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Killing Muslims and Christians a Game?

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Matt Stone

2008-06-06

If there was ever any doubt that Atheists can be just as susceptible to fundamentalism as any other religion, then take a look at this new video game under development by a “zealous” humanist.

You can see video footage and a transcript here.

The object of the game is to stop the spread of Christianity and Islam by murdering Abraham and the authors of the Bible, before beheading Muhammad.

“It’s the idea of being able to go back in time and sort of nipping the problem in the bud,” said the game’s creator.

What problem would that be, the problem of violent extremism?

Yes, I am being sarcastic.

It’s not that I am suggesting all Atheists are fundamentalists. I just seek to demonstrate that we theists don’t have a monopoly on fundamentalism any more than we have a monopoly on truth. Fundamentalism has its origins in hate and fear, and these unfortunately infect all humanity.

Tags Atheist, Muslim, Play, Violence

6 responses to “Killing Muslims and Christians a Game?”

Isaiah

2008-06-06

I don’t know if Christians could make a good video game about the faith.
It can’t be violent, that’d be wrong.
It would be pacifist.
But how much fun would a game be where you have to go out of your way and die for Christ? Not that dying for Christ is wrong it would just make a bad videogame.

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Matt Stone

2008-06-06

“I don’t know if Christians could make a good video game about the faith.” Ha, I think the key word here is “good”.
Some have tried but the results speak for themselves.
The underlying problem is that many video games are grounded in the Indo-European worldview, a central feature of which is the myth of redemptive violence, whereby the cosmos (order) is established out of chaos (war between gods).
This contrasts rather sharply with the Biblical worldview whereby cosmos (order) is established by logos (God alone through his word) and where violence is extrinsic to creation and thus temporary.
You might find this missiological article of interest
http://www.missiology.org/EMS/bulletins/hiebert.htm
I don’t think Christian games need be pacifist in every respect. But where violence and competition becomes fundamental to game play, where there is no hope of reconciliation and cooperation between competing sides, we have a problem from a Christian theological perspective. Find a game that calls for cooperation between all participants, or at least allows it under the rules, and the problems are not nearly as acute.

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Matt Stone

2008-06-06

Hmm, maybe I should call this “game theology” with a nod to mathematical “game theory”

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Isaiah

2008-06-07

I know this is kind of going of track…. but in that article you posted it spoke of different worldviews, and how the west has been abducted by Cartesian dualism. How can we dialogue with someone who is a dualist or a monist about the spiritual reality?
I don’t mean directly God, but how would you answer an Atheist or Agnostic in their skepticism about demons, spirits and what have you?

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Matt Stone

2008-06-07

Can’t say I’ve ever had an atheist ask me about spirits. I suppose when God seems implausible lesser spirits seems even more so, so there is no reason to dig any further. I will have a think about it though, interesting question.

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Steve Hayes

2008-06-07

Some years ago there was an interesting novel called “Skallagrigg” by William Horwood about writing computer game programs that raises some of those issues.
Unfortunately Horwood is no longer a Christian, and it shows in his writing. He was priobably best known for his books about moles — he wrote two trilogies (does that make it a sexology?). But in the second trilogy one got the impression that his publishers were putting pressure on him to produce more mole books, and he deliberately made the last ones so bad that he would never be asked to write any more.

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