux News" a new one. But uh...

About what Orange Soda said, I personally thing the Amazon bash was reasonable. At least the ones that didn't wish death upon her and just cussed her out. No, the more "mature" responses did more justice. I believe it was a good way to make our voices heard... Besides, even if this confirms this "childish" belief, Honestly...these come from the same people who games rise the crime rates in this country. I bet most of 'em think it contributes to global warming. >_>

Although, I believe the Amazon bash can stop now. Considering the fact that this'll be as good of an apology we'll get.

I'm happy that she came clean, but it I don't think everyone who watched that FOX News segment will read the NYT artical, so we still have a large amount of viewers who still believe falsely about Mass Effect.

@ jccalhoun graduate student

I agree with you, I'm an psych undergrad working in a psych lab with grad students and I can tell you they don't have time to host a TV show, sometimes much less for anything else, but school.

However, there are some schools that allow part-time grad studies, so Cooper Lawrence is highly likely to be a part-timer. I wonder what her grad supervisor/advisor thinks of her right now... Unless she's doing a Psy. D and not a PhD... which could make a difference.

Anyways, I'm still waiting for the Maryland study so I could comment on it.

Anyone else heard the Final fantasy victory music? Anyone..? Just me then?

Well let this be a lesson to so called "experts" that don't know what they are talking about when it comes to video games.

My thoughts exactly Xsorus.

When I read the title and then half way through the artical. I couldn't help to think she's more reacting to her book then to the gamers.

Damn, first McCullough and now her,

Gamers are getting the victories now, fter so long of talking to brick wall thompson its good to get some fresh air.

I'm very happy that she has apologised after looking into the matter, now we need to go gung ho for fox and get in a finishing move, the ball is in EAs court.

This, if it generates enough publicity can be a real turning point for respect for games, becoming self-consciouss of alarmist propoganda is something that is very hard to undo and can turn a lot of heads in our favour.

X-Play did a story aimed at her today. This is the link:

http://www.g4tv.com/xplay/features/19983/XPlay_Editorial_Fox_News_and_Ma...

That's it? Three sentences in the NY Times? Thanks for the apology but I still want her to go on the air with the people that she spoke with on the show and recant those remarks. We all know a majority of Fox 'News' watchers don't read.

While I do agree that she should go on air with some sort of apology or whatnot, I'm pretty damn sure the uppers wouldn't allow such a waste of airtime for something they would deem to not be important enough (much less showing their silly "report on things even if it's not true" tactics), just the fact it is on record is enough of a victory to me.
On the other hand, as juvenile as it is to bash her on amazon just from this scenario (smile), it would be a nugget of sweet yak teat if we could affect FOX itself for ultimately being responsible for this to occur on its network.

Still though, victory marks for us, small though they seem, are still progress!

This is somewhat good news. I wonder if there is a way to go after Fox the same way people went after Cooper Lawrence (looks over the shoulder and starts staring at http://www.votefortheworst.com/ in a dramatic movie kind of style).

J C -

Did you see the roundtable portion of the clip? It's considerably worse then the interview. GP has gone after MSNBC when they've had J. Thompson on. It's not a 'left/right' thing, it's a 'FOXNews blatantly and knowingly' lied thing.

--------

Much like Kevin McCullough, now that she has issued an apology, let her fade back into obscurity.

Nice. Although I don't think her apology means squat. Basically she saw that she had endangered sales of her book (which was just released this month) and knew that she had to do SOMETHING to try to save it.

Just goes to show, the way to make sure no one gets away with this stupid behaviour is to punch them in the wallet.

I am glad that she has admitted to her wrong doing.

So we have learned that to stop people from lying about games we need to get them early. With McCallaugh and now with Cooper we got them early and they were able to learn how wrong they were.

The true measure of our power of influence will be if we could get the likes of Yee and Thompson to admit they were wrong.

But they are at the point that anything we do is just fuel for their agendas.

I'm glad to hear that she apologized but I have no faith that she did it for any other reason than for damage control. If the woman had any integrity, she wouldn't have made her slanderous appearance in the first place. Sorry, no change in my view of her.

@J C
GP is bashing Fox News because of how the game was demonized blantantly and Lawrence was given false. Fox has a long history of this. Remember the Manhunt 2 coverage? Or the Halo church controversy?

Now if only there was a way to make Fox News suffer the same way.

Wait a minute, EA has Lawyers (muahahahahahahahahahahahahaha)

all im going to say is that people make mistakes. lets just hope she learns from it, because what she took part in was textbook slandering. and i have no doubt she knew that from the start.

A summary of the study she referred to can be read in this blog post. He links to the Washington Post's coverage of the study and the first comment to the blog links to a blog post by the study's primary author. The actual study can be obtained here (I believe this to be the correct study).

Although I recognize and am glad that she admitted to what she has done, she should still be harshly and permanently punished by whoever regulates psychologists, she should have her right to practice or call herself one removed and banned by law. She has admitted to behavior that is not professional, and as soon as someone does that they should not be allowed to call themselves one.

Fox should also be punished, and forced to pay a large amount of money, and anyone involved directly in the creation of that "news" should be as well.

Apology accepted.

On top fo that, she outted Fox News on their tactics. She likely didn't even know what the segment was to be about, and given as little info as possible to keep her as knee jerk as possible.

[...] Source: Cooper Lawrence: “I Misspoke” about Mass Effect Bookmark it: [...]

Well, you know what would fix all this?

Keep making games and getting more kids to play them, so in 20-30 years, this'll be over and done with people who actually know about games in charge.

In the meantime, Fox News is just going to sensationalize and misrepresent anything they feel like.

Seriously, guys, the Amazon thing is dirty pool, not to mention infantile.

Exactly how are people who bash a book they've never read any better than someone who bashed a game she'd never played?

Battle not with monsters, lest you become one.

Awfully funny way to misspell 'lied about the contents of' ... but ok. (Still doesn't excuse her from not doing research, though.)

Hey Cooper - want to avoid this in the future? How about doing a little RESEARCH????

You know, I was going over her statement and I realized something: SHE DID NOT APOLOGIZE. Rather she said that "I recognize that I misspoke. I really regret saying that, and now that I've seen the game and seen the sex scenes it's kind of a joke.

"Before the show I had asked somebody about what they had heard, and they had said it's like pornography. But it's not like pornography. I've seen episodes of 'Lost' that are more sexually explicit."

At no point does she say that she is sorry for her remarks or the pain that it caused our community. So I say that until she comes out with a real apology, I don't feel that anyone needs to ease up on anything anyone decides to do to her.

Until I hear the words "I'm sorry" followed by a laundry list of everyone involved with the game from the developer, publisher, retailers, players, and anyone else who took offensive at her offensive remarks.

@Nekowolf

I'm not surprised, actually. I think this is an issue that goes way beyond video games and Fox news. I think it's simply a side-effect of the way many/most news programs are run.

I wonder about any time a news network is doing a piece about some issue and has a couple of "experts" commenting on it. Just by watching the piece, do any of us have a way to know how much info the so called experts actually have, or how recently they were briefed? If it's an issue we aren't familar with, how can we know that they aren't making gross mistakes in what they are saying?

As for Cooper Lawrence... well, it's annoying that she spoke on national TV about an issue she didn't really have good information about, and I think she should have refused to go on the show unless she was given more info or more time to find out stuff for herself. So I'm still annoyed at her. But at least she's admitting the thing was a pretty much a joke now.

"@Orange Soda

Though you do have to admit its funny that her book was slammed by a bunch of people who haven’t read it. She give a derisive laugh when asked if she actually played the game to find this content. Well she isn’t laughing now that people who haven’t read her book have put down their judgment on it now is she?"

No, it's not funny. It's childish, moronic, and not even the least bit original.

But I have the same opinion about Family Guy, most Adult Swim comedies, the average Will Ferrell movie, and other such stuff. My sense of humor lies elsewhere.

Besides, funny or not, there are better ways to get the point across, as I tried to express earlier.

Misspoke? Oy vey. For once, I wish folks would actually do some freakin' research before they started popping off with their false statements. Geez. I do find it funny the chick had to have her book totally ripped to shreds on Amazon before she'd come out and see what a complete tool she'd been.

@Ren

"Just because change is slow to come doesn’t mean we shouldn’t demand respect from those who spit hatred."

You can demand all you want, but you are a fool if you think you will get it.

Any sort of peaceful protest is fine, in my opinion. Email, Phone calls, public speaking, assemblies, letters to the editor, other stuff. The point I've been trying to make is that however we protest, we should do it in a way that doesn't turn the reasonable people away. Honey and not vinegar, etc.

I strongly disapprove of playing dirty. Protest however you like, just keep it clean. If people want to smear gaming's image, the best thing to do is to keep that image clean. There's no point in demanding respect if you haven't earned it.

As far as Lawrence Cooper goes, I think it'd be beating a dead horse to keep going after her. The point's been made. Keeping a grudge wouldn't accomplish anything. My argument is meant to apply to any such situation. As I recall, McCullough reacted badly to hatred, but became more reasonable once he heard arguments from people who were willing to be reasonable. It won't work on the severely closed-minded, but just because some are lost causes doesn't mean that others who take their position are also lost causes.

I can accept McCollough's and Lawrence's half-apologies, because they've at least gone so far as to admit that they've done something wrong, which is more than some people have done. I can respect anyone who is capable of admitting wrongdoing. I believe in giving the benefit of the doubt.

Well, we know one thing for certain: she didn't do any research before saying what she did. At least she came clean

The detractors will of course claim this apology was bullied out of her. Its unfortunate that she couldnt have done her research before this happened.

Do i think she really cares that she lied? probably not. but absolutely no one is going to buy that book from amazon so she wont make...as much money as she would have normally.
But i have to give her credit for actually comming clean and talking out against the negative coverage.
so she learned her lesson...i guess

Lesson=Don't piss off the biggest consumer group out there.

A letter emailed to Cooper:

Dear Ms. Lawrence,

I would like to commend you on your handling of recent events. most notably the fact that you actually stood up and admitted to the flaws in the Fox News Mass Effect fiasco. Of those individuals who blacklist video games for whatever reason, very few indeed have the intestinal fortitude to stand up and admit to it when they are in the wrong. You did, however, and that is a credit to you.

Of course, it is somewhat marred by the suspicion that you only apologized to end the Amazon review fiasco, as opposed to being sincere, but I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.

I would like to remind you that, and I quote, asking "somebody about what they had heard" is not good research. This is essentially the real world equivalent of restricting your research to Wikipedia, which would have college professors raging mad. In this instance, it is especially worrying, as all it would have taken to view the scene in question was maybe five minutes on Youtube. I urge you to devote yourself to better research methods in the future to avoid another such incident.

In the interest of fair play, I would like to apologize for those individuals who have been vulgar or threatening in their responses to you. While what you did was wrong, such responses are going over the line of reason, and are a minority among the gaming community.

Finally, if you are reading this portion, I would like to enthusiastically commend you a second time for actually reading this entire email. The fact that you did again puts you a cut above the rest of the people the gaming community has been dealing with. Thank you.

Mispoke? Understate much?
Who did she ask about the Mass Effect sex scene that would say it's like pornography? Was it a priest? The very least she should of done was view the scene in question. At least then, she would have known what she was talking about.

This event has me seriously questioning the validity of all 24 hour news channels. IF they are going to do stories, they should spend much more time on the stories and allow the guests greater information on the topics (for example, telling them what they will be discussing a few days before their appearance). Also, allowing the guests a few minutes to discuss the topic amongst themselves to a let them feel in the gaps of their knowledge and build some respect for each other would help. It might avert future such situations. Isn't that right, darlings?

Also, I don't really think she's that important. Nobody even made her a wikipedia page, and every major famous person has a wikipedia page. She's only doing this for attention.

She's just an attention whoring feminazi. I really doubt this did any real damage to EA and Mass Effect. I hope EA does get something good from all this.

Chalts,

She didn't realize her mistake, she is simply shifting responsibility from her to Fox. While I have my own problems with Fox, should we really be surprised by their tactics?

The gaming community is going after her for her specific attacks and gross generalazations about gamers in general (average gamer is 13 years old, yeah whatever).

Until I hear something far more substantial, I don't think anyone needs to ease up. In fact, I would be for ratcheting it up because this bs pr combover should not be tolerated. Also, this will hopefully have an effect on any other commenter who is looking to pimp their piece of sh*t book on Fox.

Ren, that's both incredible and disgusting. I can't even imagine what gossip and thought processes go on there. Good on you for trying the quash rumours like that in a constructive way.

Why should we meet her halfway? She could have at least youtube'd the scene, or furthermore, declined the interview until she felt she was properly informed. Se chose not to do eitherose things, and IMHO she deserves all and more of the hate she's getting in return.

is it just me or does it seem like ea should take fox noise to court and rip them a new one? something really off the wall, completely out of proportion to the crime. that way, it would teach the other news corps and politicians not to mess with the games industry sort of like going to prison and killing a dude on the first day to make people fear you (alright thats a bit of a stupid cliche, but i think ive made my point).

I commend her, I really do.

Matt,

The number to the show is 877-6-cooper and is on m-f 7p-10p eastern

It's kind of sad that book bombs were what it took to get her to issue this half-assed "apology". While I stand with those who say that such tactics are infantile, the gaming community doesn't have the kind of leaders who can get them to stop. Who we should be attacking is the ECA, the ESA, the develpers, and the networks that allow this kind of thing to happen. We need to get the larger political and developer organizations involved here. If we are to be taken seriously, the people who make the content we buy and the people who are supposed to represent us need to stand up for themselves. So, by all means, bomb her with e-mails and phone calls, but be sure to do the same to the ECA and ESA for not standing up for video games. EA stood up, and that's a start. We need more though.

awwwww amazon has already gotten rid of all the gamer reviews (oh well time to start them up a new i guess.

I'm still hoping for more and a TV broadcast of a real apology. I also think the industry has collectively let us down again. Gamers are sick and tired of being alienated, disempowered and disenfranchised. The industry needs to take a cue from the MafiAAs about how to protect itself.

As for those people that think the Amazon and B&N bookbombings were childish, I think not. It was basically the only voice we had to draw public attention to our cause that directly impacted the offender. It was nothing more then a new generation protest. We as a group can only fight back with the tools we have at our disposal.

Maybe if we had proper representation on an industry and governmental level such actions would not be necessary. With that said, I do not support the threats and personal attacks that were made by some.

The action itself was nothing more then consumers exercising their voice about a product within a community. It was no different then a church group sending a mailing to its members telling then not to buy something or going on TV and doing it. It was just a different technology and venue that was used to communicate the message.

On a side note: G4's the Feed did a commentary about the situation recently on the MMO Report. You can see it at the following link.

http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/682359/The_MMO_Report_Friday_Janua...

You know, I was thinking about it, and I have a response on YouTube about this. Could be too much of a stretch, but follow me on this.

There could be another reason why Fox NOISE did this with Mass Effect AND Halo (both published by Microsoft for a MICROSOFT system), and that reason could be linked to Keith Olbermann (could answer one of GP's wh.

You see, Microsoft also owns a share of competing news channel MSNBC. FOX has been attacking this channel left and right for their "liberal" take on the news. Now, Keith Olbermann is ON MSNBC (and has the highest rated program on that channel). Not only does Countdown (his show) does battle with FOX's high rated O'Reilly Factor, but Keith has called out Billo on a NUMBER of issues (his comments about homeless vets not existing when the problem clearly exists, confusing Americans with Nazi war criminals in Malmandy, the sexual allegations against him by Andrea Mackris, his "War on Christmas" thing). Obviously, FOX News doesn't like this since people are clearly watching Olbermann and are starting to steer away from Billo (KO is also a firm democrat that has verbally assaulted President Bush and is the guy who has gotten press for his "Special Comments" concerning Bush).

Now, FOX has already gone after the NBC side MANY times, doing whatever they can to discredit the NBC News division. HOWEVER, they, until now, forgot about NBC's partner in MSNBC, Microsoft. If they can slime MS for making controversial games, then all one (that isn't thinking) has to do is put two and two together and see what the MS of MSNBC stands for, and think that MSNBC would be an awful news outlet.

I'm probably giving FOX too much credit to actually think something like that through. But search for the controversies with FOX News and what their head of operations, Roger Ailes, has on HIS record, and you could see that FOX might be capable of actually thinking this out and acting on it.

But its like whats already stated. Bioware put so much effort into making this one of the best games ever. How hard is it when extremist republicans depict your game as a cheap sexgame.

I dont how I missed it yesterday, but Wired's Game Life section has a story as well. The link is:

http://blog.wired.com/games/2008/01/mass-effect-mes.html#more

NYT... Fox news... yeah, there's a LOT of overlap in those demographics. I'm sure 90% of the people that watched the initial report haven't read the NYT in their entire life, let alone to find this 'apology'.

Is anyone else creeped out by her picture? Seriously, it's too God damned cheery.

@The Bobman:

I don't know about you but I feel it was only a reply to her book and not really us gamers. I bet if there was no book or if we didn't trash her book like she did us and only bitched online. We probably would of never got an apology.

I feel it was just the result to protect her book or something.

As a few others said eariler here.

She would of been better off to not trash this shit on national TV and resite stuff she's only "heard".....it makes her very unprofessional.

From that Xplay report too it seems that she did it to promote her book anyway.

Spartan.

Serves her right...oh the irony.

And she is trying to come off as innocent somehow and trying to apologize.

Granted this is Fox's usual crap they pull. The fact she came on fox with a hidden agenda makes her just as guilty. IT's one thing to promote a book...it's another thing to bash something you have no idea what you are talking about to promote said book.

[...] The tramp apologized for her Mistake! Yeah, thats right bitch __________________ I want to buy a play and charge kit anyone willing to sell? [...]

Spartan,

One part of the objective has been achieved. A very minor one at that.

Unless I hear or see the words "I'm sorry" this isn't over by a long shot.

And until I see some sort of movement from Fox based on EA's response, nothing there has been achieved. In fact, Fox is in full denial mode saying they offered EA a chance to speak and is essentially saying that since EA doesn't want to sit down with them, then Fox was totally in the right with how they handled the situation.

No one reading this should be happy with how this is going. Are we making progress? Yes, but it is slow and more still needs to be done.

@Ren - sure I agree. My comment was pertaining to the objective with regards to the action against Ms. Lawrence on Amazon. I also would like to her "I'm sorry" directly on TV like I said but unless she does it on her own you know it will be spun as she was "terrorized by gamers endlessly" and then it would be useless for our cause and in fact maybe help her and boost book sales and talk show time because then she would surely play the victim.

Get your ass back on television and say you're sorry. Go back to Fox and retract your statement and have them run a quick report on their own retardation.

Go back to Fox and retract your statement and have them run a quick report on their own retardation.

Yeah, Fox News will definitely run a report on their own retardation. Especially if someone they had on the air once tells them to.

Seriously, there's no point in bothering with Lawrence any further. It's accomplished everything it's going to.

Ball's in EA's court now.

It's a shame people don't get this outraged over false political/social commentary. Have fun with your little video games.

Dude, don't give out her personal email.

Harrassing her more will just make us look like assholes, not help us.

GP: Agreed... deleted, and DON'T repost it, please.

I just went to Amazon. This was the front page:

"You looked at The Cult of Perfection: Making Peace, by Cooper Lawrence. 20% buy this alternative: No More Heroes. 12% buy this alternative: Burnout Paradise"

Oh, the irony.

Another 'apology' that is really PR damage control done without actually apologizing to the offended.

Her book should tank just because she didn't bother to do any research other than to ask people their opinions about the game. That's totally irresponsible.

Adam Sessler puts it well at the end of this clip: http://youtube.com/watch?v=VBTh1xy5XAI

"I haven't read your book, but it completely sucks. I, for one, feel that it should be kept out of the hands of impressionable young women, for a fear that they, too, might develop into the appalling simpleton that you have demonstrated yourself to be."

the real problem is that people should be far more concerned about Fox "News"'s presentation of the news and not just game-related topics.

Misspoke my ass, she lied straight out!

Of course, its not like pop psychologists can tell the truth; its boring, and the US is a sucker for cable sensationalism.

GP, stop responding to sensationalism with sensationalism.

When she apologizes for lying, I will consider forgiving her. But as long she claims that she only "misspoke", apology not accepted. Take responsibility for your actions, Miss Lawrence. It's one of the precepts of psychology.

@Vinzent

I took her statement about it being a joke not being over the sex scene itself, but rather the stance she had originally taken and the uproar against the scene, especially when she points out that she's seen worse on Lost.

Yeah, and games are even starting to have the same curse with sequels that movies do to boot. =]

I heard from a guy I know who has a cousin who's best friend said his sister heard from this girl that works at the same store as her in the mall that her boyfriend's niece said that Cooper Lawrence secretly produces bestiality porn.

I don't know if it's true... but that's what I heard.



Can I get a spot on Fox News now that I've done as much research about this topic as any of their normal guests?

Why is her MySpace page set to private? What kind of self-promotion is that?

@Me - It is all really just a matter of priority.

Hell BioWare has earned respect in an industry that more often than not assaults its consumers with garbage while charging a premium and treats them like little children with ADD.

If people can't come together to defend such a fine example of corporate policy and respect towards consumers then we might as well just toss in the towel as consumers.

Day late and a buck short toots.

Update: Faux apparently is letting MS. Lawrence take the fall for the entire debacle and hung her out to dry. Let this serve as a lesson for any future "experts" about getting into bed with Faux without taking proper precautions.

WHAT!? MISSPOKE!? Okay wanna know what, Cooped Lawrence didn't even APOLOGIES! She said that she had "Misspoke". Yes apologies, and misspoke have completely different meanings, and everyone should look up those two words up and compare both of them. First off, I'm not gonna except these "Misspoken" words as an apology. Second, Cooper talked to a News Paper Report, yes the "New York Times" exactly. This really indeed sounds extremely strange to me, and how can we tell if she is telling the truth. Either she bribed the person to write some crummy thing about her apology, or she isn't really admitting anything. Lastly, Fox News should go down. They haven't even said sorry, or in Cooper's case, said that they had "misspoken". The only way I accept the apology from Cooper is if she came on television, and admits her wrongs. Of coarse this still won't convince me at all, even if she does cry. I want her to suffer, I want her to know guilt, pain, true suffering, discredibility, how wrong she was about her false facts, and I want to she her life plummet so badly that this will be the last time anyone has ever heard of her! Little words off an article cannot convince me that she is sorry. Yes, you can call me cruel, call me evil, call me whatever you want, but Cooper Lawrence should lose all credibility, all acknowledgment, everything for which she had falsely accused a MAGNIFICENT piece of art like "Mass Effect". Those are my two cents, I hope this can get everyones attention.

Here is the official petition site, and we need the signatures-
PLEASE post this site one you blogs, forums, and websites, because we need an official apology from Fox News and Cooper Lawrence!

http://www.petitiononline.com/foxnews9/petition.html

There is also the matter of the comments Ms. MacCallum made and has shown no remorse for doing so or even acknowledged them after the fact. Ms. Lawrence was not the only person in error in this situation. In fact I believe Ms. MacCallum to be more guilty of misconduct then Ms. Lawrence since it was her show and she knew in advance what "spin" was going to be put on things and she set the tone and controlled the entire fiasco.

BTW: I signed the petition as well.

[...] UPDATE: Cooper Lawrence on MASS EFFECT: “I misspoke.” via Game Politics [...]

[...] Fins aquí, ja n’hem vist molts d’iguals. El que fa gràcia de tot plegat és que aquesta senyora psicòloga ha tret un llibre, i uns quants jugadors indignats van posar-li comentaris poc falaguers a Amazon. Veient que li rebatien els arguments i que el seu llibre no es venia, la senyora s’ha disculpat!!! I no és una disculpa qualsevol, és d’aquelles que et deixa retratadeta, retratadeta. Un petit extracte literal: [...]

jaimec@susanblondinc.com

Is the email listed for her publicist. Send them a polite note, please. Saw where she was supposed to be a guest "expert" on TYRA Banks show. geesh...that's a train wreck to begin with.

Yes, I have more now.

She deserves this... Bunch of idiot's as smart as her doing the same exact thing she did to them. The difference is that nobody will really care about what Faux News said. What an ugly world where in almost every argument both sides are plagued with the same amount of stupidity, and all the smart people are overshadowed. (Though I doubt there are any smart people on the side of Faux and Cooper though.)

Well, I'm glad she "regretted it" but as has been said, by flaming her, what are we gonna acheive? More bad image on an already thougholy smeared view. If someone else just out of frustration began spewing all over your book about games, just because they didn't like the way you dressed, how would you feel? Did any of you actually read the book before deciding you hated her views. I'm not trying to stand up for her, but I'm just saying think and act responsibly. She smeared Mass Effect, but there was a representative there to set things straight. I don't honestly care what the rest of the world thinks, rather, what is it that my fellow gamers think about the game.

I promise you, I am not getting my game reviews from Fox News. I go online to some respectable gaming comunities, and ask around.

 

If we keep playing an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, we will all be blind toothless morons.

People like you Cooper, do not deserve the freedom of expression. You are an ignorant cocky lady who has put thousands to shame and not one sorry leaves your lips, We as a comunity are deeply upset. If your book's sales had not plummited this sham of an "Appology" would have never existed. Lawrence, Fox News, you have made many enemies and this will not make anyone thinmk differently of you!