Muslims Ask Wal-Mart To Leave Behind Left Behind
Somebody call the ACLU, this one looks thorny. The Council on American-Islamic Relations recently asked Wal-Mart to turn the other cheek and drop the Evangelical Christian title, Left Behind: Eternal Forces, from the megaretailer’s shelves. CAIR accuses the game of glorifying religious violence and negatively influencing interfaith relations.
For Left Behind, this is a trifecta: it has now managed to piss off groups from all three of the major Judeo-Christian religions. Pretty much anybody whose faith descends from bits of the Old Testament is likely to be unimpressed – and those of us whose faiths (and/or lack thereof) hearken from elsewhere shouldn’t be exactly thrilled to be tossed into the lake of fire, virtually speaking.
CAIR director Nihad Awad wrote to Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott Jr.:
“We believe the message this game is promoting is one of religious intolerance. The game’s enemy team includes people with Muslim-sounding names. When asked about the Arab and Muslim-sounding names, Left Behind Games’ President Jeffrey Frichner said, ‘Muslims are not believers in Jesus Christ – and therefore cannot be on the side of Jesus in the game’. (San Francisco Chronicle, 12/12/06) As you may know, Muslims do in fact revere Jesus as one of God’s prophets.”
Did you catch that? The mindless Bible-drones who built this game don’t even understand the basic precepts of the religions they demonize (literally) in their game – religions which, like Islam, are essentially sister faiths that spring from the same common history and holy texts. If that isn’t a great big red flag that screams “Not Actually Doing The Lord’s Work Here,” then I’m a whirling Dervish.
Read on after the jump...
You can read more of Awad’s respectful, rational, reasonable appeal to Wal-Mart via the Gamasutra link below, but it’s a perfectly humane request – although a case could very well be made that it’s dangerous for corporations to practice censorship on any level by using a biased eye (even a kindly biased eye) to choose their inventory. This, traditionally, is about the time in a political conundrum when we call in the ACLU to sort things out; but for the moment, savor the response of Left Behind’s book publisher, Mark D. Taylor:
“The game is designed to be a classic battle between good and evil, but it does not gratuitously depict violence or death.”
Yup. People with different beliefs. That’s “evil,” all right. Tolerance is a real bitch, which is why I’m trying not to hold a grudge against these morons. I’d rather try to actually be good than pay lip service to my faith while using it as a weapon for my own prejudice.
Ask yourselves, gamers: What would Jesus play?
Islamic Group Asks Wal-Mart To Drop Left Behind [Gamasutra]
tiny dancer
Posted to Video Games on 21 December 2006
· Comments (17)
Other stuff like this: kirk cameron, left behind, Left Behind Games, left behind: eternal forces, left behind: tribulation force, tyndale house publishers, wal-mart
Jesus would prolly play Animal Crossing and Devil May Cry 3,
Following their logic to it’s illogical end – there would be NO games to play. Face it – someone could object to almost any game for some reason. >SIGHrude gesture
THe problem is that all the abrahamic religions require that you kill the nonbelievers. If you are a Christian, you should be out murdering. Jesus himself endorsed that kind of behavior. It’s all in the Bible.
The sooner Christians realize that they’re following a religion every bit as violent as Islam, the sooner they’ll join the rest of us in reality.
“If you are a Christian, you should be out murdering. Jesus himself endorsed that kind of behavior. It’s all in the Bible.”
W
T
F?
Where?
Based on that post, Anugamma, I assume that you would have no problem with Wal-Mart selling a game where Muslims roam the streets of New York City killing Christians and other nonbelievers.
(I’m personally waiting for “Mohammed Atta’s Flight Simulator 2001” myself, but I’m curious as to how far YOUR idea of free markets/free speech actually goes.)
Uh, I’ve read the Bible and Jesus never advocated violence. He advocated love and understanding (and leave the judgement to his father). It’s the so-called followers that twist the message beyond any recognition to suit their prejudices and fears.
Uh… I already regret that post. politics and religion, right? ...and PS3 vs. 360 ;)
I think Jesus would totally love the Katamari games. XD I dunno why, I just think he’d love it.
why arent these people going after running with scissors for making postal 2? there’s one point where a bunch of arab terrorists run into a church and call the priests infadels and then they start blowing themselves up. yet that game still appeared on the market….
Did Wal-Mart carry Postal 2? I don’t think they did.
Regardless, one such scene (in a game marketed solely on its political incorrectness, where NPC’s are doing the killing) is a lot different than the entire point of the game being to kill people of a different religion than the main character.
And don’t forget the blatant sexism as well, as the game teaches that women can only become medics and singers. Ladies can forget about doing anything else.
Luke 19:27
“But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.”
Kill the nonbelivers. So get murdering, or realize it’s all a scam in the first place and join us in reality
Again, not the words of Jesus, but of his follower (in a parable, not a statement).
I think Jesus would feel right at home playing Yoshi’s Island on a little portable tv with the colour turned up really high. He would have to tie his hippie style hair back so he could concentrate better.
Skorpyo, Jesus was never reported to refer to gay sex as an abomination, but christlickers are always trotting out Romans as though it came straight out of his mouth…. if you ask them, their god wrote the whole thing, not just the Jesus parts.
raindog, that’s exactly what I’m saying. The followers twist the text for their own purposes.
Raindog – I owe you an apology. You “brought me up short” and you are right. Looking back, I missed one quote (ok several) that should have tilted me another way:”President Jeffrey Frichner said, ‘Muslims are not believers in Jesus Christ – and therefore cannot be on the side of Jesus in the game’.” My concept of tolerance and free speech goes pretty far-however, I reached the sidewalk’s end there. So, I will borrow my neighbors broken wii strap and give myself 20 lashes. :( And read more carefully—