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Taking pot shots at free speech ...
Boston Herald ^ | January 14, 2013 | Michael Graham

Posted on 01/14/2013 5:07:23 AM PST by suspects

Anyone know what Vice President Joe Biden’s gamer handle is? Maybe “StandUpChuck” or “Amtrak1” or “NoChanceIn2016?”

How about Attorney General Eric Holder (“Fast-
andFuriousUnleashed”)? Or Health and Human Services chief Kathleen Sebelius (“WhatsAGamerHandle?”).

I ask because these folks led Friday’s session of the White House task force that grilled members of the video game industry. Three people who couldn’t tell “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare” from “Assassin’s Creed II.”

To be honest, I’m not entirely sure I could, either. (Is “Halo” the one with Master Chief, or is it “Gears of War”?)

But I’m not the one accusing an entire multibillion-dollar, job-creating industry of being partially responsible for the Newtown, Conn., massacre either.

The White House, on the other hand, is. As Georgia Tech professor and game designer Ian Bogost wrote for The Atlantic magazine, by making the video game industry curtsy before the judgmental eye of Joe Biden and Co., the Obama administration is implying that video games must bear some responsibility for the violence.

“The truth is, the games industry lost as soon as a meeting was conceived about stopping gun violence with games as a participating voice,” Bogost wrote. “It was a trap.”

Ah, but if the “trap” catches the bad guy, that’s a good thing, right? And if, as a poll released by the far-left Center for American Progress shows, “75 percent believe that violence in video games contributes to violent behavior,” then the Obama administration should demand that the gamers answer for their carnage. Shouldn’t they?

Actually, no. But that is how Obama plays the game. He finds someone people already don’t like (the wealthy, high-earners, the NRA, video game companies, etc), attacks them as inherently bad, then invites the “low-information voter” mob to join in.

Hey — it worked on Mitt Romney. Why not on...

(Excerpt) Read more at bostonherald.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: guns; liberals; obama; videogames

1 posted on 01/14/2013 5:07:36 AM PST by suspects
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To: suspects

Look for more folks to turn against Obama in time.


2 posted on 01/14/2013 5:10:15 AM PST by Biggirl ("Jesus talked to us as individuals"-Jim Vicevich/Thanks JimV!)
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To: suspects

The DOJ gave WEAPONS to terrorists through Holder-the-Corrupt.

Video games are games. Weaponizing terrorists is not.


3 posted on 01/14/2013 5:10:56 AM PST by Diogenesis (Vi veri veniversum vivus vici)
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To: Diogenesis

Controls should be placed on violent Hollywood entertainment and video games that feed this. Free speech should not include indoctrinating teens with violence, death, and gore. The Constitution is long dead and people need to learn to enjoy the one party rule they’ve chosen for so many decades.


4 posted on 01/14/2013 5:21:14 AM PST by wrencher
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To: suspects

One question for defenders of ultra violent video games.

If the targets in these video games were pontificating liberal journalists, lefty professors, airhead celebrities, homosexual activists and stoned musicians, would these games still be deemed harmless?

What if the player characters were all rednecks and the enemies were all “inner city utes”?

What is at issue is that violent video games can condition those immersed in them toward insensitivity to that violence and to view extreme violence as a valid response to all perceived offenses toward the player.


5 posted on 01/14/2013 5:45:13 AM PST by BwanaNdege ("To learn who rules over you simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize"- Voltaire)
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Who pissed on the 1st Amendment to run cover for the Benghazi terrorism and murders?


6 posted on 01/14/2013 5:47:53 AM PST by Gene Eric (Demoralization is a weapon of the enemy. Don't get it, don't spread it!)
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To: BwanaNdege

Yes, they’d still be deemed harmless by us “ultra violent”* video game players with brains.

Why do we have to pretend to be the left? Can’t we just, oh I dunno, blame the guy that commits the crime instead of finding a scapegoat? Video games and guns don’t kill people, bad parenting does.

*Sorry, but The Godfather Trilogy was still WAY more violent, realistic and disturbing than any video game I’ve ever played.


7 posted on 01/14/2013 6:45:01 AM PST by jltate
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To: suspects

I’ve noticed an omission in the research about violent video games causing violence. They invariably test subjects for increased violent tendencies immediately after they play the game, which shows an increase in such tendencies.

However, the human mind is a lot more complex than that.

Hypnosis is shown to work on the short term, but the longer it’s been since the hypnosis, the less hold it has on the subject. It is called a “decay curve”. Importantly, it doesn’t matter how much or how often someone was hypnotized, nor does it matter whether it was voluntary hypnosis, or trying to do something against their will.

Or if they were educated and smart, or uneducated and ignorant or stupid. Importantly, enhancing hypnosis with drugs extends the effect a little, but the decay curve is still there.

So how does this effect the players of violent video games?

Simple. It matters far less what their short term tendencies to violence are, than what their mid-term or long term tendencies to violence are. And just as importantly, whether this is to simulated violence or real violence. A gambler will tell you that a poker game for “funsies” has a whole lot different character than one for money.

I suspect that playing violent video games, in the mid and long term, may actually make players *less* prone to real violence, unless they have some underlying mental illness and their brain is cross wired.


8 posted on 01/14/2013 9:14:38 AM PST by yefragetuwrabrumuy (Best WoT news at rantburg.com)
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