Jack Thompson:

This guy has really made himself a credible source for irrationality and brought many smiles to sane peoples faces. The mainstream press loves this guy too. The hot coffee mod “scandal” in GTA3 is but his latest whipping boy. This guy has scored a lot of prime time interviews and news stories on major outlets since the early ’90s with, among other things, demands that 2 Live Crew’s “As Nasty As They Wanna Be” and Ice T’s “Cop Killer” be banned (those were big news items at the time), been a major factor behind several indecency fines Howard Stern received from the FCC, and been a part of damn near every news story on the dangers of violent video games.

This is the guy who insisted that Columbine was caused by DOOM being a “murder simulator”. He has sued, among others Time Warner Inc., Polygram Film Entertainment Distribution Inc., Palm Pictures, Island Pictures and New Line Cinema, Atari Corp., Nintendo of America, Sega of America Inc. and Sony Computer Entertainment under Federal Product Liability laws after a different school shooting.

His allegations led Dateline NBC to report that Lee Boyd Malvo, the beltway sniper, had “trained extensively using Halo”. He has been interviewed numerous times on CBS, including one famous instance in which he compared Doug Lowesnstein of the ESA to Joseph Goebbels. He has appeared on 60 minutes to discuss how Grand Theft Auto (he alleges) trained a young man to murder two police officers.

You all may want to check out the ChatterBox interview with Gabe and Tycho. Gabe talks a little about his recent conversations with Jack Thompson. Apparently the first thing Jack said after calling Gabe up and establishing his identity was:

“Let me tell you something, idiot.”

This utter professionalism is well-reflected in the text of his fax to the Seattle police.

“There are a bunch of computer geeks out there who think…”
“These idiots have been so careless as to…”

I can only imagine what some of his non-game-related correspondence is like.

The deeper you dig… the crazier Jack Thompson seems to be. Apparently he ran against Janet Reno for the Office of Dade County State Attorney back in 88. He made some pretty ridiculous claims, including that Janet Reno uses call girls. He’s also gotten in an e-mail flamewar with a 14-year old, and his quips make the youngster look like Socrates by comparison.

I hope if the mainstream media begins to give Jack Thompson more air time, since he is fast becoming a “celebrity”, these past deeds are brought up. To ignore them does not accurately portray his real character.

A lot of parents seem to push off parenting to whatever or whoever else. Unfortunately, the state I live in, Michigan, has decided that it must be the parent for you…whether you like it or not: Read about it at Michigan’s own government’s web site.

Not to defend the parents who don’t do a decent job at parenting (*cough* my ex *cough*), but the truth of the matter nowadays is that both parents want to work. Our parents did a good job raising us, telling us that if we want to make something of ourselves, we have to go to college. So we did. Both men and women. Then, while at school, we met the person who would eventually become our spouse. After college, they both wanted jobs, to put this new, expensive education to work. After all, they’re young, educated, enthusiastic, and unemcumbered by kids. So they both get great jobs, and buy a nice big house and each drive a BMW SUV.

A few years later, they want kids. Being used to getting what they want, they proceed to spawn. However, neither of them want to stay home from work, being new-age, enlightened folks. “Why should I automatically have to stay home? This is 2005, for cryin’ out loud,” says the woman. “Well, I’m not quitting my job,” says the man, “I make more than you. It makes sense for me to keep working.” They crunch the numbers and realize that they both must keep working, in order to continue being able to afford gassing up their BMW SUVs and heating/cooling their 3000 sq. ft. mansion.

Kids are inevitably born, and a minimum-wage, immigrant nanny is hired, or the kid is shipped off to daycare, where he/she learns questionable value and is largely emotionally devoid of the individual attention he/she needs and deserves. But mom and dad, still working 8 – 10 hour days, only have to deal with Junior for a few hours a day, so they don’t notice that Junior is starting to resent them. Feeling guilty, they buy him whatever he wants (after all, they’re still “rich” enough to do so). Junior wants a cell phone. “It’ll let us reach him wherever he is,” the parents reason, and buy him the phone. Junior wants a car. “It’ll free us from having to shuttle him around all the time,” reason the parents. Junior wants Grand Theft Auto 3. “It’ll keep him out of our hair for a few hours a day,” say the parents.

So junior, having been raised by an immigrant with poor english and questionable credentials, learns to entertain himself, and finds that he can spend a very large amount of time hanging out with his friends doing whatever, and his parents won’t nag him about it. He doesn’t really like (or know) his parents anyway. Eventually, they get divorced. Junior plays GTA4 with his buddies in his basement while his parents are at work, and they laugh every time they run over a hooker. Then they go out behind the house and smoke a joint. Mom and Dad won’t be home for hours anyway.

Anyways, back to the legislation…

In the 80′s, it was the PMRC under Tipper Gore that was leading children away from the path of suicide and darkness brought on by music. Easy target, musicians don’t tend to contribute as much to political campaigns as Hollywood types. Life was good. Then the “extreme” music of the day became more normal, and all we’ve got is some warning labels. Aside from Lieberman during the 2000 elections, I don’t know of any politicians really speaking out on it these days.

New target possibilities? Let’s see… Video games. They’re easy. P2P technologies. That has the bonus of getting your Hollywood and corporate buddies to apprieciate you more and gives you something that doesn’t require a lot of money or work on your part. Ain’t politics grand?

Welcome to 2005.

My favorite excuse used by politicians to pass laws for their own agenda is when they use “WON’T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!”. Well, I am, so I certainly won’t be voting for Granholm next election. So much for her reasoning behind trying to pass this law based on “violent games make violent people” theory: CNN article.

Yep, we’re slowly approaching a police state.