An Open Letter to Maclean’s Magazine
I wrote this literally 20 minutes before the news broke that Brandon’s body was found. Once again, my heart goes out to the family.
Your article concerning the disappearance of Brandon Crisp contains a number of errors and falsehoods which are, unfortunately, becoming increasingly common in media reports on video games. For example, you appear to place the blame for the Columbine tragedy squarely on the removal of Doom, when in fact this occurred months after the shooters began to exhibit their antisocial tendencies. Furthermore, you mention Brad Dorrance “racking up a new high score on Quake 2″ when there are no points to be scored in that game. To the casual reader, these may seem to be small details not worth quibbling over, but as a frequent reader of this sort of media report, I can safely say that they are signs of an article authored from an outside perspective which doesn’t reflect the view within the gaming community.
Other elements of the article support this: large blocks of quotes from the National Institute on Media and the Family, an organization often criticized for its pro-censorship agenda and suspect sampling methods, and unsourced hearsay from supposed counselors “on the front lines” are barely offset by the selections from Hal Halpin, Dennis McCauley, and the recent US-Canada gaming study, which had far more good to say than you let on.
Alerting parents to the fact that they should be paying attention to what their children are doing is a start, but actually learning about video games requires further effort. Fortunately, it’s as easy as picking up the controller (Call of Duty 4 supports multiplayer, after all) and experiencing it for themselves. Maclean’s wouldn’t print allegations against controversial movies or books without setting up a reporter to review them first; perhaps it’s time for you to add a gaming columnist to your back pages.
Tags: Brandon Crisp, the media