Hello Everybody =)
Im Gav, I'm an avid gamer, love the gaming community, and have helped some developers with Alpha and Beta testing, (I'm sure a few people have here and I know it can be tedious. An example would be the 4.2 PTR for WoW and Waiting for the GM's to turn FL on.) If anyones interested, go take a look at TB's video on "Mounts that will block out the Sun". I'm also a guild leader and a few of my members are Christians and they turned to me when they discovered that themselves and ordinary gamers alike were being branded evil by a group of christians on a forum online.
My friends asked me questions like, Do you see any evil within specifically WoW (Which the play alongside me and the rest of the guild) or anything that would cause a person to be evil? Do I see any sexual references or symbols which may insight evil or do I see anything evil in any of the classes or character within the game? And is there anything which as they put "Would insight sins of the flesh?"
As always I gave my honest opions and thoughts about these questions and that was that I see nothing in WoW which may cause this, or diablo or the Sims the list is really quite long. I spent a great deal of time talking with them on my Ventrillo server, explaining some evil things within the game but that was all within the Lore of Azeroth, and even went back to my old warcraft books to tell some of the story which in my opion is one of the crowning achivements of 21st century fiction.
After a while discussing points and an incident which did happen over in Europe about WoW which did effect the lives of many people (Il come to that a little later) I chose to visit this forum where this apparent hate branding towards players, and I was shocked.
With myself being myself and free with my thought, I posted to these forums hoping, knowledge of the gaming community, the people therin, my friends and the games they play and the walks of life they come, and reasoning would maybe give these people a real glimpse of the core gaming community, and what could possibly come from the business of software and gaming develop and how it can make the world a better place. (The coding I talk about is present in your smartphones, internet browsers, sat-navs pretty nuch every handheld device or computer which has been developed since 2008) and why it couldnt be evil.
I had also mentioned one incident which effected many people. One person (Who played on a different realm) was killed by another player over some rediculous thing but it became apparent afterwards that the person who killed this player suffered a severe mental illness and he did not see the world as it should be seen, and it could have only been prevented if this person was admitted to a facilty for care for people with a mental illness.
I went on to then explain a little about the communty that is contained just within my guild. I said that some of us are parents, some of us have familys, some of us have illness, some of us are still at school/university, that we have entire familys in our guild, some of us are young, some of us are old, some of us are new to gaming, some of us have known eachother for so long that we know what somebodys going to do before they do it as a few of us who started the guild have been playing together for over 7 years, my partner whom I love helps run the guild with myself the core group and the rest of the members and that we look after eachother. We have young children who play (as I said we have entire familys playing) and we look after them actively and protecting them from online predators/people who will mislead or give them the wrong ideas, we even talk to the parents of the children (whose parents dont play) to make sure they know they are safe within our guild and we have a very active contact forums for our guild.
I have a dedicated ventrillo server and skype where anybody in the community can contact me or the other officers of the guild if something serious could happen to any of the members and I'm on most of the time as I have PTSD (Traumatic Stress Disorder) and Insomnia.
I went on to explain as well that at the end of the day some of us play to relax or for the challenge of the game. I myself raid (a lot) with my friends and community members, and for myself the thrill I get from it is protecting my allies whilst taking a beating from a raid boss (Main DK tank 370ilevel) or keeping my friends alive by healing them (Alt Hpriest 370ilevel). We all help eachother out ingame and out and we have fun. We have jokes, we have shared and celebrated new babys being born from some of our members, we have mourned the loss of players as well.
Knowing what I know of life and the way the world works, I went on to say that evil is a choice. Its down to the person if they choose to do evil or wrong. Everybody in the world has the absolute capabilty of becoming the worse kind of human being anybody can be. And it makes me sad to say that it is true. I'm not questioning anybodys beliefs as a persons own belief is finite and people will choose what they wish if it brings them the clarity and closure to fill there lives with meaning. I respect peoples individualty and their right to choose.
After some time a post was replied and I was told that I'm a stinking godmocker, that I should repent otherwise I would burn in hellfire and that I should go basically perform an act which I find quite unacceptable and so does my long term girlfriend, and to further belittle myself the forum administrators took it upon themselves to change my user login data to a "trolling" kind of way, and was told I should speak "American English" and I quote "God's Favourite Languadge". This came about after they found out I was from the U.K. and had used a little of my own dialect.
Finally the questions from myself and my friends.
Are games evil and do they promote people to insight evil?
Do games mock the will of God and his word?
Are the developers/designers evil and the people who help with testing?
I do apologies for the length of this post and if it has been placed into the wrong thread. I not only represent myself but a group of people within my guild.
Your thoughts are appreciated and any advice I can give to my friends.
Gav <3
Im Gav, I'm an avid gamer, love the gaming community, and have helped some developers with Alpha and Beta testing, (I'm sure a few people have here and I know it can be tedious. An example would be the 4.2 PTR for WoW and Waiting for the GM's to turn FL on.) If anyones interested, go take a look at TB's video on "Mounts that will block out the Sun". I'm also a guild leader and a few of my members are Christians and they turned to me when they discovered that themselves and ordinary gamers alike were being branded evil by a group of christians on a forum online.
My friends asked me questions like, Do you see any evil within specifically WoW (Which the play alongside me and the rest of the guild) or anything that would cause a person to be evil? Do I see any sexual references or symbols which may insight evil or do I see anything evil in any of the classes or character within the game? And is there anything which as they put "Would insight sins of the flesh?"
As always I gave my honest opions and thoughts about these questions and that was that I see nothing in WoW which may cause this, or diablo or the Sims the list is really quite long. I spent a great deal of time talking with them on my Ventrillo server, explaining some evil things within the game but that was all within the Lore of Azeroth, and even went back to my old warcraft books to tell some of the story which in my opion is one of the crowning achivements of 21st century fiction.
After a while discussing points and an incident which did happen over in Europe about WoW which did effect the lives of many people (Il come to that a little later) I chose to visit this forum where this apparent hate branding towards players, and I was shocked.
With myself being myself and free with my thought, I posted to these forums hoping, knowledge of the gaming community, the people therin, my friends and the games they play and the walks of life they come, and reasoning would maybe give these people a real glimpse of the core gaming community, and what could possibly come from the business of software and gaming develop and how it can make the world a better place. (The coding I talk about is present in your smartphones, internet browsers, sat-navs pretty nuch every handheld device or computer which has been developed since 2008) and why it couldnt be evil.
I had also mentioned one incident which effected many people. One person (Who played on a different realm) was killed by another player over some rediculous thing but it became apparent afterwards that the person who killed this player suffered a severe mental illness and he did not see the world as it should be seen, and it could have only been prevented if this person was admitted to a facilty for care for people with a mental illness.
I went on to then explain a little about the communty that is contained just within my guild. I said that some of us are parents, some of us have familys, some of us have illness, some of us are still at school/university, that we have entire familys in our guild, some of us are young, some of us are old, some of us are new to gaming, some of us have known eachother for so long that we know what somebodys going to do before they do it as a few of us who started the guild have been playing together for over 7 years, my partner whom I love helps run the guild with myself the core group and the rest of the members and that we look after eachother. We have young children who play (as I said we have entire familys playing) and we look after them actively and protecting them from online predators/people who will mislead or give them the wrong ideas, we even talk to the parents of the children (whose parents dont play) to make sure they know they are safe within our guild and we have a very active contact forums for our guild.
I have a dedicated ventrillo server and skype where anybody in the community can contact me or the other officers of the guild if something serious could happen to any of the members and I'm on most of the time as I have PTSD (Traumatic Stress Disorder) and Insomnia.
I went on to explain as well that at the end of the day some of us play to relax or for the challenge of the game. I myself raid (a lot) with my friends and community members, and for myself the thrill I get from it is protecting my allies whilst taking a beating from a raid boss (Main DK tank 370ilevel) or keeping my friends alive by healing them (Alt Hpriest 370ilevel). We all help eachother out ingame and out and we have fun. We have jokes, we have shared and celebrated new babys being born from some of our members, we have mourned the loss of players as well.
Knowing what I know of life and the way the world works, I went on to say that evil is a choice. Its down to the person if they choose to do evil or wrong. Everybody in the world has the absolute capabilty of becoming the worse kind of human being anybody can be. And it makes me sad to say that it is true. I'm not questioning anybodys beliefs as a persons own belief is finite and people will choose what they wish if it brings them the clarity and closure to fill there lives with meaning. I respect peoples individualty and their right to choose.
After some time a post was replied and I was told that I'm a stinking godmocker, that I should repent otherwise I would burn in hellfire and that I should go basically perform an act which I find quite unacceptable and so does my long term girlfriend, and to further belittle myself the forum administrators took it upon themselves to change my user login data to a "trolling" kind of way, and was told I should speak "American English" and I quote "God's Favourite Languadge". This came about after they found out I was from the U.K. and had used a little of my own dialect.
Finally the questions from myself and my friends.
Are games evil and do they promote people to insight evil?
Do games mock the will of God and his word?
Are the developers/designers evil and the people who help with testing?
I do apologies for the length of this post and if it has been placed into the wrong thread. I not only represent myself but a group of people within my guild.
Your thoughts are appreciated and any advice I can give to my friends.
Gav <3
