Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

In response to this, I’ve decided to draft a short message:

To Glenn Beck:

I have a lot of respect for you and your opinions. I especially appreciate the way you’ve been able to overcome and rise above adversity, and there have been many times I’ve found your views to be especially salient and meaningful.

Unfortunately, I find that I strongly disagree with the way you have recently portrayed video games and especially bloggers.

As a video gamer, a video game “blogger”, and a deeply religious person, I was rather disappointed that you decided to label us all as “losers”. I’m not entirely sure why you felt it necessary to write off as losers an entire subset of the fastest growing segment of the internet (i.e. bloggers). More young people are getting their news from internet sources than TV or newspapers. And yes, that means blogs (the internet equivalent of talk radio, if you will) are also a major component for not only getting news, but also opinion. In the political realm, some have even compared blogs to the “committees of correspondence” that played a major role in shaping the American Revolution.

It’s good that, as you say, you are not an enemy of video games. After all, that would be like being an enemy of TV, movies, comic books, or any other popular medium of entertainment. Surely, we can agree that there is objectionable content in any medium. I’m sure we could also agree that an “M” rating for Grand Theft Auto IV is probably a little lax. Unfortunately, it’s hard to have a productive discussion of ideas, when one party to the discussion has been branded a “loser” by the other.

I can understand, though, that you might be frustrated with how “bloggers” have reacted to the recent appearance of Jack Thompson on your program. But in fairness to my blogging colleagues, Jack Thompson had gotten himself into particularly hot water with one Florida judge by including homosexual pornography in one of his court filings. He also happens to be currently under trial for disbarment for some of his more dubious actions in the past several years.

Naturally, I was intrigued when you decided to have Dr. Cheryl Olson, author of Grand Theft Childhood, on your program, as I wanted to see how you dealt with a rational, studied expert (as opposed to a trial lawyer like Thompson.)

Now, I can understand wanting to show all sides to a story, but when you had an actual doctor, someone who had spent part of their professional time studying the ACTUAL effects of video games on violent behavior, you barely gave Dr. Olson more than a few minutes.

In the future, I hope you will give more time to the experts, and less time to the crackpots like Jack Thompson. I also hope you will take the time to read sites like ours, at Aeropause.com, and see that many of us are willing and able to have a rational, intelligent discussion on this topic, as well as any important topic that affects us as a culture.

Sincerely,

George Walker