Oqm's Razor

 

 

I just came accross this article, which is about a month old but probably still accurate: poll. The article presents the figures of a poll conducted to investigate the ranking of parental dispositions toward various vices that, for the most part, the youth of the world are exposed to. The two most relevant to this discussion were "violence in games" and "depictions of a man and woman having sex." The list also included the classic, "graphically severed human head," and the emergent standard, "two men kissing."

 

The result? Mum and dad would wish on their children exposure to violence in games before they would encourage them to explore procreation. Well done, mum and dad. Well reasoned. What's happening to their generation that would make them prioritize like that? The reason could be that they're shitass lazy and feel satisfied with letting their kids figure out rendered violence on their own, giving them a copy of GTA and locking the door behind them, leaving the complexities of love and lust (for lack of a better word) unmolested and not articulated by either party's curiosity. It could be embarrassment rather than laziness; I know that my upbringing didn't involve a lot of verbal preparation for sexual encounters, but my dad could always make the effort to debug my QOOLE scenes, figuring out and imparting his discoveries as to why the nailgun wouldn't instantly gib the mob around the first corner and empathizing with my disappointment.

 

In their effort to know and control the substance of what is being transmitted to kids or young adults, our most direct predecessors are either being mislead or are blatantly wrong. Of course, polls are used (if not meant) to amplify the voices of the majority and offer a blanket stereotype for those who don't want to interrupt their daily schedules with too much critical thought. That means that its results might not speak accurately of your parental unit, but we have enough evidence to convict all units as a single one in desperate need of correction. They are mistaken, whether they are active in its promotion or passive in disagreement - either stance is too wrong or not right enough.

 

In summary, parents:

 

 

You might wonder why I chose to rant on this subject at 2:00AM in my local time zone, as well as my choice of Vader as the arbiter of the failure we have witnessed (there is no answer). You might also feel slightly betrayed by the tone of this piece, insofar as it seems to challenge the gaming-positive poll results - you want to tell me, "the results are in our favor; now I can play Warcraft with the statistical blessing of my parents." But look closer: that isn't binge-eating ice cream that our parents have condemned: it's the replication of our kind's assorted genes, the continuance of our presence in this world. For the sake of their pride or their loving concern, the polled parents judge their children's time better spent (safely?) shooting at geometry than indulging their sexual intrepidity - and we didn't get this far as a species with that kind of reluctance as a guiding force. I, for one, feel the need to abandon the support of gaming in this particular competition. Stifle not our will to perpetuate, parents - I don't think I should be thanking a round of Parcheezi for the blessing of my existence, but I'm NOT going to think too hard about it.

 

I feel the need, out of concern for self-preservation, to introduce some conditions surrounding my opinions that haven't been mentioned: I love games as much as anyone does, and I write constantly about their natural inclusion into our daily experiences; I write often to bring public notice to new ways of thinking about games (see last Sunday's Slauka column for a great example of what I support). But as easy as it is to become fixated on the joys and immersion of gaming, and as much as we feel the need to appreciate our parents' guidance, we cannot be swayed from the natural path of our lives. Digital experiences can, as far as I'm concerned, take over every part of our conscious experience up to but not including that one loving relationship, because we can't (yet?) reproduce using computers, code and/or the internet. I'm not even sure if that technology will ever reveal itself (I have mixed ethical feelings about being sexually attracted to binary code). For the sake of the species (and against my instict to refrain from shouting heresy), tell your parents to stuff it, disconnect from the raid group without warning or explanation, and go find someone special.