ESPN Sunday Night Baseball, interviewing John Kerry in the Fenway stands during the Sox-Yankees game (paraphrased):
ESPN: So now we'll ask you about... the really tough issues and see where you stand.
JK: Okay.
ESPN: Designated hitter rule.
JK: Never liked it.
ESPN: So would you let it stay in the AL or just get rid of it altogether?
JK: Well, I've just never liked it.
ESPN: Okay, how about Pete Rose in the Hall of Fame? Does he belong there?
JK: Boy that's a tough one. I'll leave that one up to the writers.
ESPN: But do you think he belongs in the Hall or not?
JK: I just think that's the writers job. I just think it's a tough call.
ESPN: Steroids in baseball. Will that be a part of your platform?
JK: Well, no, it won't be a part of my platform since we'll be talking about the economy, jobs, making America safe, and doing a better job in the War on Terror.
[and so on with the dodging...]
Not that W is necessarily better or worse in terms of just being able to chat, but my goodness, John: take a friggin' stand on SOMETHING! (P.S. Go Sox!)
I'm having something of a dilemma. My nine-year-old son has a growing interest in lots of console video games, including some that seem pretty inappropriate. However, defining "inappropriate" (especially given his lawyerly, argumentative nature to bend, stretch, and challenge every rule) is proving to be fairly difficult.
The game that brought me to question his choices in games was "Bad Fur Day". In addition to characters cursing at the player ("Didn't work the first time, ain't gonna work the second time, dipshit!"), the main character apparently gets drunk and pisses on opponents. As for violence, there's apparently a head-to-head mode in which characters behead each other. ("But it's just teddy bears, Dad!" my son retorts...) Since the recent civilian beheadings in the Middle East, I'm a little more sensitive to that sort of thing... even so, it just doesn't seem like a good game for a nine-year-old. (FWIW, he was spending the night at a similarly-aged friend whose parents could not have cared less.)
That one seems obviously inappropriate. But what about other games? How much violence is too much? Does realism play a part, i.e., is cartoonish violence any different from realistic violence? What about mysticism? I played D&D for years growing up and watched all of my friends drop out of high school for this "fantasy" game... is it a slippery slope down which my son could foreseeably slide if introduced to it at an early age? And how do my own gaming habits play into things--doesn't the Bible say to "think about...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable"? How does Deathmatch UT2k3 (as a completely random example) play into that?
Is there a difference between video games and movies? Movies tend to be more passive, yet my son occasionally gets a little freaked at particularly action-filled movies, like LotR. If movies can affect him in that way, will they affect him when they portray violence, spew vulgarities, demonstrate poor family dynamics, or condone (encourage, even!) relationships that clash with our family's Christian beliefs?
I know that, for an abstract example, when my son spends all day playing video games (of any sort), he comes home noticably antisocial, defiant, and disrespectful. I generally confront him when he acts this way, only to have him confess to having plopped his butt in front of a TV at a friend's house for the majority of the day. (I guess it's something that he's still confessing and not trying to lie his way out of it... like I used to...) Is part of his behavior due to the content of the video games, in addition to the sheer time spent playing them?
It seems improbable that he, or anyone, would remain wholly unaffected by the things with which he fills his mind. So where is the moral meridian, that line that invisibly divides acceptable from unacceptable? And how does one go about enforcing that boundary until such a time as self-enforcement kicks in?
(As an aside: ESRB ratings are a pretty poor indicator. Two examples: he has a Digimon game that was rated T(een) for (some unstated) reasons I am completely unable to fathom. Perhaps it's because the Digimon he raises actually has to poop occasionally and it makes a discrete farting sound when it does defecate. It hardly seems like teen material; on the contrary it seems far too childish for teens. On the other end of the spectrum, ESPN recently ran a story about a video game (the name escapes me) where baseball players were encouraged to build up some sort of rage points, fly into a type of beserk mode, and beat the everliving crap out of the opponent, if only to gain an extra base. This game received an E(veryone) rating, but hardly sends the message I want my son to receive about this country's greatest game, competition, etc.)
As with anything, I suppose it is largely sheer vigilance. I'm just finding that my efforts to define that boundary in a clear way (and without self-conflicting rules!) are not quite effective enough, nor do they leave me very satisfied. I'm likely a fool for even casually soliciting advice from you, my three readers... but I'm feeling a bit foolish these days.
As much for myself (my bookmarks are a mess) as for you, I present this article. I haven't had the chance to read it all yet, but it sure looks pretty interesting...