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Proselytize on XBox Live!
Last night I was playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 when the oddest thing happened. Another player asked everyone in the room what they thought of Jesus and whether or not we knew him. As people began saying that they'd prefer not to discuss religion or politics, he said that he wasn't interested in converting anyone (RIGHT...!), just wanted to know what they thought. First off, XBL is well-known as a place of near continuous psychobabble, but I've never heard someone proselytize on there before and I was amazed at how calmly people reacted to him.
Out of a room of 8, two of us said that we understand naturalistic evolution to be the creator of life, not god, and that we believed that religion was made by man. There were a few chuckles at the idea that we made up god, not the other way around. The preacher then rendered a well-rehersed pitch saying, "I just want you guys to know that Jesus loves you and that by accepting... etc, blah-blah-blah." I then calmly explained that he then appeared to be trying to convert people, contrary to his previous statement.
I was amazed at his response.
He said, "Wow, I didn't even realise that I was doing it, I just felt concerned for all of you."
Hear's the clincher- there is nothing in Xbox live terms and conditions that says that he cannot proselytize there. Instead we use a muting and avoiding system, which works great. Point is, who the hell goes on XBox live and pulls this kind of crap? Well after speaking to this oddball, I found out that he does this as a part of a psychological strategy to cull animosity. This usually makes his opponents angery and thus leads to them making a lot of mistakes. He assured me that, aside from the occasional room like that one, it works like a charm.
Bottom line: DO NOT LET THEM PUSH YOUR BUTTONS! They are only trying to sabotage you!
Out of a room of 8, two of us said that we understand naturalistic evolution to be the creator of life, not god, and that we believed that religion was made by man. There were a few chuckles at the idea that we made up god, not the other way around. The preacher then rendered a well-rehersed pitch saying, "I just want you guys to know that Jesus loves you and that by accepting... etc, blah-blah-blah." I then calmly explained that he then appeared to be trying to convert people, contrary to his previous statement.
I was amazed at his response.
He said, "Wow, I didn't even realise that I was doing it, I just felt concerned for all of you."
Hear's the clincher- there is nothing in Xbox live terms and conditions that says that he cannot proselytize there. Instead we use a muting and avoiding system, which works great. Point is, who the hell goes on XBox live and pulls this kind of crap? Well after speaking to this oddball, I found out that he does this as a part of a psychological strategy to cull animosity. This usually makes his opponents angery and thus leads to them making a lot of mistakes. He assured me that, aside from the occasional room like that one, it works like a charm.
Bottom line: DO NOT LET THEM PUSH YOUR BUTTONS! They are only trying to sabotage you!
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by FreeThinker on -
ROFL. That's a brilliant strategy on his part. :D
You should employ the same strategy (in reverse) when playing against theists.
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on -
Well it's hard to determine each opponent's religious beliefs, but I have thrown down the "Jesus was brown" card against some people to great effect. Wow, they got mad! And after two or three humiliating defeats they finally left. One of them sent me a message saying that, "Jesus wouldn't appreciate being called brown," which is really too stupid to even argue against.
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on
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Good call! I wouldn't think of that since I've never played 1v1 on Modern Warfare 2.
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Permalink Reply by Wario on
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That's funny man. I hear so many different things on Xbox Live. People really open up the hate flood gates when online. They never seem to want to talk about anything real or substantive in depth.
To what you're saying about using god as a way to take people off there game. Sounds like it might be a better way then the more commonly used methods such as racial, sexist, and homophobic rants. Most people seem to be use to that at this point. I know I hear the words Nigger and Fag more than the word the while on Xbox live.
Doesn't seem to hurt my score. I've got a 1.21 kill to death ratio on Modern Warfare 2, and when ever I open my mouth all I seam to hear back from most white people is Nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger nigger Ahhhhhhhhhh nigger nigger nigger nigger.. LOL..
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on
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WITHOUT A DOUBT!!!! I can't even believe how regularly those words are used, it's absolutely incredible. Don't get me wrong, I swear like a sailor, but why would people be so deliberately hateful? I think this boils down to a giant headgame, just like the preacher in the post. People just trying to get at each other. Just like I feel terrible for any female who plays a lot of COD. Holy shit, I would kick a dude's teeth out if they talked to a woman I didn't know that way! But they're pretty safe saying whatever they like on XBL.
Kind of doubt they'd be so vocal face to face. Way to not let them get to you. The best way to close their holes, is to soundly defeat them in the game.
Make them leave in frusteration = Sweetest victory.
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I think a lot of the adults are teaching the kids on xbox live how to be little bastards. They don't understand that the children soak up everything they say and tend to regurgitate at inopportune moments. Don't think we'll really know how bad we're screwing them up until this little xbox generation gets to be our age.
But most of the girls i play with are really good despite the constant taunting, and catcalling by guys. I see two types of girls online. The ones that are really gamers and don't really care what you got to say in the first place, and the ones that are there to have 29 dudes in one room vying for there attention. Can't really blame them if i got online and every person other than me was a girl. I would be all over it myself. You don't really find those types on COD. More on UNO or whatever. Really who get's on xbox live to play UNO anyway lol..
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on
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I see your point, but I don't think XBOX is doing anything to kids that the internet isn't doing on a much greater level. When I was a kid, my parents didn't want me to watch Monty Python or Saturday Night Live because they were too racey. Now the idea of any of that being racey is almost laughable, you know?
As for the girls on XBL, I have a couple of girl friends who are awesome at COD and they can certainly handle any shit-talker. I don't even have to say anything- they got it. I think it's hilarious hearing those dumbasses get shut down like that.
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I guess what you're saying is true. Life is getting worse and worse every year anyway. We looked at Saturday night live and in living color when we where kids and now we're jaded cynical adults. Just wandering what our kids that shoot at people for four hours out of the day (every day almost) will be like. You know the generation before us had leave it to beaver, we had in living color, and our kids have the nuke everyone on the map option in COD just saying lol....
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I'm really waiting for these teachers to figure out that a lot of kids are visual learners and maybe it would be a good idea to merge the thing that most kids can sit in front of unattended for hours on end with education.
Think what it would be like to sit your child in front of a interactive multiplayer game where they could learn algebra, geometry, or geography.
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on
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Dude, I was just thinking that. Seems that we are starting to do that, just not on the level that I though we would be.
http://kids-games.suite101.com/article.cfm/video_games_as_learning_tools
The one really serious problem with video game learning, that I can see anyway, is that it is based off of national curriculum. So the contention between science and pure bullshit is there. Beyond that though I imagine there being a lot of success in this method, but I'm sure some unforseen side effects as well. Whereas there is a great capacity for learning team work there's an absence of many other social structures. At best they'll come out highly educated but very under socialized. That's my opinion anyway.
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Sometimes I wish people would use Xbox live for more than just gaming. When you think about it you meet different people every time you cycle through to find a game. those are people you could be talking to about whatever you'd like. I feel we are wasting the technology on gaming in a way.
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Permalink Reply by David Miller on
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Wario, I agree with you whole heartedly. It's pretty hard to get a conversation started when you have such a diverse group of people in a given room. I mean you've got kids (10-13), teens, young adults, and adults plus all of the cultures and subcultures imaginable. I prefer to stack the odds by grouping with cool people.
gamertag: Davski1979
Sounds like we're playing on a similar skill level (my kill-death is about 1.3 but my win-loss is around .94). Look me up in a few days and we'll gleefully slay some racist theists and tell them that Jesus was black. We can't lose!
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