Author Topic: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?  (Read 10919 times)

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Offline ironbite

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Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« on: April 27, 2013, 10:08:34 am »
According to David Barton, yes it does.

Since its debut in March, Irrational Games' new first-person shooter, "BioShock Infinite," has received rave reviews and is expected to sell more than 4 million copies this year. But some evangelical Christians claim the game may be turning young gamers against Christianity and conservatives.

David Barton, an evangelical radio host and amateur historian, may be the latest pundit to see sinister messages in the dystopian-style game that, according to the Associated Press, "sets a new standard for video-game storytelling, delivering a complex tale in often surprising ways." During Thursday's episode of his "WallBuilders Live" radio show, Barton decried what he apparently feels are the game's subversive principals.

"Christians are starting to be ruled out in many areas in our country," Barton told co-host Rick Green. "I don't know if you're familiar with it, but there's a new video game out now, and in this video game you shoot the bad guys. You go in and kill the bad guys, and the bad guys are Christians and conservatives."

"This is the kind of stuff that the Nazis started early on with young people and getting them to hate Jews, teaching them that Jews were bad and all the bad things that Jews did," Barton went on to say later. "And Jews did not have the political platform to be able to turn that around. Now Christians still do. And if Christians don't get involved, we're going to have trouble."

Now I've played Bioshock Infinite.  I've also played the first Bioshock.  Now that game has such a huge contempt for Ayne Rand's Conservative utopias that you'd be hard pressed not to see that BI does in fact paint Conservatives in a bad light.  Course what this idiot then goes on to do is Godwin himself so he immediately DQs any form of reasonable dialogue from the get go.

Ironbite-I dunno...the game does demonize Conservatives but Christians?

Offline Barbarella

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #1 on: April 27, 2013, 11:04:53 am »
According to David Barton, yes it does.

Since its debut in March, Irrational Games' new first-person shooter, "BioShock Infinite," has received rave reviews and is expected to sell more than 4 million copies this year. But some evangelical Christians claim the game may be turning young gamers against Christianity and conservatives.

David Barton, an evangelical radio host and amateur historian, may be the latest pundit to see sinister messages in the dystopian-style game that, according to the Associated Press, "sets a new standard for video-game storytelling, delivering a complex tale in often surprising ways." During Thursday's episode of his "WallBuilders Live" radio show, Barton decried what he apparently feels are the game's subversive principals.

"Christians are starting to be ruled out in many areas in our country," Barton told co-host Rick Green. "I don't know if you're familiar with it, but there's a new video game out now, and in this video game you shoot the bad guys. You go in and kill the bad guys, and the bad guys are Christians and conservatives."

"This is the kind of stuff that the Nazis started early on with young people and getting them to hate Jews, teaching them that Jews were bad and all the bad things that Jews did," Barton went on to say later. "And Jews did not have the political platform to be able to turn that around. Now Christians still do. And if Christians don't get involved, we're going to have trouble."

Now I've played Bioshock Infinite.  I've also played the first Bioshock.  Now that game has such a huge contempt for Ayne Rand's Conservative utopias that you'd be hard pressed not to see that BI does in fact paint Conservatives in a bad light.  Course what this idiot then goes on to do is Godwin himself so he immediately DQs any form of reasonable dialogue from the get go.

Ironbite-I dunno...the game does demonize Conservatives but Christians?

I can only laugh at the gall of these Bible-Bashers and their "Randroid = Christian" mindset. Sure show who they REALLY worship!

I wrote this on another thread but I think the NeoCons have an alternate perversion of Christianity that goes like this:

Khorne/Saklas/HaSatan The Demiurge = God The Father/HaShem/YHWH/Eheyeh
Jeebus Antichrist/Republican Jesus = Jesus Of Nazareth
Ayn Rand/The Whore of Babylon = Mother Mary
Ann Coulter (and those like her) = Mary Magdalene

If there's any truth to this Book of Revelation stuff, it's an allegory of all this Religious Right B.S. and if that's the case, they will get their "just desserts" in the end!

Offline Dakota Bob

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #2 on: April 27, 2013, 11:21:04 am »
Conservatives and Christians already demonize themselves pretty well, a videogame isn't going to make it any worse.

Offline nickiknack

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #3 on: April 27, 2013, 12:00:22 pm »
Conservatives and Christians already demonize themselves pretty well, a videogame isn't going to make it any worse.

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #4 on: April 27, 2013, 01:02:15 pm »
Should I even ask if he's actually played Bioshock: Infinite before commenting on it, or would that be a stupid question?

Offline Yaezakura

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #5 on: April 27, 2013, 01:04:42 pm »
I haven't played the game, but from what I've seen of it... In some ways, the guy's point is legitimate. It does paint things like religion, conservatism, and nationalism in a bad light.

But I don't think he realizes exactly how extreme the examples given in the game are. These are people who literally worship the Founding Fathers as holy figures. People who built an artificial heaven because they thought God was taking too long. People who use religion to justify killing over race.

If he realizes how extreme the examples are and still feels the way he does, then I think he ends up being a perfect candidate to explain exactly why the game's message is important: extremes are dangerous.

Offline chitoryu12

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #6 on: April 27, 2013, 01:55:30 pm »
I've played through all three BioShock games, and all three are rather moderate political commentaries. The first two are about the flaw of making a utopia based on a single strict policy (extreme freedom and laissez-faire in the first and extreme collectivism in the second) without taking into account how human nature doesn't work with it.

BioShock Infinite is a game about the dangers of extremism. You can see aspects of the Founders and Vox Populi in the real world: the Founding Fathers are treated almost as legendary figures of pure good whose wishes should be considered for every decision (regardless of whether they would even have the knowledge and mindset necessary to understand the changes of the modern world), while anti-government sentiment is unusually common and can reach scary levels where people will outright state a desire to engage in violent revolt if a political decision doesn't go as planned. In the Infinite world, the Founding Fathers are literally worshiped as gods, with a religious mythology built around them that all citizens are expected to follow. Meanwhile, the downtrodden minorities forget the cause that they fight for and instead begin to irrationally hate the Founders, slaughtering children and civilians and essentially causing random chaos until Columbia burns. They're both too far deep into extremism to even consider the other side more than the most horrifying monsters on the face of the planet. Mix that with a lot of authentic turn-of-the-century prejudice, and you've got a melting pot of human terror.

The whole point of the game is that both sides have gone to the extremes of the right and left sides of the political spectrum. Elizabeth even romanticizes the Vox Populi as noble freedom fighters, only to realize that they've become just as monstrous as the Founders. They even repeatedly stated this during previews of the game, that both sides were extremists and you'd be forced to fight both.

Ironically, the outcry over everything kinda proves Ken Levine's point: everyone is so busy getting angry over the game "supporting the other side" that they forgot to look at how bad they're acting themselves.
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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #7 on: April 27, 2013, 01:57:07 pm »
He's just mad that Bible Adventures was terrible.

Offline mellenORL

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #8 on: April 27, 2013, 03:00:23 pm »
With that in mind, I wish Bethesda would do an RTS/RPG accurately depicting the Old Testament. Wut a bloodfest, man! Would the xtians love it or hate it?
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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #9 on: April 27, 2013, 03:09:04 pm »
With that in mind, I wish Bethesda would do an RTS/RPG accurately depicting the Old Testament. Wut a bloodfest, man! Would the xtians love it or hate it?

That actually sounds fun to play, if you're looking for some gore. You could either be god and destroy things as you please, or be a poor mortal and try to survive his bitchiness.
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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #10 on: April 27, 2013, 03:16:50 pm »
The people in Columbia worship false idols. I don't see why Christian conservatives are getting into a tiff when it's only pointing out extremes and is even showing one of the things the Bible says not to do (though a good portion of the ten commandments are broken, the main theme is false idols). But then again... what doesn't get them in a tiff?

But meh.
« Last Edit: April 27, 2013, 03:21:10 pm by Commander Shepard »

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #11 on: April 27, 2013, 04:21:43 pm »
There's a shitload of media that paints a corresponding shitload of ideologies in a negative light. If this happens to be an ideology you like, you are faced with the stark choice of a) Ignore it and enjoy your game/book/song/movie/etc. on its other aspects or b) Stop playing/reading/listening/watching/etc.
Crying Hitler about it is idiotic and won't accomplish anything, except possibly annoying people.
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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #12 on: April 27, 2013, 04:26:03 pm »
Well, they may hate that the game shows what they do in such a stark light.  Their extremism is shown in stark detail.  Think about it, how many of the extremists would love to have the propaganda of Columbia made into Law?







The extremists, too, worship their false versions of the Founding Fathers, after all.

Offline TheUnknown

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #13 on: April 27, 2013, 05:23:07 pm »
It's funny how one of the "Foreign Hordes" is Native American, as in, the people who are native to this land because they were here first.

Offline ironbite

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Re: Bioshock Infinite teaches gamers to hate conservitives?
« Reply #14 on: April 27, 2013, 05:33:32 pm »
There still the horde though.

Ironbite-cause....propaganda.