February 2, 2008 -
GamePolitics has been running a poll for the last two days in order to determine if the gaming community is willing to forgive (but certainly not forget) Cooper Lawrence's trashing of Mass Effect.After all, the self-help author did come clean on the state of blissful ignorance from which she slammed the highly-regarded game on Fox News' Live Desk program on January 21st.
Moreover, many gamers apparently suspect that Cooper was simply the front person while Fox News is the real culprit behind the Mass Effect smear
So the votes are in. With nearly 2,600 GP readers registering an opinion:
- 52% say it's time to forgive Cooper
- 37% say "no way!"
- 11% are undecided
Comments
@EZK: Ain't that the truth.
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Papa Midnight
Indeed, I can't accept an apology that never happened.
We didn’t forgive Hermann for going along with Adolf.
Yeah, and how about that time Cooper Lawrence killed Jesus and kicked a puppy?
Come on, guys. If "I regret saying that" isn't a good enough apology for you, you're too hard to please. Part of being a functional adult is meeting people halfway sometimes, and getting over minor insults.
And again, Kevin McCullough had much, much worse insults for gamers, and for Mass Effect, and he was forgotten in a week. (The guy who threatened to rape his daughter notwithstanding.)
As a community, we need to be proactive. But we also need tact and thicker skin. If we just lash out defensively en masse every time someone gets the story wrong or acts condescending, people will continue thinking we're a bunch of overgrown kids. And they'll be right.
There's nothing more to accomplish where Lawrence is concerned. It's irrational to expect her to retract her comments on Fox News; even if she wanted to, do you really think Fox News will run a story about how wrong they were? No, of course not.
And as for this whole mentality where it's okay to be nasty and use dirty tactics when it's [i]us[/i] doing it... Well, remember what Buffalo Springfield said: Nobody's right when everybody's wrong.
http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/commentary/alttext/2008/01/alttex...
I only forgive people that first admit they were wrong.
"misspoke" is a word used by people trying to make an apology without actually making an apology.
At least that other guy said he was sorry.
Then that makes you just as wrong.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
February 2nd, 2008 at 8:44 pm
@EZK
"I only forgive people that first admit they were wrong.
“misspoke” is a word used by people trying to make an apology without actually making an apology."
(so true agree 100%)
"At least that other guy said he was sorry. "
He said he was sorry about saying you can change breast size(thats it) and in his radio thing he made comments that sudjested we were lieing when we told him you could not do that
(in addition to calling us life-less losers, He did not make an apology in fact he just further insulted us,i hate the people who claim these morons said sorry when they so clearly did not)
I am unsure to your comment, if you are referring to what happened at amazon.com, I did not do anything there, and didn't even know lawrence had a book until gp reported that people had stormed her book's page.
beyond that, I can't forgive someone that hasn't actually apologized yet. I'll accept her apology when she makes one.
I am referring to the idea that only people who seek forgiveness should get it.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
I find the actions of the people who book stormed her appalling.. yes, let's lower ourselves to their level.. how about next we start accusing people who disagree with us of obscene and violent acts, so long as we get our way its okay!
If we are ever going to combat things like this, we MUST prove that we are mature, sensible, responsible individuals in all situations. If you are about gaming enough to want to stop people blaming video games for violence and bad things in the world, stop being an offensive punk who rebels against everything... exhibit intelligence, restraint and tolerance, and maybe, just maybe, people will get the message that it is not us shooting up schools.
I'll accept that she fucked up badly, and that she wants to make up to it, but I can't forgive until she stops pushing her book out in our faces to score a buck or 2.
What those who posted reviews on her site did was actually more important than anything. I mean, think about it, it sent a message. You knock something that you have no idea on, you get burned. This would make Fox and other news media out there to sensationalize anything lose support like Cooper here. We've technically instilled a bit of fear. It isn't exactly a good thing, but it would back people like Fox from pushing bullshit out.
She ran her mouth off on a subject she had no fucking clue about. Lots of people (read: idiots) watch Faux News, so she's helping giving videogaming a worse reputation with parents and politicians.
I completely agree with you. This is the reason I forgave her. I once thought of writing to her (in a civilized manner), but I'm too shy to dare do it.
By making the statement that she misspoke (no matter as weak it was) she showed that her views aren't completely set (unlike someone we know). So, I'm giving her a chance. If I didn't, I'd be no different from those anti-game activist (those guys don't give any chances to anyone whatever).
I know and am aware that the real culprit is Fox. Sorry finaleve, but this won't work with Fox. They would shift all the blame on Cooper and they'll do it again using someone else. And each time they'll do this, our reactions will be a little more aggressive until all hell break loose. Just compare our reactions with Susan Bartell and those right now.
Like I said before, if I did trashed her book, I'd never be able to call anyone an hypocrite anymore.
Re: Ashton - We are not on a crusade to allow video games to be X-rated and available to three-year olds, but they are on a crusade to misinform the general public into believing that is what we are doing. We may have a "holier than thou" attitude, but ours is miniscule in comparison to theirs.
Wouldn't you be angry if a bunch of people turned up a place you were trying to sell something, and started loudly insulting you because of something you said in a completely different setting? Put yourself in the shoes of someone who doesn't game... wouldn't you be confused by someone who cared so much about a video game that they throw a tantrum about you misrepresenting it.. rather than just informing you in a sensible and mature manner?
The amazon thing was a mass tantrum, and had no value beyond that.. yes, it may have gotten attention, but it is not the kind of attention we should want.
But wait...does she weigh as much as a duck?
That's the only poll I've seen so far that I was honestly undecided, and voted as such, it was just too complicated. I still put Fox more at fault though
One movie critic once stated that, before Monster House, no animated feature has been able to express real human emotion. I wrote a thoughtful letter expressing my dissatisfaction with this attack on animation and gave many examples in this letter. I received a simple sentence reply, "I wish I cared, you nerd." I once had a chance to talk to Roger Ebert in discussing the games as art debate during Ebertfest here in champaign to which his response was "you poor, poor idiot." And yes, I even got a wonderful response from my local senator when Illinois attempted their antigaming laws. What was the response? A generic letter in relation to the RIAA lawsuits.
Now, as I stated before, the high road simply does not work. You are attempting to be civilized with animals. That's all these people are, when you get down to it. Easily lead, never free thinking. So if you cannot take the high road because you'll be instantly discredited as a moron or a nerd, whatever choice do we have? Guerilla tactics, I'm afraid. EZK, we can talk about how the Amazon bombing was somehow inappropriate, but frankly I see nothing worse than destroying an entire shipment of heavily taxed tea.
After she made those statements, I was furious. She never mentioned what the studies out of Maryland stated and then she went as far as to directly insult her debate partner. This was unprofessional to the highest degree. But a clearer head existed so I went to Borders to see where her professions allied themselves. I spent ~3 hours reading pop psychology so blatantly stupid and condescending towards males that it honestly made Dr. Phil look like the smartest man alive. And to top it all off, her books never touched on the subject in which she was called in as an expert. In other words, she had no clue about the game or the subject matter in which she was speaking about. In many professional circles, this IS a high crime and many people have been shunned for years and even lost their credentials for this kind of shameful behavior.
But still, I stayed annoyed yet inactive. So she announced she "mispoke" which is a good thing, but she never apologized. She publicly attacked 120 hard working people who spent three years making Mass Effect and even disparaged her debate partner based upon an opinion that simply wasn't hers. Yet she never apoligized, she laughed it off. Put yourself in the shoes of those people who worked very hard on Mass Effect. Imagine you're spending a large amount of you life putting work into something and someone who claims to be a professional, who has never seen nor played your work is willing to go on TV and call your art pornography. How hurt would you be? This is someone saying they are an expert, claimed to have research, and yet never saw the game.
But then, as stated here many times, would she have the reason to look at this if her book wasn't being attacked? If her livelyhood (and incidently, I read the first 100 pages of that new book of hers and if you did the same, you wouldn't be here defending her ass) was not attacked by those she attacked, would we be given the whole "should we forgive" question. And she even went as far as to say the retaliation her book on Amazon received was not fair despite her actions should be more than enough you point at her "apology" for what it was, PR.
Now, should we as gamers continue to bear the torches and pitchforks towards Lawrence Cooper? No, actually. We can call off the attack, it worked. But should we forgive someone who hasn't even remotely taken steps to correct the problems she caused? No. And no, this isn't about how we should prove gamers are better than the stereotype. Hal Halpin already said those tactics were wrong. If we stand idly by and take the high road on every given turn, nothing will get better.
If another politician drafts a law that adds taxes to video games to pay for increased costs of law enforcement, we shouldn't simply step back and let the ESA handle it. We need to write letters and yes, even impede the progress of tactics like this by working WITH their competition come next election period. If another false expert jumps on national television to peddle her book while attacking a soft target like games with blatant misinformation, we should shove their tactics right back at them.
Most of the time, gamers are the most easygoing fellows around. But we need to start fighting back misinformation with information. Because the way things are going, our past time will be censored and villianized long before the currect tactic of "waiting for the ignorant to die" will ever come around. I mean, you can enjoy the high road all you want, but I see the video game industry running headlong right into another travesty of censorship....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority
But then maybe I'm expecting too much from people.
This is my own little pet revenge.
http://www.users.on.net/~pskene/CooperLawrence.jpg
I think a victory for games would be this image replacing the real one for her cover on Amazon.com
Golden rule stuff, everybody's human, everybody makes mistakes. The question being can she suck it up and learn from it. If she can, great, more's the better. If not, well, I hear wacko-jacko's lonely in the human-freakshow category. Maybe she can help him protect us horrible gamers from our mind-masters in the ESA. /sarcasm.
I firmly stand by the research I cited that violence and sexual content in video games has a desensitizing effect on young developing minds.
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."
to put it simply. as the first post in the previous story said, it's like she's always right, she was wrong about mass effect but she's still right"
I still believe the only reason she gave the "misspoke" apology is because her amazon took a thrashing. I forgive her for being ignorant, I don't forgive her for only apologizing because of amazon.
She has done nothing to warrant forgiveness. I'll go as far as say, "Let it go," but forgive? You have to earn forgivness for it to mean anything - "I'm sorry," just doesn't cut it, and she didn't even go that far.
Like I said in other thread, she retracted her statements about Mass Effect, but still went on to spout tripe about her 'study' and stand firm on her flawed stance on video games. So, Mass Effect episode - over. Her being a sham-psychologist and enemy of gamers? Still active.
Now I don't like the baseless insults and immaturity that some gamers brought to bear in this issue - those do nothing to help. The bookstorming on Amazon was effective, but I like to look at the individual reviews and judge them case by case. Plenty of Amazon reviews for other books are about the author and not the actual book, so the precedent is there. I think putting up a review that says, "This author goes on TV News and makes false, un-researched claims. So what does that say about the things she writes about?" or similar is a fair assessment of the situation - and technically that doesn't break any rules.
The high road does not mean that we fight back. The high road means that we fight back without stooping to their level.
That is a perfect example of a high road tactic. You are not personally attacking the person who drafted the law, but you are working to make sure that they cannot do anything else so stupid.
You can write Fox News and tell them that you will be boycotting their program. Sure enough if they get enough of those letters it will make them think twice before they do it again.
I have heard of people writing the program's advertisers explaining the situation and why you cannot support a company that promotes such drivel.
These are high road tactics that make a statement without making personal attacks.
Those people that told you that you were an idiot or nerd for loving games, they are just jealous that they are not on that high road.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
I for one will not forgive her for her statements, but I do not think people should continue to blast her book. I do think that it was needed or she never would have corrected her mis-statement, but I hardly consider what she said an apology. I consider what she said to be a "you caught me making statements of stuff that I don't know but you should trust me o this other thing, because I am an expert". People who act like that bring discredit to their field and should be removed from it.
Ummm, no. Look, as Hal Halpin said, high road tactics don't work. We've been steadily pushing towards government controlled censorship or a much more strict CCA. I mean, people laugh at the fact that Marvel comics could never say Satan in their comics and instead went for Mephisto but that's CCA. The CCA created strict guidelines which stiffled the industry and if comics wanted their product sold through majority of distributors, they had to adhere to the CCA.
Having said that, remember Manhunt 2? AO rating = gamers will never get a chance to play it. Nevermind the fact that much more horribly violent material is readily available for purchase at Wal-mart. AO equals no distribution channels being open. Effectively the industry DOES have their CCA except without the very easy to follow rules to keep their product avalable. We've officially bent over to these demands and things ARE getting worse. We no longer have the luxury of the high road.
"Those people that told you that you were an idiot or nerd for loving games, they are just jealous that they are not on that high road."
Umm, no. Who am I? I am a faceless entity upon the vast web of cyberspace with zero power. People do not follow me, listen to what I have to say, nor does my voice stretch to thousands who would take up the battlecry which ushers forth from my mouth. I am alone and powerless.
Meanwhile, a movie critic in the San Francisco Bay Area for a newspaper will determine the thoughts and ideas of many thousands of people. Roger Ebert is an icon and is especially big in my area as a UofI graduate who hosts an annual independant film festival whos tickets sell out months in advance of the actual event. He determines the ideas and thoughts his readership follow. Who is Cooper Lawrence? She is an acclaimed pop psychiatrists who's books as feed into the shallow base emotions of far too many Oprah fans and her statements guide the thoughts and minds of her followers.
I am but one against a voice who commands thousands. I am alone in my tactics and ideals, they have their fans and their followers. They are not jealous of me. But they should fear me. Because while my voice and motivations are my own, there are millions like me. Solitairy in our influence and yet united in our goals. If her Amazon ratings were not bombed, would she have taken the effort to educate herself? This is a cause and effect that the high road simply does not produce.
Listen to GP. He is absolutely right. You can ignore the critics and get nowhere. Or you can take the high road and control the debate.
You hit the nail on the head when you said that thse critics should fear you. But not because we have the collective power to book storm. But because we are a tv watching, voting, educated, well employed demographic that should not be ignored.
When a tv station bashes games and refuses to apologize, we can air our criticism and collectively stop watching that station. When a politician writes legislation that unjustly targets games, we can vote for the other guy and air our reasons for it.
The high road does not mean that we don't strike back, it means that we strike back on our terms and with better tactics, than those on the low road.
Think about it in military terms. When you are at the top of a cliff, you can snipe a convoy marching along the valley floor, without ever putting yourself in danger. But once you leave that vantage point and go for face to face combat, you open yourself up to their attacks and you could fall.
When we hold the vantage point of the high road, all the enemy can do is throw insults at us and our hobby. What we can d is systematically take out the people who are fighting against us.
What good is a game legislating politician who can't get voted back into office? What good is a news station that lost most of its viewership? What good is a pop psychologist who has a bad reputation?
Once we step down and start falsely accuse someone, lie about them or their work, or other tactics, we have left the high road and are now fighting on their turf.
Look at Cooper and her "apology". She played the victim card extremely well. He fans will look at that and see that gamers went and book stormed her and attacked her. Our actions just solidified the gamer stereo type in thousands of her fans. That is the casualty of low road tactics. She may have lost credibility with us, but we didn't care about her in the first place, so no real loss to her. But we lost credibility with potentially thousands of people who like her work. That is a huge loss to us.
The Low road will never give us anything more than a superficial victory. To truly win this "war" we need to stick to the high road and attack with our large forces of influence on media and politics.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
hovever regarding all of your statements, im positive that she wouldn't of apoligized if the full brunt of gaming hadn't come crashing down on her.
In my opinion the focus should be on creating a positive message on behalf of gamers, educating the general public that doesn't really know a whole lot about this new art/media, sorting out the mess in terms of self inflicted pseudo-censorship and preventing government regulation from being implemented. I don't see where the critics fit into the problem, they just keep saying the same thing over and over again and the only reason they matter is because people don't ignore them. The issue isn't about the critics, it is about us. Gamers, game developers and game retailers. It is all about the game industry and all who belong to it. The anti-game activists really aren't well spoken nor do they provide logical arguments. They blatantly spread lies and present arguments full of fallacies. All of them are one in the same, every single one of them. They don't deserve the attention we give them, it is a waste of valuable time.
Exactly. That is part of the high road. Don't attack the people attacking us. Convince the people supporting the critics to support us.
What is the easiest way to stop an opposing army? Block them from receiving any kind of support from the home front. What good is an army of critics, if no one will listen to them?
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
I think there are two issues at hand here: forgiveness and responsibility. Do I forgive Cooper Lawrence for making a terrible mistake in judgement? Yes, we all make mistakes, it's typically part of being human. However, I also hold her responsible for her unprofessional and irresponsible comments. As she told the New York Times, "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." No where in that statement did she every apologize for the damage she caused or the unprofessional manner in which she conducted herself. The Amazon book rating attack was a cost for those words. If she came forward and said she understood why the gaming community was upset and she was sorry for what she said then she'd be taking responsibility for her actions. She has not, so we as the gaming community owe her nothing.
It's obvious from Cooper's comments that she is putting the responsibility of the misinformation squarely on Fox News's shoulders. Yes, Fox News DEFINITELY needs to apologize and take responsibility as well, but that's irrelevent to her situation. SHE made the comments. The words came from HER lips. No one forced her to say these things no one put a gun to her head and made her get on network television.
I honestly think another pole should be run asking if Cooper is as much to blame, as responsible for the slander against Mass Effect as Fox News.
EZK I get where you're coming from. Turn the other cheek, forgive and forget. I personally feel it's time to draw the line in the sand. At what point do we as a group make it clear there's a cost for misinformation? I understand what Blackice is saying. If there is never a cost for misinformation and outright lies in the court of public opinion then why should anyone ever stop?
I personally have never made a comment about Cooper as an individual. She seems like someone who's be caught in a bad situation and simply doesn't know how to handle it. Good people make bad mistakes and it seems the community as a whole didn't attack Cooper either (I could be completely off base there since I'm basing that off what I'm seeing here).
Anyway, I hope at least some of what I've said makes sense.
And proxied this poll to death.
I just want to say unless specifically stated comments on this blog do not reflect the ECA's opinions’ or official stances. The ECA has never officially commented on the book storming. But the ECA has spoken clearly about the FOX misinformation which is the issue at hand. Unlike other organizations the ECA made their voice known.
We're currently working on a tool set where you will be able to directly contact members of the press or politicians and let your opinions and voices be heard. That should be available pretty soon.
Brett Schenker
Online Advocacy Manager
www.theeca.com
Everyone - Yea I'm sure the ECA doesn't really condone the book storming, probably most likely because it gives a bad image to the organization and also some of the ideas expressed in the comments were probably not fitting to the ECA's official stance.
I'm incredibly interested to see how this tool set is going to be implemented. It could be dangerous but it could be great. The Video Game Voters Network had a pretty good system, even though I no longer endorse anyone that is in anyway connected to the ESRB. I do wish it was less generalized but I do understand that you can't grant complete freedom otherwise there will be a few people sending ideas not endorsed by the ECA.
I think it would be cool to also get a members-only voting systems going. So basically you give the ECA members a topic, get them to write a few sentences generalizing their opinions, then you make a poll in which only ECA members can vote(once) and then endorse the winning opinion considering it isn't a extremely close tie or just too close to really call the official ECA stance. Really it is about the members and I think this would be beneficial to the organization to have a clear and open communication and opinion trading between central offices, chapters, and all other members. Not that the ECA isn't already striving for that, but I think this could be an efficient way to know where everyone stands and how you should adjust the stance or if you even need to adjust the stance at all.
The polls here at GP are good, but they are so easily manipulated. Having members-only polling would ensure that people can only vote once, and determine how many ECA members are actively participating in the surveys. It would be, in my opinion, a marvelous source of information not only to find the most popular topics but to make sure we are well informed on each and every situation at hand.
Thanks for the feedback and those are definitely some good ideas. As there are many issues going on at once, the general set up will be that each issue will be put forward at once (like how on the ECA website you can find all of the legislation currently going on), and time sensitive issues will be highlighted in various ways. For each issue there will be different ways for action to be taken. If it’s dealing with legislation in the US Senate you could write to your Senators, if it’s state specific you could contact them, or if its media related you could contact them.
As far as members giving their opinions, members can currently check out the forums and write their opinions there and debate the issues at hand further. ECA completely agrees about opinion trading and open communication, which is at the heart of online advocacy tools ECA’s building and offering.
As far as the polls go, I’ll pass your concerns along.
Brett Schenker
Online Advocacy Manager
www.theeca.com
Note I said retracted. She regretted saying it, but at no point did she admit her own personal fault for this insult. Instead she goes and says that she didn't know. In short, she's acting like a spoiled little valley girl after she causes a major accident. All that's missing is the stupid giggle.
She had a choice, she made her choice, and instead of accepting the consequences for her choice, she tries to pass the buck. Until she owns up to her own mistakes and accepts responsibility for her own actions, She gets no forgiveness from me.