Boys And Their Toys
Posted by Michelle Moquin on April 17th, 2013
Good morning!
It has been pretty hectic around here with work. After getting home yesterday I glued myself to the news. Got up early but all I have been doing is reading about Boston. So tragic. I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m sure all of you are feeling the same. It seems so many that I have spoken to knew someone that was running in this race. Thankfully none of them were injured. I HOPE that same for you. Again, my heart and healing thoughts go out to the friends and families who were.
I’ve been working on posting something for the last two hours but I keep getting interrupted by work – phone calls mostly, so I apologize that this morning has been challenging.
Now hearing about these letters laced with the poison ricin going out to Obama. And one as sent to Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) too - Okay, as much as I am not exactly delighted with republicans, and their policies, and “party of no” attitude (need I go on?), I certainly don’t wish death upon him.
I am just so sickened by all of the horrific things happening of late. What I thought was a state of Chaos for our country seems to be not as random, but venturing toward, (dare I say) normal. Okay…so I know I am stretching it…and this is far from normal, but boy, the death and destruction lately is just getting to me.
What is going on here with the way people are behaving in our society?
I was visiting with girlfriend of mine over the weekend, whose sister-in-law was visiting from the south with her 3 kids – a girl and two boys. The boys who were both young, under 14 years of age, were playing a video game on the television. Typical right? But what I saw wasn’t typical…or maybe it was.
All I knew, was what I saw was shocking. The two boys were glued to the television as if in a trace state. In the game they were playing, they were portraying armed men shooting and killing other men.
The scene took place in a warehouse space where men in hiding would be exposed to shoot at. I never saw the faces of any of them except for one time. And the one time, I did, it was a black man being obviously portrayed as the “bad guy”. “The “bad guy” came from behind and tried to attack a “white guy” and the white guy responded by swiftly killing him.
I sat there watching for a few minutes, with my mouth open not believing what I was seeing. And then I noticed as I started to take a look around the room…and what I saw was even more shocking. No one in the room was paying attention but me. Wha’at? Do they know what these kids are playing? Well of course I knew they did. But that was what was so hard to take in – They knew their kids were playing games that portrayed them killing people…portrayed “black people” as the “bad guys.”
I felt like I wanted to cry.
This was just a typical day in the life of a family hanging out and the kids “playing.” It felt so “normal.” Yeah to them. But to me it wasn’t “normal.” – It was so disturbing to me.
I had to pull my girlfriend aside and speak to her. Unfortunately, it was not the first time I had experienced this while hanging out with a family. And no doubt it will not be the last.
I think, “Why are these games even being made? What is the reason? With so much ‘real destruction’ in the world, why more?” And then it dawned on me: Because they make money. Lots of money. The demand is there. I’ve seen it. And all the parents seem to say is that all boys have these games – they all play them. So what! Does that mean it is OK? What kind of crazy thinking is that? But that is the answer I get.
If killing becomes so common do we say it is OK because everyone is doing it? How do we combat racism when it is blatantly portrayed in games that our young boys play? We are headed down a worse path of destruction if we keep teaching our young men that it is okay to kill at will – and that black people are the bad people.
Yet, here we are. We have adults here who see nothing wrong with their kids playing games that portray them killing people, and black people as the “bad guys.” No wonder we can’t get good gun laws passed to protect. No wonder we can’t get any votes for background checks on guns. No wonder racism is alive and strong.
That is all I can say on this right now. I have to go. Blog me your thoughts.
Peace & Love. It is what I HOPE for.
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
Gratefully your blog host,
michelle
Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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April 17th, 2013 at 2:07 pm
Oh boy, Mischa, you didn’t even see the one where they can pull over and commit a quick rape, think it’s grand theft auto…again, feeding into the rape culture mindset, if it’s in this game it must be ok?!
…this past weekend, my old BF and I reunited after many years (long story, controlling hubby didn’t like me bc she might learn something from me and threaten the relationship, he decided it’s ok to call it ‘bygones’ and bc I really wanted to see her I said yes ‘bygones’ : ) she has a lot to do with that industry and they have no games. I visited them in a new mansion she paid cash for bc her stock was worth all that, there’s HUGE money in that industry.
Like all good movie execs (and they tend to live in pretty places like Palos Verdes or Brentwood) that I’ve met at parties, school events, etc…they filter what movies, channels, TV shows their kids watch WAY more than the average parent, what’s that tell you? I tell my girl she can listen to certain artists including peeps like Macklemore bc poppin’ tags and talking about ‘same love’ is good with me, talking about women as bitches and hoes is not.
She is convinced boys are ‘stupid’ and left alone to their own devices are pretty much ‘jerks’ ahahaha…and I did not feed her that, she says it’s from her own observations about how they act (like knuckleheads : ) oh shizz, she’s going to be hard to get over on, and I’m glad. She has also seen how girl culture can play out, she was crushing on a boy that another girl was digging for years, and even though he’d made it clear he was uninterested in the other girl, it was made clear to my girl that if she pursued any kind of friendship she’d get the dump from the pack. I told her the one thing you must always do with your friends is understand the ‘girl rules’ which are whatever the group decides they are, you can date/be friends w/ someone else’s ex only with their approval or after 6 months or whatever random rules apply, it’s the only way to keep the peace, people both male and female are too jealous to handle anything really…especially as young people. OR you can fly solo and do what you want, but at 14 it’s all about belonging to the group so…
Anyway, the stories coming out of Boston are horrific and I’m stunned and saddened by the whole thing…
I’m not sure what’s going on Mischa, but with bombings, teen rapes/teen suicides, women as second rate in most parts of the world, ugh…it’s just sick and inhumane and Im wondering how did we get here and how do we make it stop??
Luv, Zen Lill
April 17th, 2013 at 3:20 pm
I am watching Obama making a speech about the Senate defeating the Gun background check bill. He is just not using the bully pulpit to its best effect.
He is allowing the Senators who voted against the bill to leave the impression they were concerned about 2nd Amendment rights. Why didn’t he say that they were being paid by the Gun Industry to vote against the bill?
If our representatives are allowed to lie to us by claiming it is conscious thing rather than an economic one, we will be deceived into believing their lies.
Get some balls Obama and tell the people these Senators are BAPF.
April 17th, 2013 at 5:09 pm
Now that the Senators who voted against this bill have shown their colors we can begin to focus on getting therm out of office.
April 17th, 2013 at 5:57 pm
You know what…it could be me…and I do empathize with wounded/killed…but I’m feeling intuitively that some of this has a ‘made for mass consumption’ feel to it, remember that often seemingly disconnected occurrences sometimes tie together (along with things that are not told to us by the media) & (Howie where are you when I need back up on things like this?!) – Sandy Hook was a crazy event, and has lots of conspiracy theory behind it from day one, then the Boston marathon gets bombed at the end with a Sandy Hook presence there (must be a low level cell too, out of that many people a pro terrorist job would’ve taken way more lives and wounded overall) and then gun control is on the plate on same/next day, smells like a funk truck drove into town to me…something is unfolding that could get very interesting.
The people of Boston are, of course, still in my thoughts…
- ZL