Wednesday, February 8, 2012

What does Gaming teach us? (Skyrim)

Wisdom Quarterly


() A young Buddhist trainee-monk (novice, samanera) finds a portable video game, gets instantly addicted, then suffers greatly when its battery dies. This is Deborah Saez's story about how one Buddhist reacts to a first encounter with gaming technology. More from Aniboom: Facebook, Twitter, Blog


Skyrim P14: meeting, greeting, mauling "Buddhist" monks?
()

WARNING: MATURE CONTENT, EXTREME VIOLENCE (17+)! What do video games teach us? What are they training us for? Many popular titles seem to have one theme that mimics life in the American empire: "Kill 'em all." Tee shirts and bumper stickers read:

"Join the Army: Visit exotic places, meet interesting people, and then kill them."

It might be a lesson, a training, a suggestion one could easily dismiss IF it were not given again and again by a hypnotic device. Children grow up and have no trouble applying the lesson to a job in Las Vegas manning the CIA's killer drones by joystick.

Interestingly, even safe in a cubicle committing murder for the spying agency without military oversight or any of the ordinary traps of war, joystick pullers still suffer PTSD (post traumatic stress syndrome) according to new studies.


The memory of warring titans lives on in violent video games.

The archetypal giants (titans, asuras, nephilim) who once ruled are remembered in the lore of video games. Police play a great deal of games. Could their behavior, giving free rein to their basest impulses to rape and be violent, be influenced? The next video suggests the answer (particularly at Minute 2:26 where one wields a club in New York like a giant on the battlefield).

(
) This video illustrates of the importance of videotaping police in public to provide transparency, accountability, and accuracy about what occurs. It is no secret that the US has a serious problem with police brutality and corruption against even law abiding citizen. According to Gramrastag "Freedom of press begins with you!"

Mental Karma
What is the karma of pretend-killing in video games? Karma is of three varieties -- by body, by communication (usually verbal), and by mind.

Exercising the mind to kill over and again changes something inside us. Whatever we frequently rehearse comes more naturally, becoming habit or second nature, which may be to our benefit or
detriment.

Deepak Chopra and son try to harness it for the good. The White House wants more of it for bad from Constance
Steinkuehler. And one prominent Buddhist from Stanford University, Dr. Jane McGonigal (gamification theory), may be at the center of the explosion in scientific research on its potential to save the world as seen at the 2011 Buddhist Geeks Conference.

Video game violence, porn, and cheap alcohol (gamespy.com)

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