Jack Thompson Strikes Again -- Booted Off NPR Show

[Asher]

http://ps3.kombo.com/article.php?artid=6782

Jack Thompson Interviewed on NPR, Gets Booted by Host

The host of Talk of the Nation on National Public Radio gave anti-game activist Jack Thompson a rather swift interview on the subject of GTA IV. Needless to say, it probably didn't go as Thompson had planned. Read the transcript provided below or give a listen (courtesy Game Politics):

[Neal] Conan: I understand that you think one of the characters in Grand Theft Auto IV is based on you

Thompson: Well, they go into a lawyer's office and they kill him. I had my house vandalized, by the way, today by gamers. I get calls, death threats all the time by gamers… The real issue here is, though, that there is so much sex and so much graphic sex… I'm working with various law enforcement agencies,hopefully with the result that Take Two corporately and the chairman Strauss Zelnick will be indicted for that because this is way, way over the line…

[Adam] Sessler: I hope you don't mind if I step in there, Neil. Having played the game I have yet to discover the graphic sex Mr. Thompson is identifying…

Conan: John Thompson… Have you played the game?

Thompson: It just came out and I have a life…

Conan: And which law enforcement agencies are you working with?

Thompson: I'm not gonna tell you.

Conan: Alright, well, thanks very much for speaking with us.

Thompson: (chuckle) I'm done?

Conan: You're done.

Thompson: Oh, great. I'll go play the game now.

Conan: Good luck… (click)

On a personal note, I'm glad to see the inclusion of G4's Adam Sessler on the show. Yes he may be a little zany for some, but he does a great job in counterpointing criticisms aimed at the game.

Also, satire: Jack Thompson reviews GTA4: http://www.somethingawful.com/d/game...ompson-gta.php

[Imran Siddiqui]

NPR

[Wiglaf]

Thompson's not wrong. It is a crime for kids to be buying this game and it happens in large numbers and parents are complicit in having 10, 11, 12 year olds play this

Also, it's hypocritical for everyone to say Thompson's wrong because there's no graphic sex. There's hordes of graphic violence, which most of you liberal fascists agree is worse. I think taking a whore to your car and then shotgunning her into bloody pieces constitutes graphic sex and strong sexual connotations.

Also, that transcript of the radio interview is inaccurate. Click Asher's link and listen to him being more fairly represented.

[Dinner]

I actually heard this yesterday; NPR streams each show on demand from their website. It was great showing what a nutty zealot Thompson is. What was even better was that Neal Conan got Thompson to admit that he'd never actually played GTA 4 or even watched someone play it before he ran out and started running his mouth off about how evil it was and how it was corrupting kids (which BTW the game is rated M so kids aren't allowed to buy it).

[Asher]

I can't believe you listen to NPR, Wiglaf.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I actually heard this yesterday; NPR streams each show on demand from their website. It was great showing what a nutty zealot Thompson is.

San Diego!!!

[Wiglaf]

You lunatic, I don't listen to it, I followed your link because your transcript seemed bogus. AND GUESS WHAT? IT WAS! YOU'RE INCAPABLE OF BEING FAIR! OR ACCURATE! ABOUT ANYTHING! WRONG WRONG WRONG ALL THE TIME! IF THIS WAS JEOPARDY YOU'D BE INELIGIBLE TO COMPETE IN FINAL JEOPARDY BECAUSE OF A NEGATIVE DOLLAR AMOUNT! GOOD DAY! :maD:

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Asher

San Diego!!!

You have an unhealthy obsession.

[Wiglaf]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I actually heard this yesterday; NPR streams each show on demand from their website. It was great showing what a nutty zealot Thompson is. What was even better was that Neal Conan got Thompson to admit that he'd never actually played GTA 4 or even watched someone play it before he ran out and started running his mouth off about how evil it was and how it was corrupting kids (which BTW the game is rated M so kids aren't allowed to buy it).

Yes, you really need to play GTA4 to know it is inappropriate for kids. This is like saying you need to rape someone to know it's bad.

[Dinner]

Thompson kept saying it was the most brutal game EVER and that it was turning kids into trained killers and monsters but he had no first hand experience with it so how does he know what he's talking about? Also when the company already refuses to sell it to kids what is the problem?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Thompson kept saying it was the most brutal game EVER and that it was turning kids into trained killers and monsters but he had no first hand experience with it so how does he know what he's talking about? Also when the company already refuses to sell it to kids what is the problem?

The same **** happened a while ago when people were up in arms over the Mass Effect sex scene. One critic had to admit on the air they hadn't played the game, nor even seen the scene...

[Kuciwalker]

Bizzarely, Jack Thompson defended the scene.

[Krill]

Link, Kuci?

[Asher]

http://blog.wired.com/games/2008/04/jack-thompson-p.html

Jack Thompson is mailing Take Two Chairman's mother now...

Jack Thompson Reaches Out To Take-Two Exec's Mother
By Earnest Cavalli EmailApril 24, 2008 | 5:51:53 PMCategories: Politics

Jackthompson1 To decry the upcoming release of Grand Theft Auto IV, Jack Thompson sent a message to the mother of Take-Two Chairman Strauss Zelnick, according to a report by Shacknews.

The email is provocative, to say the least. Not only does it say Mr. Zelnick is "like the Hitler Youth," it also attributes the deaths of three Alabama policemen and "a recent plethora of cop killings" to prior entries in the GTA series.

Game|Life contacted Mr. Thompson earlier today and were informed that the email was actually issued to Zelnick's lawyer. This would be in following with a prior settlement that prevents Mr. Thompson from contacting Take-Two, unless he does so through legal counsel.

"I sent it to Strauss Zelnick's attorney. I would never send it to his mother," Mr. Thompson told me.

I've specifically been avoiding passing any judgement on the email; Instead, I offer you all the chance to form your own opinions. The email sent by Mr. Thompson can be found verbatim directly below:

"Mrs. Zelnick

Strauss Zelnick, Take-Two Chairman’s Mother

New York, New York Via e-mails to intermediaries

Re: Your Son, Strauss Zelnick

Dear Mrs. Zelnick:

Your son, as you may know (or maybe you don’t know), is Chairman of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., whose most popular video games are the Grand Theft Auto murder simulator games banned in some countries but sold to children here.

Your son last week was reported to have said the following about Grand Theft Auto IV, due to be released Tuesday, April 29:

"We’ve already received numerous [GTA IV] reviews, and to a one, they are perfect scores. My mom couldn’t write better reviews…"

Taking your son’s thought, I would encourage you either to play this game or have an adroit video gamer play it for you. Some of the latter gamers are on death row, so try to find one out in the civilian population who hasn’t killed someone yet.

What you will see in your son’s game, if this iteration of GTA is anything like its predecessors, is incredible interactive violence aimed at police officers (whom you can shoot in the head and see the blood spray), innocent bystanders (whom you can run over with your car just for the heck of it), and of course the plentiful female prostitutes you can have sex with and then filet with a knife or stomp with your feet in order to get your money back. Experts note that the recent plethora of cop killings is caused in part by your darling son’s entrepreneurial energy. There are three policemen dead in Alabama because of Grand Theft Auto. I was on 60 Minutes about it. I hope Strauss has provided you with a flat screen tv to see the grief of the bereaved families that fills the screen.

The pornography and violence that your son trafficks in is the kind of stuff that most mothers would be ashamed to see their son putting into the hands of other mothers’ children, but, hey, your son Strauss has recently assured the world that he is "a Boy Scout, everybody knows that." I’d love to see the merit badges that Scout Troop handed out. Is there a Ted Bundy merit badge? If so, your loving son deserves one now. It should be red and green, for obvious reasons.

With Passover having just come and gone, it is appropriate to note the following from the Old Testament, Proverbs 22:6:

"Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

Mrs. Zelnick, did you train up your son, Strauss, to make millions of dollars by pushing Mature-rated video games to children? Any kid can go right to little Strauss’ corporate web site and buy GTA IV with no age verification. Strauss is even marketing the new Grand Theft Auto IV on World Wrestling Entertainment tv shows seen by millions of kids. If you trained up Strauss to do this, then shame on you.

But maybe the explanation for your son’s corporate sociopathy is to be found in Old Testament Proverb 29:15:

"The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame."

Maybe you, Mrs. Zelnick, were so taken by your handsome son that you spared the rod and spoiled the child. That would explain why he has brought you, by the way he presently acts, "to shame."

There’s another mother you would do well to talk to. Mrs. Crump in Alabama had a son who was a police officer. He’s now dead because a teenaged boy unwittingly trained himself to kill him on Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. She has a grief she carries every day that only a mother can know.There are other such mothers in the heartland of America whose inhabitants your son simply sees as commercial targets.

Your son, this very moment, is doing everything he possibly can to sell as many copies of GTA IV to teen boys in the United States, a country in which your son claims you raised him to be "a Boy Scout." More like the Hitler Youth, I would say.

Happy Mother’s day, Mrs. Zelnick, which this year is May 11, two weeks after your son unleashes porn and violence upon other mothers’ boys. I’m sure you’re very proud.

Sincerely, Jack Thompson"

An hour after Mr. Thompson sent along the above message, he also pointed out to me a number of Biblical references dealing with John The Baptist's issues with Herod in the New Testament -- the same references he mentioned in his email.

[Wiglaf]