Here Jack Thompson makes a headline-grabbing offer. I provide this link in the spirit of asking: is there any NEW evidence of video game inspired-violence? Can you tell me more about this guy and does he have a factual leg to stand on?
Heh. I expect that by the end of the week there will be flash games following this script and demanding ten thousand bucks. I do hope that some minor computer game company will take him up on his offer–because of course there’s no potential harm from the scenario he describes. It’s too preachy to be any fun to play, for one thing, unless whoever makes it makes it over-the-top camp that mocks Jack.
Daniel
Ctrl+Alt+Del did a strip on ol’ Jack today…
The associated rant, which points out many of the attendent idiocies in Jack’s proposal, is also good reading. And here’s a little bit of surrealia between Jack and the creator of the comic, VGCats, whom Jack somehow mistook for the chairman of the ESRB. That particular exchange inspired this older Ctrl+Alt+Del comic. Lastly, here’s an interview Jack did on the subject of video game violence.
So, Jack Thompson: soulless opportunist or legitimate nutbar? You decide!
I choose “legitimate” nutbar. The man’s a fanatic.
Case in point from that article: “Kids took guns to school for 200 years in this country without turning them on one another.” Huh?
According to Penny Arcade, they sent him a mildly snarky email saying (paraphrased): Ten thousand bucks? Dude, we gamers have given half a million bucks in supplies to needy kids through our gamer-charity. Ten thousand bucks is lame!
Jack Thompson called them (their phone number was in their email sig) and screamed at them and told them they’d regret it if they ever emailed him again.
Wheee!
I doubt I’m the only one who finds his game proposal more unsettling than Grand Theft Auto.
Daniel
There have been a few studies that show a slight increase in aggressive behavior after kids play violent videogames.
However … you have to ask yourself, an increase in comparison to what? ANY exciting activity will boost your aggression level. I personally have witnessed football fans so whipped into a frenzy from watching a game that they overturned cars in the streets. If we’re talking about banning entertainment that gets you pumped up we’re going to be banning LOTS of things. Video games are just being singled out unfairly because they’re the new kid on the block.
$10,000 is chicken feed in the game business. A top title in full production has a burn rate of about $20,000 a day. Thompson thinks he can buy complete creative control over a title for the price of half a days work by the dev team? Laughable.
I guarantee if he could come up with $5M someone would make that game for him. And it would sell about 10,000 copies and vanish without a trace.
Wasn’t there a video game where your character had gone postal? This seems to be about the same thing, but it’d be funny due to the self-referential nature.
Jack Thompson refers to this game in his screed.
Daniel
Yeah, Postal, which I didn’t like because of its’ excessive violence(which is funny considering this thread). I don’t mind running people over in a sports car in GTA Vice city, but using a flamethrower on a marching band…no thanks.
I’d agree that there are some games that make a selling point of their violence, such as that title and The Suffering for Playstation, but I think it’s up to the parents to determine if their kids are mature enough to deal with that stuff.
Penny Arcade was already mentioned but I wanted to give a link.
Here’s the set up
And here’s the strip
http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php?date=2005-10-14
Apparently the game is now to see how long before gamers drive Jack to violence.
As linked to in the commentary for that PA strip, even Mad Jack Thompson’s ideological allies are trying to distance themselves from his ravings.
Incidentally, in this article here, Jack is just making shit up. I no longer think there’s a necessary dichotomy between crazy and dishonest for this man: he’s clearly excelling in both fields simultaneously.
Follow-up: Jack Thompson chickens out of his offer after a team of GTA modders make the game he wanted.
Cluck cluck cluck cluck cluck…
Followup to the followup.
Penny-arcade ( www.penny-arcade.com ) has donated ten grand in Jack’s name.
History: This is the man who got 2 Live Crew investigated for obscenity.
He ran against (She’s a man, baby!) Janet Reno for a position and was obsessed with her potential lesbian nature to the point where he approached her (At a debate?) with a piece of paper that stated, as I recall, “I am a, A: heterosexual, B: homosexual, C: Bisexual. Failure to return this paper in two hours stipulates B or C are true.” She trashed it.
Also mentioned in that article is that the folks at PA have made the $10,000 donation he said he would make then backed out of. They made it in his name, too.
As for evidence against his position, video game use has obviously been (exponentially?) increasing since 1995, but the violent crime rate has declined 32% over the same period.
D’oh! My slow word choice has left me in the dust by E-Sabbath.
Boy, he DOES sound like a nut. I’m amazed he gets any airtime at all.
You know, Tycho and Gabe are pretty cool…I need to start reading Penny Arcade on a regular basis again.
Seems Jack is trying to get Gabe and Tycho arrested. This guy really is all sorts of crazy.