Onward Armchair Soliders . . . Just in time for Xmas
31 May 2006 by Lya Kahlo(from Crooks and Liars)
Quote:
This is just plain sick. Many Christian activists complain that the violence contained in these games have a direct impact on American Society. I guess killing people who are for a “separation of Church and state” is fair game. Will these be handed out at the next “Justice Sunday” event?
“Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City. You are on a mission - both a religious mission and a military mission — to convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who advocates the separation of church and state - especially moderate, mainstream Christians.
Your mission is “to conduct physical and spiritual warfare”; all who resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice. You have never felt so powerful, so driven by a purpose: you are 13 years old. You are playing a real-time strategy video game whose creators are linked to the empire of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life
< snippy >
This game immerses children in present-day New York City — 500 square blocks, stretching from Wall Street to Chinatown, Greenwich Village, the United Nations headquarters, and Harlem. The game rewards children for how effectively they role play the killing of those who resist becoming a born again Christian. The game also offers players the opportunity to switch sides and fight for the army of the AntiChrist, releasing cloven-hoofed demons who feast on conservative Christians and their panicked proselytes (who taste a lot like Christian).
Is this paramilitary mission simulator for children anything other than prejudice and bigotry using religion as an organizing tool to get people in a violent frame of mind? The dialogue includes people saying, “Praise the Lord,” as they blow infidels away.
The designers intend this game to become the first dominionist warrior game to break through in the popular culture due to its violent scenarios and realistic graphics, lighting, and sound effects. Its creators expect it to earn a rating of T for Teen. How violent is that? That’s the rating shared by Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell - Chaos Theory, a top selling game in which high-tech gadgets and high-powered weapons - frag grenades, shotguns, assault rifles, and submachine guns — are used to terminate enemies with extreme prejudice.
< snip >
The developers obtained the license from Tyndale House, the Christian publisher of Left Behind.
Tyndale also publishes Bringing Up Boys and The Complete Marriage and Family Home Reference Guide by Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, PhD. Mr. Dobson has advised parents to monitor the amount of time children spend playing video games and “avoid the violent ones altogether.” But he has not yet stated his views on whether there should be an exception for video games that role play gunplay in the name of Christ, or of the AntiChrist.
< snip >
As part of its marketing pitch, Left Behind Games hypes the realism with which it portrays the neighborhoods of New York City. There is, for the most part, a remarkable verisimilitude except for one detail - all of the ambulances have 911 painted on their roofs. In the reality-based world, most ambulances have a red cross on top. Yet the game designers make prominent use of these 911 ambulances to evoke the tragic events of September 11, 2001. The historical context of 911 is invoked as if to say, We are living in the End Times, and Muslims are among the kinds of infidels whom you should fear, whom you should be prepared to kill for your cause.
< snip> (and it just keeps getting scarier)
Time has dubbed Mr. Warren “America’s minister.” But Mr. Warren says that his agenda stretches far beyond America, and far beyond traditional ministry. He sees himself as the CEO of a global marketing enterprise, and as the Commander in Chief of a stealth army of one billion Christian foot soldiers.
A key aspect of dominionist thought is a conviction that the Scripture gives the church a mandate to take dominion over this world socially and culturally before the return of Jesus Christ. Mr. Warren’s global plan is a strategy to realize a dominionist vision of churches, states, and corporations forming partnerships to bring about a new world order to make way for Christ’s return by establishing a literal, physical kingdom of God on earth. In order to build this earthly kingdom, Mr. Warren plans marketplace ministries - business ventures with a veneer of missionary compassion that slip into a country in order to transform it systematically through the governmental, corporate, and social sectors. And that is why Mr. Warren calls himself a “stealth evangelist” - because he wishes to cloak his dominionist agenda, which is the establishment of an earthly kingdom that reflects his skewed vision of Christianity.
According to Mr. Warren, the establishment of this earthly kingdom requires “foot soldiers.” As part of his plan, Mr. Warren said he would encourage laypeople to “adopt” needy villages overseas in order to plant churches, expand business opportunities, educate children, influence governments, and overthrow corrupt political leaders, whom he described as “little Saddams.” Mr. Warren said his purpose is to enlist “one billion foot soldiers for the Kingdom of God” in the developing world. And the stadium crowd roared its approval.
< snip >
Yet through an unexpected turn of events in Georgia, the spotlight was turned on Mr. Warren’s stealthy strategy in March 2005, when Ashley Smith read a passage from The Purpose Driven Life to the Atlanta courthouse killing suspect, Brian Nichols. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Nichols freed his hostage and surrendered to police. The entire world suddenly wanted to hear from Mr. Warren, who was busy planting the seeds of a Christian theocracy with his “foot soldiers” in Rwanda.
< snip >
On March 22, 2005, CNN’s Larry King interviewed Mr. Warren about the Atlanta courthouse shooting and hostage taking. A caller asked, “Can you explain the sudden thirst or craving that people seem to have for religion?
“[T]here are really two stories going on in our culture right now. There is the story of things are getting more worse [sic] in some ways. We’re seeing the increase in violence. We’re seeing terrorism. We’ve seen these recent shootings. We’re seeing the coarsening of our society, that has disgusted a lot of people. And there is people [sic] — some people are more materialistic than ever.
But at the same time, there’s another story going on in America, that I think is a spiritual awakening that is brewing. And that is a desire and hunger to know God. I don’t always think it’s always a desire and hunger for church. But there is a desire and hunger to know God.
So according to Mr. Warren, the worst of American culture is reflected in examples of violence, terrorism, shootings, and the coarsening of our society, that turn people away in disgust. And in addition, “some people are more materialistic than ever.”
If violence, coarseness, and materialism are serious social problems, then what purpose is served by exploiting a global pastoral network to mass market a game about mass killing, whether in the name of Christ or the AntiChrist?
On the one hand, this video game is anti-American, because it endorses roving death squads engaged in faith-based violence without any regard for Constitutional law. On the other hand, the video game is anti-Christian, because it argues that the Kingdom of God can be advanced by using the methods and tools of the kingdoms of this world, namely guns and bombs.
~~~
Read the link for more details.
So, what was that about religion not being indoctrination and brainwashing again? What was that about xians being full of love for their fellow man? What was that about xians being patriotic Americans?
And, exactly how are the good xian parents who will buy this for their kids come this xmas justify the behavior contained within after they’ve spent years decrying the decline of society - namely violence in media?
Can’t wait to see the backpeddaling for this one.
“Oh, video game violence is okay if it’s for Jesus!”
Because (all together now) It Can’t Be Christian If It Doesn’t Involve A Fucking WAR.
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31 May 2006, on 8:20 am
This is very disturbing. The majority of people who play a game like Grand Theft Auto don’t take it seriously. I’m not sure the same will be true about the fundies who play this game.
Also, isn’t the story about Brian Nichols turning himself in after being read The Purpose Driven Life untrue? I thought it was revealed that it was actually the pot and crystal meth that Ashley Smith had in her home that calmed him down?
31 May 2006, on 8:22 am
Any bets on whether they really wrote their own game or just hacked and skinned over the latest GTA?
31 May 2006, on 8:37 am
Any bets on whether most players play as Christians or Anti-Christians? Unleashing a demon horde on christards sounds like a lot of fun.
31 May 2006, on 8:45 am
“Unleashing a demon horde on christards sounds like a lot of fun. ”
Definitely. But I could never bring myself to give money to the likes of Warren and his thugs.
31 May 2006, on 9:10 am
Yeah, there was a story in Newsweek around two months ago about this game, or one like it. According to the creators, the target consumers were those that “really liked” the Passion movie. Imagine that.
31 May 2006, on 9:11 am
Oh man, I’m definitely going to check this out and write something up about playing from the demon side (don’t worry Lya, I won’t pay for it). That will just be too much fun. It will be interesting to see if they even give the demons a fighting chance.
31 May 2006, on 9:43 am
“But I could never bring myself to give money to the likes of Warren and his thugs.”
Good point. And really, I’m more interested in relaxing, Mario-type games than shooting at stuff (except for Metroid). The GTA sorts bore me.
31 May 2006, on 10:15 am
Tom - Mostly I agree. However, my absolute favorite PS2 game is Burnout. It’s apparently a racing game, however, to me the entire point of which is to cause the largest auto wrecks possible. You get money and points for this which unlocks more vehicles to cause wrecks with. It’s an amazingly catharsis for road rage.
I also love Simpson’s Hit and Run which is much the type of game, except that there’s actual “missions” to accomplish.
31 May 2006, on 10:42 am
“Oh, video game violence is okay if it’s for Jesus!”
War and violence have always been ok if it is in the name of Jeebus. This video game is so disturbing because it is more brainwashing of the young for the purposes of some demented bibble beliefs and bringing forth its “prophecy” of Armageddon.
A key aspect of dominionist thought is a conviction that the Scripture gives the church a mandate to take dominion over this world socially and culturally before the return of Jesus Christ. Mr. Warren’s global plan is a strategy to realize a dominionist vision of churches, states, and corporations forming partnerships to bring about a new world order to make way for Christ’s return by establishing a literal, physical kingdom of God on earth.
This is disturbing in itself and not unlike the beliefs of fundamentalist muslims. Not all xians are like sappy, happy Ned Flanders. For those who say we have nothing to fear from our xian neighbors…they really don’t understand the mentality of some of these xian sects who actually believe they are being called to violence against non-believers and that the “great war” must happen.
31 May 2006, on 11:44 am
“Oh, video game violence is okay if it’s for Jesus!”
Because (all together now) It Can’t Be Christian If It Doesn’t Involve A Fucking WAR.
Man, I really worry about the loved ones I still have trapped down there in States. All this “holy war” shit makes me so glad I had the sense to escape (and officially renounce my US citizenship), and that my son is 100% Canuck. Canada can’t afford the army we’ve got, let alone be able to launch a war on anyone. Besides, all that obligatory apologising really slows down the efficacy of an invasion.
31 May 2006, on 12:47 pm
Lya said:
Definitely. But I could never bring myself to give money to the likes of Warren and his thugs.
That’s why God gave us the Bittorrents. Praise the Lord and pass the Broadband. His Will be downloaded.
31 May 2006, on 1:24 pm
Dominion theology scares the crap out of me. When I first read the game description, I thought for sure it was a parody a la Onion. Finding out it wasn’t has really freaked me out.
You guys who are going to test this game out, let us know what happens, OK? I suspect there’s a built-in failsafe to keep the anti-christ’s side from winning, but who knows?
31 May 2006, on 1:28 pm
” I suspect there’s a built-in failsafe to keep the anti-christ’s side from winning, but who knows? ”
Or, the anti-christ side will be populated by atheists, gays, feminists and assorted non-christian and should they win the game, the game will show you how horrible the world would be if these people aren’t converted or killed.
Kinda like that ep of the Simpsons where a lawyer dreams about what the world would be like without lawyers. It shows all races and tyopes of people holding hands, and singing. It’s all happy and bright and there’s no fighting.
31 May 2006, on 1:46 pm
“It shows all races and tyopes of people holding hands, and singing. It’s all happy and bright and there’s no fighting.”
No fighting?? Now, that would be hell… for a xian.
31 May 2006, on 2:15 pm
Beyond Belief… Lies Insanity…
Fundamentalism is pretty scary. Anybody nutty enough to kill a person just because they don’t believe in that’s person’s particular fictional superbeing should be locked up for the benefit of all mankind. And yet Dominionism (the belief that Chris…
31 May 2006, on 2:54 pm
This one got a link from me over at Unbecoming Levity, thanks Lya for bringing this to my attention. Heaven preserve us from fundie fucknuts who do everything that Jesus despised in his name.
31 May 2006, on 10:35 pm
Didn’t Rod and Tod Flanders play a game like this on a Simpsons episode? Something about; “You only winged him, he’s a Unitarian now”? The exception being, they were converting the heathens and not killing them.
31 May 2006, on 11:31 pm
Chuck S says: “Heaven preserve us from fundie fucknuts who do everything that Jesus despised in his name.”
I guess I’m, perhaps, ‘the other Chuck’ on the current GifS roster?…anyway,…just wondering; my being fairly new to the clubhouse; are you, Chuck S, actually a theist amongst us atheists, or what? First, I guess I’ll say the usual: “How do you do, Chuck S?” [OK..."Do Vat, comes to mind!...ha, ha? See? I'm unarmed!]
I immediately responded, mentally, to your referenced line:
Which, or what, Heaven?…and what direction is that in the our Milky Way Galaxy? As to Jesus despising in ‘his’ name; doesn’t it all boil down to unrecognized Mythology? I guess what I’m saying, is: Beyond the Da Vinci baloney lies the whole, long trail of Xtiany’s humongous fraud!
Maybe I just missed your brand of humor. If so,…I apologize…or just,:…”NEVERMIND!”
“I mean no harm!” [I just imagined a bit of Don Rickles type comments...if you remember him, and get my gist!]
Now, regarding the ‘Insane Dominionist’ game:
This Warren fuckhead is “more worse(er)” than I ever imagined. I saw part of that Larry King interview; and switched it off after a very short while. Larry King, although claiming to be Agnostic, for my taste, gives WAY more interview time to these Fundie fucks; including the other Billy Graham types, etc. He also rarely, if ever ‘puts their feet to the fire’ in any kind of , ‘hardnose probing’; e.g., doctrinal questions. He always gives them way too much wiggle room; and if anything, loads the panel with the same types of guests. If there’s ever an atheist on board, he/she gets ‘ganged up on’; hardly getting, in my observation, a chance to have an input!
I guess, he wants all those fuckheads to come back for another ‘Ass kiss’?
I’m, pretty much, too old to even be interested in the electronic game world…except for maybe, Madden’s football games…but, hadn’t realized just HOW sick all this shit had become.
Wow!…and I thought Grand Theft Auto was sick! So much violence!…and fisticuffs!
I think I’ll go watch the ‘Wizard of OZ’!…
“Muslims, and Christians, and Jews!…Oh MY!”
“I feel so much OLDER now!”
31 May 2006, on 11:36 pm
I love the absolute hypocracy involved in games like this. I wonder what the reaction will be when a kid goes out, kills an atheist or follower of another religion, or different sect in the SAME religion and kills them, then admits it was this game that gave him the idea.
Do you think Jack Thompson and his moronic ilk will point to it and give their tried and true talking points, or will they blame “liberal” society?
1 June 2006, on 12:38 am
raindogzilla Says:
Didn’t Rod and Tod Flanders play a game like this on a Simpsons episode? Something about; “You only winged him, he’s a Unitarian now”? The exception being, they were converting the heathens and not killing them.
Go here:
http://www.thesimpsons.com/characters/home.htm
Click on “F-H.”
Click on “Rod Flanders.”
Click on “Bill Graham’s Bible Blaster.”
Have fun!
1 June 2006, on 1:08 am
My girlfriend, raised Catholic, says:
1 June 2006, on 7:38 am
Hey Chuck A,
I an atheist humanist. I was suggesting that if “heaven” must preserve us from these types, they are clearly warriors for “Satan”, not “God”. I imagine the suggestion that a fundie is doing “the work of the devil” would probably be extremely insulting to the fundie.
1 June 2006, on 4:58 pm
They should have the guns shoot nicer things, like fruit.
1 June 2006, on 7:01 pm
This report was very inaccurate. The game does not have the player try to establish a theocracy or kill people who don’t convert. In fact, you are penalized for killing people, even though Christian forces are fighting against the anti-Christ’s army. See more about the nature of the game, with quotes from secular reviewers who have actually played it:
http://christiancadre.blogspot.com/2006/06/truth-about-left-behind-video-game.htm
1 June 2006, on 7:52 pm
Talk to Action has a follow-up story:
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2006/6/1/82458/92817
1 June 2006, on 9:44 pm
From Seans Talk2action
As for the violence in a game built from a Christian perspective, Lyndon doesn’t shy away from that either, pointing out that the Bible itself is quite a violent book. “The point of morality is that people have a choice in how they react to situations — and one of those choices is always going to be violence.” While the game itself has no blood, it doesn’t shy away from showing corpses, and lots of them. In fact, one of the things people might find surprising is that bodies in this game don’t disappear, making for some gruesome landscapes as corpses pile up in the streets of New York. “Violence has consequences — even justified violence,” Lyndon said. “You can behave morally and still cause harm.”
Woooo doggy. These folks are fukin crazy.
2 June 2006, on 3:57 am
making for some gruesome landscapes as corpses pile up in the streets of New York
Piling up corpses on the streets of New York. The town (my goddamn town, you fuckers) that suffered the greatest terrorist attack in U.S. history. So, remind me again… How are these fundamentalist lunatics any different from the ones who flew the planes into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon? I mean, given their druthers, it seems like they would be perfectly happy to participate in such things.
2 June 2006, on 6:59 am
Hey Layman - it’s kinda hard to verify your story when your link doesn’t work.
2 June 2006, on 7:45 am
Was missing an all-important “l” at the end:
http://christiancadre.blogspot.com/2006/06/truth-about-left-behind-video-game.html
2 June 2006, on 8:35 am
FYI Layman’s link header (which is, of course, his own blog - on which he defends Dobson. oy.) : “Welcome to the Christian CADRE blog for the Christian CADRE website (http://www.christiancadre.org). The members of this site maintain this blog for commenting on various items of interest to apologetics.”
Yep. Sounds nice and un-biased to me. It calls talk2action an “anti-christian right” website as if that’s a bad thing.
I can’t access the actual link presented for the game reviews so I will quote what’s posted on the apologetics website. My favorite bits are bolded
quote:
“Players aren’t competing to kill the enemy army — rather, they’re trying to save them, and each person killed represents a failure rather than a success. “We found that adhering closely to Biblical philosophies made the game more interesting rather than less,” Lyndon said. “One of the key elements of that is to make sure that the player sees that every life is important and precious.”
That is, “important and precious” if they’re xian, of course. Because the rest of us need “saving”.
quote:
“As you’d expect, you’ll be encouraged to do good while playing the game, but you may also do evil, as well. Like many real-time strategy games, Eternal Forces features a variety of resources that you need to accumulate to build units. One of these resources is your spiritual rating, which measures how good or evil you are. If your troops kill civilians and innocents, your spiritual rating drops, and if it drops too much, you may see your units defect (each unit has his or her own spiritual rating), and if drops too far, demons will show up.”
quote:
“Killing civilians will definitely make you a friend of the devil.”
Which makes me wonder how the game plays out when the opposite side is chosen. Does not killing civilians make you a friend of god in the game even if you don’t manage to convert them?
quote:
“The forces of evil mirror the forces of good, with the notable difference that the abilities of evil will decrease spirit, while those of good raise spirit (except for killing, which lowers spirit, no matter what).”
As you can see, I can’t verify WHO said these things and the apologetics blog doesn’t tell us. If you guys can access the link given, can you tell me?
And, I have some questions. Is the game designed to make it increasingly difficult to “convert” the non-xians? Does the game, despite the “spiritual rating” penalty for killing civilians, leave little other option then to kill them? Is the game overly gruesome in the death details that the xian fascists-in-training playing it will want to kill the civilians? Is no one even a little bit upset about the strong anti-American ideology in this game? Or the disugsting use of the 9/11 tragedy to justify it? How about all those anti-obscenity censorship supporters - are they going to be packaging up this game to deliver to little Timmy and Tammy Xian this xmas?
Lastly, the link that Sean provided for the follow up story is truly frightening. Read it. Immediately.
2 June 2006, on 7:33 pm
Lya,
Being anti-Christian right might not be a “bad thing” to you but it should tell you about the site’s bias.
I apologize for the missing “l” on the link.
And unlike Talk2Action, we allow people who disagree with us to engage us in debate by commenting on our blog. At Talk2Action, if you don’t tow their line, you are banned from the club.
2 June 2006, on 7:36 pm
Lyla,
I do to tell you who said the things. I refer readers to a gaming site that has reviews of the game. It is a secular site, not a Christian one. Much more dependable than a censor-prone anti-Christian rant.
You are speaking from a lot of ignorance and apparrently feel justified in simply speculating the worst in order to justify falling for Talk2Action’s anti-Christian propoganda.
Which is too bad, because a real discussion about the game — rather than paranoid ignorant pronouncements about it — might be a good thing.
2 June 2006, on 10:13 pm
If I knew how to design a video game, I’d make one where some dude with two trained lions, tigers, or, better yet, ligers, hunts down wild, fish-headed Xians armed only with a Phillips Head screwdriver and a ballpeen hammer. The Xians have the chance to be deprogrammed at hammer point though they must pull a Constantine Copronymous and, from that day forward, wear both hairshirts and cilices in order to prove their new enlightenment.
3 June 2006, on 1:25 am
Raindog - that was great. LOL!
3 June 2006, on 2:24 am
Hey! Maybe the mysterious bulge under Dubya’s jacket during the debates was a kind of cilice??
4 June 2006, on 12:24 pm
I WOULD TAX ALL PEOPLE STANDING IN WATER!!! OOooOOOoO!!! YOU WILL ALL ROT IN HELL!!! HAVE FUN WITH STALIN AND HITLER!!!
4 June 2006, on 4:47 pm
Holy crap… I’m really going to have to make a smaller version of that.
5 June 2006, on 6:55 am
“Being anti-Christian right might not be a “bad thing” to you but it should tell you about the site’s bias.”
Being biased against hatemongering bigots is not a bad thing.
“And unlike Talk2Action, we allow people who disagree with us to engage us in debate by commenting on our blog. At Talk2Action, if you don’t tow their line, you are banned from the club.”
I have little experience with them. But, I won’t be taking the word of an apologist. So far I have seen nothing to show that this statement is true.
“I do to tell you who said the things. I refer readers to a gaming site that has reviews of the game. It is a secular site, not a Christian one. Much more dependable than a censor-prone anti-Christian rant.”
I don’t take the word of apologists. And as I clearly said I couldn’t get to your link, I fail to see why you think you’re just teling me it’s right is supposed to convince me. There’s no proof Talk2Action is anti-christian or censor-prone. So far there’s only proof that you wish to badmouth them.
“You are speaking from a lot of ignorance and apparrently feel justified in simply speculating the worst in order to justify falling for Talk2Action’s anti-Christian propoganda.”
You are speaking from a lot of ignorance and apparently feel justified in simply speculating the worst in order to justify presumptuous notions about me because you don’t like that there are people objecting to this asinine game. You came by to dazzle us with your “it ain’t so” posts and so far no one’s dazzled. Now, you’re getting insulting because you can’t have your way.
“Which is too bad, because a real discussion about the game — rather than paranoid ignorant pronouncements about it — might be a good thing.”
*lol* more presumptuous arrogant bullshit. This must be what happens when an apologist FAILS in debate.
8 June 2006, on 7:20 pm
I don’t know, Marcus; it’s pretty fun at that size - gets the point across really well.