(no subject)
What the Fuck? When did the government start getting involved with video games anyway? From what I hear, those ratings are now being enforced by government (supposedly, the penalty for selling mature games to underage kids is worse than selling cigarettes for the shopkeepers, but I'm skeptical). And now, I read on my front page Google news that Hiliary Clinton is calling for an investigation into this whole GTA:SA "porn scandal". I thought liberals were supposed to be the good guys when it comes to this stuff.
Whatever. People can be really dumb, I feel this has been proven axiomatically many times over (the proofs come in all sizes and colors, one uses the axiom of choice). I'm somewhat surprised that people still hold the belief that violent games can cause violence. Or even encourage it. They look at the statistics, say, hey, look at that, among violent children, violent games are more popular than with nonviolent children. That must be what's causing this who mess. Not us, of course.
Well, I guess you can't blame them, the parents..they just want their kids to be safe. No, wait a minute, yes, you can. Their "cures" don't cure anything, they just allow the blame to be shuffled around. Meanwhile the real culprits get let loose at 18, and the parents, of course, simply say, "we raised him so well, it must have been Doom." Foolishness.
In other, less irritable news, I finished up the Chamber of Secrets. I liked it as a book better than when I saw the movie, but I realize that the climax in particular has a notable flaw. Everything that happens at the end feels like a series of Deus Ex Machina style events. Emotionally, it makes the end feel very anti-climatic, and thematically, very empty. My thought is that all of this occurs simply because some new rules get introduced right at the end that weren't explained earlier. It's like playing a game of chess under the impression that to win, you just capture all the pieces, and the move before checkmate, your opponent suddens says, oh wait, did I forget? To win, you only need to capture the king. In the Chamber of Secrets, everything makes sense after Dumberdore explains it all, but it is a mistake not to explain that the Sorting Hat does more than just sorts. Also, when Harry finds the sword, we should at least partially understand the signficance of Harry's finding it in the hat and what the sword is or what it can do. As it stands in the book and movie, we really have no clue what's going on, and neither does Harry as his role in the climax is basically to say "OMG, what am I going to do? I have no wand, no weapons, all I got is a phoenix and a hat." (Incidentally, the phoenix was explained well, just not the hat) Had Harry some idea of what his tools could do, he wouldn't have had to spend the first time calling out for someone to please rescue you, because given the circumstances, it does appear he needed some powerful assistence. Anyway, I still enjoyed it and I found it particularly thematic, especially after everything was explained to us. Moving onward, the third book.
Whatever. People can be really dumb, I feel this has been proven axiomatically many times over (the proofs come in all sizes and colors, one uses the axiom of choice). I'm somewhat surprised that people still hold the belief that violent games can cause violence. Or even encourage it. They look at the statistics, say, hey, look at that, among violent children, violent games are more popular than with nonviolent children. That must be what's causing this who mess. Not us, of course.
Well, I guess you can't blame them, the parents..they just want their kids to be safe. No, wait a minute, yes, you can. Their "cures" don't cure anything, they just allow the blame to be shuffled around. Meanwhile the real culprits get let loose at 18, and the parents, of course, simply say, "we raised him so well, it must have been Doom." Foolishness.
In other, less irritable news, I finished up the Chamber of Secrets. I liked it as a book better than when I saw the movie, but I realize that the climax in particular has a notable flaw. Everything that happens at the end feels like a series of Deus Ex Machina style events. Emotionally, it makes the end feel very anti-climatic, and thematically, very empty. My thought is that all of this occurs simply because some new rules get introduced right at the end that weren't explained earlier. It's like playing a game of chess under the impression that to win, you just capture all the pieces, and the move before checkmate, your opponent suddens says, oh wait, did I forget? To win, you only need to capture the king. In the Chamber of Secrets, everything makes sense after Dumberdore explains it all, but it is a mistake not to explain that the Sorting Hat does more than just sorts. Also, when Harry finds the sword, we should at least partially understand the signficance of Harry's finding it in the hat and what the sword is or what it can do. As it stands in the book and movie, we really have no clue what's going on, and neither does Harry as his role in the climax is basically to say "OMG, what am I going to do? I have no wand, no weapons, all I got is a phoenix and a hat." (Incidentally, the phoenix was explained well, just not the hat) Had Harry some idea of what his tools could do, he wouldn't have had to spend the first time calling out for someone to please rescue you, because given the circumstances, it does appear he needed some powerful assistence. Anyway, I still enjoyed it and I found it particularly thematic, especially after everything was explained to us. Moving onward, the third book.