World's Worst in Videogames: O'Reilly Factor Edition
Bill O'Reilly is best known for his very conservative rants, often taking falsehoods, misinterpretations (either accidental or purposeful) and complete lack of perspective to prop up his political opinions.
As per GamePolitics (here: http://gamepolitics.com/2006/11/18/bill-oreilly-slams-playstation-3-launch-gamers-ipods-tech-not-in-that-order/#comments ), O'Reilly turns his ire toward videogames, and technology in general.
One thing caught my attention, and just because he has a podcast of his own (again, quote is via GamePolitics):
"I don’t own an iPod. I would never wear an iPod… If this is your primary focus in life - the machines… it’s going to have a staggeringly negative effect, all of this, for America… did you ever talk to these computer geeks? I mean, can you carry on a conversation with them? …I really fear for the United States because, believe me, the jihadists? They’re not playing the video games. They’re killing real people over there."
Ironically, if he listened to KFI in LA, where Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge broadcast a show, then he would know Leo Laport, a self-professed geek who is talking to the masses. He also podcasts that show via his TWIT network (www.twit.tv).
Here is another example of him making a sweeping generalization about a group of people without even speaking or listening to one of them. If he had, he would have seen that we aren't that introverted, but often talk to other people in a large variety of situations, often in person (see PAX, or the dozens of anime conventions) but also via online.
He also equates video games with drugs and alcohol. I can't deny that some people get addicted to the likes of WoW, but the same thing happens to nearly every hobby out there. There are a set of people called workaholics, people who work at the sacrifice to their personal lives. So should we ban work?
Early in his rant, there was this paragraph (again, via GamePolitics):
"Basically what you have is a large portion of the population, mostly younger people under the age of 45, who don’t deal with reality - ever. So they don’t know what day it is; they don’t know temperature it is; they don’t know what their neighbor looks like. They don’t know anything… because they are constantly diverted by a machine. Now what this does is it takes a person away from reality because they’ve created their own reality…"
He's accusing video games of being an escape from reality, something that books, movies, music, poetry and so forth all have in common.
This is another case of where someone doesn't investigate, or at least talk to a gamer (and there's plenty of them) to get an idea of what the culture is like. O'Reilly would rather believe the fiction that is often put out, and doesn't even lift an inch to find any evidence to the contrary. Even with the more reasonable Blois Olson, from the National Institute on Media & the Family, as a guest, he just refuses to change his perception at all.
So the Worst in Videogames Award goes to political pundit Bill O'Reilly.
As per GamePolitics (here: http://gamepolitics.com/2006/11/18/b
One thing caught my attention, and just because he has a podcast of his own (again, quote is via GamePolitics):
"I don’t own an iPod. I would never wear an iPod… If this is your primary focus in life - the machines… it’s going to have a staggeringly negative effect, all of this, for America… did you ever talk to these computer geeks? I mean, can you carry on a conversation with them? …I really fear for the United States because, believe me, the jihadists? They’re not playing the video games. They’re killing real people over there."
Ironically, if he listened to KFI in LA, where Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge broadcast a show, then he would know Leo Laport, a self-professed geek who is talking to the masses. He also podcasts that show via his TWIT network (www.twit.tv).
Here is another example of him making a sweeping generalization about a group of people without even speaking or listening to one of them. If he had, he would have seen that we aren't that introverted, but often talk to other people in a large variety of situations, often in person (see PAX, or the dozens of anime conventions) but also via online.
He also equates video games with drugs and alcohol. I can't deny that some people get addicted to the likes of WoW, but the same thing happens to nearly every hobby out there. There are a set of people called workaholics, people who work at the sacrifice to their personal lives. So should we ban work?
Early in his rant, there was this paragraph (again, via GamePolitics):
"Basically what you have is a large portion of the population, mostly younger people under the age of 45, who don’t deal with reality - ever. So they don’t know what day it is; they don’t know temperature it is; they don’t know what their neighbor looks like. They don’t know anything… because they are constantly diverted by a machine. Now what this does is it takes a person away from reality because they’ve created their own reality…"
He's accusing video games of being an escape from reality, something that books, movies, music, poetry and so forth all have in common.
This is another case of where someone doesn't investigate, or at least talk to a gamer (and there's plenty of them) to get an idea of what the culture is like. O'Reilly would rather believe the fiction that is often put out, and doesn't even lift an inch to find any evidence to the contrary. Even with the more reasonable Blois Olson, from the National Institute on Media & the Family, as a guest, he just refuses to change his perception at all.
So the Worst in Videogames Award goes to political pundit Bill O'Reilly.
posted by SeanM at 3:18 PM
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