Thou Shalt Not Kill, Except in a Popular Video Game at Church

With me being the daughter of a retired pastor....and growing up in the church - literally I would be MUCH more leary of children who are growing up in the church super restricted and hidden from the reality of life......then those kids who are playing video games.

Also, not all church events are centered around sitting in pews listening to a preacher. Growing up, our youth group had a "youth center" where we had various activities to keep us occupied and not bored or fleeing to the streets for fun.

This is ONE CHURCH. Not a respresentation of all churchs. However, im not so sure this really bothers me as much. I guess it all depends on many things.

Like I said before. I choose not to go to any church, for many reasons. I was preached too 24/7 not to watch TV or listent to secular music or have boyfriends. So, I snuck it and rebelled pretty bad once I hit 18.

I guess its better they are playing this game inside a church, and not out partying and doing drugs and drinking on the streets. Guess its the lesser of many evils.

Originally posted by Freenrgy2

Proof? Blanket statements such as this should be taken with a grain of salt. Everyone of us is different, with different upbringings, different circumstances that shaped us.

Absolutely. So why is it that the article and the OP are so worried because it's christian kids playing it? do they have some stereotype in their heads that makes them think only christian kids would be effected to the point of slaughtering people, from simply playing video games?

The article is pointing out that christianity and violence have no
common ground with each other. which is absolutely true. they
should not have a common ground, in application, or in thought.
but shooting little pixels is like slaying personal demons, not
killing real people.

Originally posted by Freenrgy2

Originally posted by _Phoenix_
VIDEO GAMES DO NOT CAUSE VIOLENCE! [edit on 8-10-2007 by _Phoenix_]

Proof? Blanket statements such as this should be taken with a grain of salt. Everyone of us is different, with different upbringings, different circumstances that shaped us. This was the same philospohy back in the late 70's & 80's where many people were saying that the lyrics in music weren't responsible for violence or suicide. However, there were many reports that stated the lyrics were influential for the crimes committed or a facotr why a teen killed themselves. Same for the D&D (Dungeons & Dragons) craze during this time period.

Video games are like anything else, they are a stimuli. They can affect behavior, they can desensitize, they can allow one to "escape" reality for awhile and pretend they are someone else. And like ANY stimulus, they can have an affect on an individual, even to the point of committing violent crimes. Does the person commit the act, yes. But to say that a video game had no possible influence on the person's motives or reasoning is naive.

Well it seems you missed out an important bit from the quote "VIDEO GAMES DO NOT CAUSE VIOLENCE! If a kid does violence and blames it on a video game, he/she is the problem not the game."

As you can see I did say it can have influence, but its not the games fault, its the kids, if a video game cause them to do it, then they have a BIG problem, they are mentally ill.

Seriously if you saw a bunch of kids playing cowboy and Indians together, and then hear about a kid that goes to school and shoots a native Indian boy and blames it on the game, thats really the kids problem, its crazy to blame it on the game. So I think you should retract calling me naive, because I did say it had an influence, EVERYTHING around us has an influence, I can assure you hanging around kids in high school can have a much bigger influence on kids causing violence, there is influence everywhere, but you cant blame it on anything but the person themselves, they are the ones who choose to do something wrong.

Most sane people know the difference from Right and wrong, so the only thing you can blame violence on is the person themselves. Of course people with a mental disorder with very high influence shouldn't be playing games or watching movies in the first place, but thats a different matter.

Originally posted by DEUCE N CHICA
I PERSONALLY THINK THAT HAVING A YOUTH GROUP TOGETHER HAVING FUN PLAYING A GAME INSTEAD OF BEING OUT DRINKING ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES UNDER AGE IS A GOOD THING.

BUT THERE ARE SOME LEFT WING HIPPIES OUT THERE THAT THINK THAT GAMES ARE THE DEVIL AND INSPIRE KIDS TO DO CRAZY THINGS.

HOWEVER I'D LIKE TO REFLECT ON WHAT THIS IS... A GAME.

SO I POSE THE QUESTION... WHATS THE PROBLEM WITH GAMES?

Oh for Christ's sake can the left wing hippie crap this has nothing whatsoever to do with left/right/hippie or anything else like it.

I swear some of you right wingers are borderline psychotic with your "its the left" hysteria. Go get a prescription for Prozac and calm down. Jesus!!!

If a person, child or adult is unbalanced mentally then anything can be a trigger for them... Harris and Kiebold come immediately to mind when I think of kids who used violent video games as fuel for their hate.

Personally I do not like depictions of violence at all and would not buy my child such a game... but that is me. I think children sitting around watching TV or video games all day is unhealthy.

[edit on 8-10-2007 by grover]

games have been bad since the beggining of shooting games. only difference is the technology. Hell i play a lot of games that require shooting and killing on massive scales such as medieval total war where my army will kill 10s of thousands of men in a few hours. But i dont ha ve urges to go kill real people.

stupid stuff

Originally posted by _Phoenix_
Well it seems you missed out an important bit from the quote "VIDEO GAMES DO NOT CAUSE VIOLENCE! If a kid does violence and blames it on a video game, he/she is the problem not the game."

No, I missed nothing from what you said. Let's explore, shall we.

From Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)

cause /kɔz/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[kawz] noun, verb, caused, caus·ing.
–noun

1. a person or thing that acts, happens, or exists in such a way that some specific thing happens as a result; the producer of an effect: You have been the cause of much anxiety. ex. What was the cause of the accident?

2. the reason or motive for some human action: ex. The good news was a cause for rejoicing.

So, this brings up the question on whether or not a violent videe game (such at GTA) can cause or be the cause for some human action, regardless of whether or not the person committing the act blames the nature of the act on the game.

This same logic could be applied to music, books, television, movies, etc..

I'm not advocating book burning or any other such nonsense. However, one can't state categorically that video games do not CAUSE anything. You better believe they 'cause'.

Have you ever been to a LAN party? Have you and friends rejoyced after killing some super-uber boss in Quake or Doom? Did you all cheer and congratulate yourselves? What was the root cause; killing the uber boss or the game that created the scenario?

I'm also not suggesting that we defer personal responsibility to a video game. I am merely suggesting that video games can and do CAUSE.

To BLAME something is completely different than causing.

Originally posted by Freenrgy2

No, I missed nothing from what you said. Let's explore, shall we.



To BLAME something is completely different than causing.

OK lol I admit I used the wrong wording, I meant you cant blame it on video games.

they ae just getting them ready for the "Big Holy War' they're all beating their drums for. Guess who all will be footing that bill too (blood, money, reputation..).
The main religions are hypocracies and frankly blasphemous. they require you place some appointed guy to be the 'end all' when it comes to the faiths teachings. Unfortuantely these are only the babblings of men- not a God. If they were really in touch with 'god' they would know that they are not necessary for the average human to 'commune' with 'god'. but since their doctrine requires that we all bow down to the clergy- they are frustrated and deperate to find more to follow their delusions of granduer.
I'm not a video game person- but would invest in the best system in a heart beat if it kept my kid out of their clutches ( physically, mentally and spiritually.) the Anti Christs have been here - their called Organized Religion

reply to post by grover


Sir or Maa'm you are grossly misinformed. I seriously doubt the people at Bungie games made Halo in order to further any christian agenda. And I have been a christian my whole life and have never been taught to kill anyone for their beleifs or lack thereof.

And with that same logic why are you not speaking against the game itself instead of just the game being used at church. Thats a bold speculation with no founding.

Originally posted by purple girl
they ae just getting them ready for the "Big Holy War' they're all beating their drums for. Guess who all will be footing that bill too (blood, money, reputation..).
The main religions are hypocracies and frankly blasphemous. they require you place some appointed guy to be the 'end all' when it comes to the faiths teachings. Unfortuantely these are only the babblings of men- not a God. If they were really in touch with 'god' they would know that they are not necessary for the average human to 'commune' with 'god'. but since their doctrine requires that we all bow down to the clergy- they are frustrated and deperate to find more to follow their delusions of granduer.
I'm not a video game person- but would invest in the best system in a heart beat if it kept my kid out of their clutches ( physically, mentally and spiritually.) the Anti Christs have been here - their called Organized Religion

I promise, I don't want to kill you. I don't want you to bow down to me or my family members or friends. I'm not a priest or pastor or preacher. Neither are my kids or husband. You don't even know if the church that was at, was a "main religion." And even if it was, I'm fairly certain they did that because its a fun game (do you think everyone who buys it is a christian?), not because they wish you any harm. All you know is the propaganda on the news.

reply to post by purple girl


Have you been to that particular church and heard the leaders of the church say that they are using Halo to promote what you say? What evidence do you base this wild scheme on? I mean honestly, do you always just beleive any whimsical idea that crosses your mind?

Originally posted by Aaron_Justin
reply to post by grover

 

Sir or Maa'm you are grossly misinformed. I seriously doubt the people at Bungie games made Halo in order to further any christian agenda. And I have been a christian my whole life and have never been taught to kill anyone for their beleifs or lack thereof.

And with that same logic why are you not speaking against the game itself instead of just the game being used at church. Thats a bold speculation with no founding.

No I think you are the one who is misinformed: What I said was:

The name of the game is halo right? Do I need to draw a dotted line?

Killing people of different (or no) religion or trying to convert them is not what the teachings of Christ is all about.

It is so basic and simple I didn't think it needed elaboration.

The game, which I have seen online and what I was discussing, and, what is being marketed as a "Christian" game does... you get points for converting people and points for killing those who do not.

I did not say that real life Christians do this (though they have so in the past) I was referring to the game.

Still, no matter how you cut it; since it does market itself as a Christian" game, if should be pointed out that is not what Christians are supposed to do.

It is so basic and simple I didn't think it needed elaboration.

By the way; even though you are a good and decent Christian and associate with only other good and decent Christians, that does not mean that there are dangerous extremists in the faith... ones who have killed Doctors or blown up clinics or those who plotted with Jewish extremists to blow up the Dome of the Rock, in Jerusalem, an act, if it had succeeded would have set the entire mid east ablaze.

Also considering the niche of "Christian" video games is so small there can't be much of any profit in it so someone has an agenda in regards to that game.

[edit on 8-10-2007 by grover]

Just popped into this thread, but it's the same tired thing. Christians justifying bad behavior because:

1. Not by works, but by faith, lest any man should boast

2. Churches are hospitals for sinners, not museums for saints.

3. We are only human and so we sin, but Jesus forgives us and we are saved, so therefore we are better than all you sinners who aren't forgiven.

Christians are basically a gang, acting out gang behavior. If you don't join our club, then you're in danger of hellfire. All I got to say is hell is gonna have quite a few christians dwelling in it.

Many of you are thinking in the past, there is nothing in human history that compares. When it comes to video games more importantly the advancement in current technologies related to video games and the vast potential for 'experimental' programming.

No one can say one way or the other for sure if there has been any long term conditioning among users of current high end games and game machines. As I said before it could take decades before we know how these things may have affected the users, to what extent, how or why.

These current systems, technologies and advanced games have not been around long enough for anyone to conclude that they do or do NOT have any conditioning affects on long term users.

And usually if there is a way to manipulate a consumer there will be people who will try to exploit that, also there is a potential for using game programming to implant power of suggestion in users (theory). Hacking the minds of users?

Never underestimate technology like this in the wrong hands, also, never over-estimate your ability to avoid being influenced.

Unless of course you are safely playing these games in Church with religious supervision.

[edit on 8-10-2007 by UM_Gazz]

Please UM_Gazz, ive asked you twice so far.

If These games are being controlled by the government to put people in a certain mindset, why do games such as Grand Theft Auto exist, which basically puts you in one of the negative places of society, against Authority.

reply to post by UM_Gazz


I'm with you about 50%, just can't make the leap the rest of the way.

What about "backwards masking" in the 70's & 80's where churches were teaching that satanic messages existed in music when played in reverse. We all know the most famous one from Queen's 'Another one bite's the dust' which says "It's fun to smoke marijuana" when played in reverse.

So, who's to say that if backwards maksing is real that TPTB weren't "experimenting" back then and using the church to bring it to light.

reply to post by Octavius Maximus


I never implied that the 'government' was controlling these games.

I simply illustrated how this technology may be misused, exploited .. etc.

If you are willing to let the minds of your children be potentially influenced or conditioned by these games, or if you feel there is no risk of that.. Fine, I can respect your position, mine is no more or less valid because of it.

Thank you for the many interesting contributions to this discussion.

Originally posted by grover
The game, which I have seen online and what I was discussing, and, what is being marketed as a "Christian" game does... you get points for converting people and points for killing those who do not.

I did not say that real life Christians do this (though they have so in the past) I was referring to the game.

Still, no matter how you cut it; since it does market itself as a Christian" game, if should be pointed out that is not what Christians are supposed to do.

It is so basic and simple I didn't think it needed elaboration.

By the way; even though you are a good and decent Christian and associate with only other good and decent Christians, that does not mean that there are dangerous extremists in the faith... ones who have killed Doctors or blown up clinics or those who plotted with Jewish extremists to blow up the Dome of the Rock, in Jerusalem, an act, if it had succeeded would have set the entire mid east ablaze.

Also considering the niche of "Christian" video games is so small there can't be much of any profit in it so someone has an agenda in regards to that game.
[edit on 8-10-2007 by grover]

Halo is NOT marketed as a christian game, nor is it one. there can be tenuous connections made with characters and themes (though they are VERY loose and hardly the main intent of the story). The game is marketed as a mature shooter.

there is no conversion going on anywhere in the game. there IS killing, but it has relatively little to do with religion. the religious alien zealots are the enemies, and the activation of the halo rings is the main theme of their religion. it's the entire purpose of it. these halo rings, when activated, render the entire galaxy completely devoid of sentient life. the fact that Master Chief and humanity in general are killing these aliens isn't to convert the aliens, or to punish them for their beliefs. they don't really care, they just don't want the aliens to kill everything in the galaxy because they're all mostly misinformed (there are one or two exceptions).

the war isn't based on the hate of the alien religion by humanity, it's based on the alien's hate towards humanity. we're simply caught in the middle of their religious crusade.

We're hip, we're cool and to prove it you can come over to our crib and chill. We've got some dope games to play. Please? I promise I'll be your friend!'
It's bribery; it's the 'uncool' kid at school trying to make friends with the popular kids by giving them stuff or letting them play with their ball.

The choice of Halo 3 as a game to me was simply because of it's phenomenal popularity. Perhaps a bit of a PR bungle due to it's 'violent' content (real world violence or not it still does depict and reward the shooting dead of sentient beings.) It just reveals this, to my eyes, as a failed PR attempt

Ah that just reminded me of this:

www.kotaku.com.au...

John Howard playing halo 3. (which just happened to launch recently.)


I'm still not convinced the military and government are in cahoot with game developers to train us into real world killers though. In fact I think it is the other way around: we as hot blooded males have a need to 'hunt' since the days we were all cavemen doing it for survival or to get food. The skills we developed like eye-hand co-ordination, the dexterity to use tools and weapons to succeed, to come up with techniques to catch or escape from danger, were instinctive and fast forward today, we are drawn to violence as a form of entertainment and so industries popped up around this lucrative interest amongst the already violence-obsessed population looking for an escape from their everyday boring existence. But that is a HUGE stretch by saying that because violence in games exist and kids claiming "the game made me do it" means its true.

You got to understand that the US is a litigious society and that the criminals want to get off easy from judgment by the society by coming up with excuses to make you sympathise with them. "Oh I had no control, it was the game that made me go and kill, or the book I read" and the more you listen to their excuse the lighter the sentence. They hope that this is what you'll think: "awww poor thing maybe we are to blame after all" rather than the sensible reaction of you just wanting the criminal taking responsibility for his actions and understanding why he is wrong for doing it, and why we need to lock him up to protect innocent victims of his murders to keep the public safe from harm. (which he is trying to avoid by lessening the time he has to stay in prison - it's all an act)

Lawyers need money and have to create a reason for the murderer to get off easy so they use scapegoats like music, games, violence on tv, as ways to get the people on the killer's side to go easy on him. Then the media promote this idea with no facts to back it up, maybe calling "experts" to comment, to bring some validity to the article, and then the public who is unable to research this in-depth, automatically makes the link which doesn't exist and causes huge panic over nothing. Like the warnings reading "harry potter books" or "dungeouns and dragons" or listening to rock or heavy metal music, which; after almost half a century, people are starting to finally realise the claims were being blown WAY out of proportion. The killers that DO get influenced by it were already killers from the begining and represent the exception rather than the rule. The mass majority of us normal people are stable mentally and live normal lives, unaffected by the exposure to these things.

Actually the very people who grew up playing those things are probably on forums like this telling you right now "I came out ok! I am your proof that the mind control, if any, isn't going to make me dangerous to you! Stop patronising me by saying I'm not aware enough to comment! I'm smarter and more educated than you on this topic as a parent myself!"

Sure the games, like books, may influence, but influence isn't the same as MIND CONTROL. ie joining a cult and giving up all their possesions, sacrifice freedom, unable to leave the cult.. etc




[edit on 9-10-2007 by Snake Plisskin]

Also the claim that in the game you are rewarded for killing the sentient aliens and you become holy and "earn a halo" is a bit misleading. Have you even played the game??

The "Halo" is just the name of the megaweapon that the ancient civilisation created as a last resort to wipe out a dangerous species of alien known as "the flood" which is infesting planets in the same way a bunch of bird-flu infected animals is going around spreading diseases and killing off native healthy animals in the wild (included some humans).

Because the weapon is so powerful the Covenant (race of aliens who are ignorant of what the Halo was really designed for) wish to activate the Halo because of a religious belief that it will bring them closer towards their heaven. There is some symbolic significance to the Halo in a alien prophecy, and they (religious aliens) don't know that they are about to kill all life when this thing is activated, so you play as a human cyborg to try to prevent the Halo from being used. In star wars you had the Death Star which was a dangerous megaweapon the bad guys used to destroy whole planets. In Halo you have these Ring Worlds (now you know why they are named halos) which are like Giant Guns that are too dangerous to keep around lest they be activated and left in the wrong hands. So you as the hero set out to destroy them and prevent the religious aliens from trying to activate them. (who incidentally are a warlike race that has already planned to destroy humans and earth)

Only difference between star wars' death star, and these halos, is that Darth vader at least knew the death star is a weapon, (despite being a puppet of the emperor) but the aliens in halo don't know the halos are dangerous because they just follow orders from a bunch of aliens called Prophets who refuse to believe the ring worlds are dangerous. (think of them as an alien "pope" with lots of power who use the warlike aliens as their soldiers and protectors) Yes, you must kill to survive but not because you are on a crusade, just fighting in defence of yourself like just about every other videogame, and to stop the rings by blowing them up to prevent their usage. Just like Luke Skywalker having to destroy the Death Star in Star Wars to prevent it being used to kill planets.

Honestly, it might be best that you just play the game before making stupid claims that the game encourages killing for religious purposes. That's what I mean by people not getting involved heavily enough into something first hand and trying it out for themselves to know the facts from the myth. They would rather just imagine the worst and believe that, rather than apply critical thinking. (asking themselves: is it true? where is the source of the claim? what method did the person use in the study to come up with the claim before believing it to be true? Was the method used acceptable to draw accurate conclusions? Could the information in a given article, news item or recording be edited or cut creatively to support one side of the argument? Was information missing? Did the people making the claims take ONLY examples that work strongly AGAINST the argument that 'it has no mind control in it' and then merely throw them out and ignore them, while only include examples that work IN FAVOUR of their argument that 'mind control is in the game', to make their side of the debate seem right?") Lots of misinformation out there..

[edit on 9-10-2007 by Snake Plisskin]