It is a very well spoken comparison and contrast on the subject.

When violence is committed in the name of God, or God's name is envoked, or religion of some sort is used to justify the act, how many demands from politicians, organizations, and the "morally superior" amount to "protect the children" from exposure to that religion?

It's a sign of the hypocrisy of our society. It's all well and good to shout "family values" and "morality" when attacking any number of "pop culture" media. But when the shoe's on the other foot?

Moreover, some religions get the full brunt of attacks while others are ignored altogether. The Muslim faith, for example, is closer in treatment by society to gamers. While those associated with Christianity tend to receive little hits on it's overall system from crimes committed by individuals spouting Christian dogma (Eric Rudolph anyone?).

The fact is, individuals are responsible for their own actions. Yet, when it comes to personal, religious, and/or political agendas, whoever can get away with blind sweeping accusations will do so. And usually, they will only do so if it supports their alternate agendas (censorship, dictatorships, etc).

Nightwng2000
NW2K Software

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Gamers do not have to use the Bible to point to their critics and say "See! See! The Bible is worse and video games are awesome!" Gamers have enough points to get the ideas across without trying to justify anything by way of saying the Bible does it too.

Also would not the link between the bible causing violence also come under attack from the gaming community or is this a case of selective outrage?

He makes many good points in the argument, too many infact.

Any real arguments would be vain against the anti-video game hypocritical resentment. Using the Bible will just make the critics plunge even further in their self inflicted selective deafness.

But yeah, the Bible has plenty of mature content. It was one of the reason Alex from A Clockwork Orange loved to read it. And he was a psycho...

@E. Zachary Knight

If I remember correctly, public access to Bible was indeed forbidden until some time in the 1960s

...at around the time as the Second Vatican Council, I think.

The claim that "oh man wrote the bible, really, so it doesn't matter. It's not the true word of God" is fine for The New Testament. But the Torah and Qur'an are pretty brutal books and by law in Jewish and Arabic countries, those books must be copied to the last T. So, in otherwords, it's only the bible that can use that excuse. And, Christians can't really use it, because the parts of the bible that are most brutal are the books of Israel. The Torah. Basically untouched for 5,000 years.

That arguement is a desperate arguement from religious folly, of which the only hopes is to lessen the damage made by such statements and bring Christianity out in a good light, all the time.

The point of this article is not to attack religion, but to point out that this video games bandwagon going around western media is a load of hypocritical horseshit without so much as a leg to stand on.

@E. Zachary Knight
Fair enough

Still the gaming community does not need "The bible is worse" card to win these kinds of arguments. Also the author makes vague and ambiguous points. I'm sure he has an argument in there but his use of language for example: "In fact they are usually too bland to emotionally engage and would be far better if they moved a bit in the “adult” direction… " this is not a fact and is completely subjective to his view on video games.

One more: "a prime example of a book that children are encouraged to read is the Bible" again, who is encouraging, how many children? there are to many holes here. After all the bible is not taught in schools, there is no state religion so the matter of children being encouraged to read this book is purely a private matter, very much like playing video games.

The gaming community needs to stay away form these kinds of arguments as much as we love games there are far better ways to defend them.

"Interestingly enough, University of Michigan professor Brad Bushman, a leading critic of video game violence, also found links between Biblical violence and real-life aggression in a 2007 study.

Bushman is one Jack Thompson’s expert witnesses in a pending wrongful death lawsuit against Rockstar and other video game industry defendants in Alabama. "


lol does anyone else find that amazingly ironic? surely if JT pushes for Bushmans testimony as anexpert witness to be belived he cant pick and choose... surely??

@ JB

Sounds a lot like Ray from Call of Juarez :)

It is interesting to know that there is the children's Bible that is more toned down and says everything like sinful to cover up most of the adult content, and then there is the Adult Bible with all the themes of adultery and sex and horrible needless violence and death.

Even God killed many people like in the story of Noah's Ark,

Sadly some arguments could say that these are the things that really happened in reality but all they are doing is just trying to defend the indefensible.

But there is some things that are good, for example King Soloman told his children to stay away from the house of the "Adulteress Woman"

Also think about Videogames and there are some Japanese Hentai games that explore these same details, sadly the Hentai games are banned from many places while the Bible has been accepted sadly all because, it is just a book that is about events that many Christians believe that really happened.

Also even though I am not a real believer of Christians, I do believe that we should look up the bible and read it before we try and bash it, other wise we will be no worse than Cooper Lawrence how she bashed Mass Effect without even playing it.

well, those are my words for today

Wow... I never noticed how my holy book was so violent, no wonder people have been looking to pin real world violence on modern entertainment, if people stopped to look back they would probably notice "hey, what about them there crusades into the holy lands, why did we do that again? oh yeah the bible made us do it!"

But of course that would be getting on God's wrong side, which none of us want to do- apart from Marlyn Manson

I don't mean to offend anyone (I manage to do it anyway though) but I really do think that when god gave us free will, he expected us to use it creatively and intelligently, instead we have used his teachings to bring war, fear and hatred to our fellow man, maybe we need to learn that religion should be a private thing, I mean it is tied to so many wars nowadays that it is insane, our own belief systems are holding us back from letting us take the necessary steps to defend them!

So thats why I am a Christian-Buddhist in the comfort and privacy of my own home, nowhere else.

I dont want to attack the Bible!

its a great book!

better even than Terry Pratchett and Tom Clancy!

Then again if Terry Pratchett rewrote it, it would sell a lot better

Pominator,
Even better: Get L. Ron Hubbard to rewrite the bible. :O

Nightwng2000
NW2K Software

Attacking the bible is fair game in this debate. The simple fact is that one of the most of the most passionate opponents of media freedom is the religious right. Do you think kooks like Jack Thompson would be doing what they do if they weren't christian?

@Zerodash

If there's one thing I learned, people like Jack Thompson will ALWAYS find a way to be the way they are irregardless of religion or race.

Stupidity doesn't discriminate.

Tom
Yet society dose it anyway through bans it imposes on itself,you can say censorship is illicit but if have if you have 70% of public outlets blocking it on moral grounds its practically banned.

But I do not think the bible was ever banned in post modern US, pre printing press you had "translation" and distribution issues as well as a church that had tight rules over who got them and how they could be used, around the time of the printing press the bible was seen as a tool of civilization as much as a religious device.
=======================================

On a side note in the bibles defense it has been read throughly everything has been dissected and debunked if you will, because it has so much refrance material and speakers to talk about the issues and story and show the merit of each story/phrase its fiction or setting isles damaging than current fiction/story/setting because modern life dose not have enough "orators" to show the merit and balance in it .

Of coarse society normally matures its "standards" keeping them for time frames of 50-500 years and indignation keeps radical thoughts, story's and settings from taking root outside its niche so "righteous indignation" becomes a oxymoron...

Those on the high moral ground do not see that normal people generally more kinder/humbler/forgiving than they they are and their lust to insert their way of thinking into everything can blind them.

@Zippy
But I think the concern is that the interactivity is some sort of bridge between the content and your own actions, causing the gamer to exhibit the behavior of the game. (I do NOT share this view AT ALL just so we're clear) And yes, I agree that all science to the subject has been lost to politicking and fear-mongering.

ARGH...total lack of coffee..."won" instead of "one." Bleah.

Not criminal trial, civil trial, sorry.

@Zippy
Then we all should be wear aluminum foil hats to combat this effect! ;)

@Zerodash
"Attacking the bible is fair game in this debate."
I hope that gamers take the high road here. Rather than attack the bible, do something that will actually go somewhere and attack their hypocrisy or abandonment of moral choice. Again, polarizing the debate leads only to mutual hatred.

This kind of arugment I think is actually more dangerous to eht gaming community then more thoughtout logical. The problem is if you start placing similiar blame on reigilious books it's only going to enforce the negative stereotype that fantics are already trying to press.

Roger Meyer Jr.: "And there was this thing called the Crusades! Hundreds of people killed! The darn thing lasted for years!"

Kent Brockman: "And this was before cartoons were invented? Fascinating!"

@mario

lol, the link is blocked through my work sever.
@ everyone else,

does anyone remember the jaack thompson quote "there is nothing questionable in the bible" well , i now have a weapon that doesn't include 1 star reviews on amazon.=)

Ban it! BAN IT NOW! Surely exposing minors to this sort of media violence will lead to the downfall of society as we know it. We can stop it while this form of media is still in its infancy...

Won't someone please think of the children?

"Bible Has More Adult Content than Video Games"

This. Is. True.

Games are just a scapegoat. Anyone can see that now. Rock and roll caused babies, comics caused insanity, adn rap music made everyone kill all of the police officers. Now we are all homicidal, pregnant, cop-killers and society is doomed.

Video games killed Elvis and caused the sock market to crash into wall street.

But violence in the name of God is awwwwwwwwwwright.

I have some serious issues with the bible... but I have to play devil's advocate here.

One thing that hasn't been taken into consideration here is time.

Look at a song like "Great Balls of Fire" when that came out, people were up in arms, but no one would persecute people for listening to that today. That was decades ago.

People who read/follow the bible have gone through some of the worst persecution in history. And it wasn't merely litigation... people were fed to LIONS for entertainment.

I'm not excusing what people do/have done in the name of God. But videogames are still in their infancy comparatively.

Garrett
One can say the same thing about religion... the "masses" or indevendaul need guidance to "understand it" :P

I wonder how people are forgetting jesus, and how they drove LARGE IRON NAILS into his arms, and legs. how they HUNG HIM FROM A FSKING CROSS.

I'm not anti-christian, but that's some pretty violent imagery right there.

Skyler
finally thought up a comment to reply with, humans "herd" its a fact however hey are not so easily brain washed.

I is a black sheep that naws to much on his tinfoil hat... wait... *thinks*

You don't have to worry about the Bible causing violence in children, because it's too boring for children to read. (This is coming from someone who has read the Bible through several times.)

Also, it's different. The Bible simply has you reading the violence and you have to visualize it yourself. A video game gives you the image already.

Its about time someone pointed that out.

The Bible itself and the Christian religion do not promote violence; certain fanatics and idiots interpret it their way.

Who knows, maybe Pandralisk scrambled his IP and comes under a different name?

It's kind of pointless comparing games to the bible. The bible is nothing but history. Besides, don't we all get annoyed when games, movies, and musics are blamed all at once?

The Bible has adult content!11!1! NO WAY!!!11 I, for one, am SHOCKED!!1!@@2

[...] Quelle: gamepolitics.com MEHR ZUM THEMA: Electronic Arts WHOA! WTF!? xbox 360 Bookmarken:  [...]

[...] Read the Entire Story…Source: Game Politics [...]

@JB
“O spiteful one, show me who to smite and they shall be smoten!!!”

*Bonus points to those who can correctly guess that quote

Simpsons. Nice one.

The arguments given in the web log post are questionable because they assume that all video games are the same and that "shocking" words in the Bible are the same as shocking images in some video games. Also, if mere words like "smite" are already considered controversial, then the comparison between the Bible and video games in general may in fact go against those who support the latter.

"B-B-B-B-B-But the Bible was written by God, so it’s alright!"

No, the Bible was written by man, not God, so it is not alright. If there is a God, and if He wrote the Bible, I don't think He would write such crap.

jeu du poker...

...

Wow, judging by all these comments this a heated subject. Well lets just put some things in perspective and open our eyes to history. First off, evidence of Dinosaurs cannot coincide with Creationism, so lets just say for argument sake the Bible was written by man and it not only has many violent parables but it has many positive morally enlightened concepts as well. Unless your completely obtuse and close minded these are facts based in logic. So now lets look beyond the Bible. People are asking to look up passages, I say look up the wars and bloodshed cause by the self justification of religious premise. I believe the Holocaust is a prime example. History speaks for itself. They cannot compare to violence actions thought to be perpetrated by violent video games. I disagree that video games cause violent tendencies, if anything they are an outlet/relief source for the more depraved and may even be helping prevent violent actions.
But we all have our own distinct opinions on the issue and were all entitled to it though some may be more hopelessly absorbed than others.