Dog Fighting Videogame Draws Fire From Humane Society, Michael Vick

Dog Fighting Videogame Draws Fire From Humane Society, Michael Vick(blogs.wsj.com)

4 points by thurgoodx 15 years ago | 4 comments

simonsarris 15 years ago |

Surprisingly short article that might as well be an ad for the game.

I hoped for at least mention of pokemon, which supposedly was a game born out of the (once popular?) kids pastime of capturing bugs and making them fight each other.

Nor does it mention the massively popular genre of Human Fighting games, like Call of Duty.

I'm reminded of Penny Arcade:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2011/3/23/

DjDarkman 15 years ago |

My hypocrisy sensor went off. They should take a look at Mortal Kombat, Call of Duty, Blood Rayne to name a few. In these games people kill people, they slice and dice them, why not complain against those. Aren't those games sending the wrong message?

Just because a game contains objectionable material doesn't mean that the players will do that.

icegreentea 15 years ago | |

Well, to begin with, many people do complain about those types of games. cough Jack Thompson cough. There is infact, a great deal of yelling going on about those. It's not hypocritical for the humane society to talk about this game versus Call of Duty. Their job is to deal with animals and animal cruelty. As an organization, they have no 'position' on violence on humans per se. And Michael Vick is involved for all the obvious reasons... he has to look like he's sorry for what he'd done.

Furthermore, there is a difference between violence on humans and violence on animals. Regardless of the how violent our entertainment gets, there is also a constant reminder from society/whatever that it's not cool/moral/right whatever to actually maim/kill other people. On the other hand, there is much less of that when talking about animal violence.

Anyhow, I still think it's kinda silly. No actual reason for it to be pulled. I really think that everyone is just going through the motions here.

jcr 15 years ago |

Of course, training and equipping virtual humans or humanoids to fight each other is perfectly acceptable.