"I do not feel obligated to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reasons, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use" -Galileo Galilei

"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation" - Oscar Wilde

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Interesting Photo: Barak or Bush?

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Thursday, March 12, 2009

"Hail to the Chimp" video game? WTF?


UPDATE: To the ones who would minimize the offensiveness of this game, especially with ignorant comments, be gone. You probably weren't offended by the "gunned down chimp" news story either.

This game was released in June 2008, a few months before Obama was officially elected. Even if it were initially about Bush, it would STILL be offensive NOW. How can a country thrive without respecting its leadership?
The reality is that given the continued racism in this country and the FACT that blacks have been portrayed as "CHIMPS" and the FACT that we now do have a black president, this game IS offensive and should NOW be pulled from distribution.
Having my young BLACK son looking at the game and ask, "Why are they showing President Obama as a CHIMP is IMPORTANT to ME!!!!! If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, it IS a duck.
As an avid game player who buys video games on a weekly basis, I have NEVER seen this game in Gamestop, BestBuy, or any other store that sells games until recently. Why would there NOW be a stack of the games at a local store NOW, especially given the nature of the race relations in this country.

WTF? I went into a BestBuy store (Willow Grove, PA) today and saw a XBox360 game titled, "Hail to the Chimp, The Presidential Party Game."

I actually thought it was a cruel, insensitive joke. I looked around to see if this was part of a hidden camera show....No camera crew was there....
When I got home, I discovered that it is an actual game being sold across the nation. If you don't believe me, check out this link to the game on the amazon.com website.

Everyone (as least those who are "educated") knows the history of blacks being portrayed and dehumanized as monkeys.

Now I am not one of those "hypersensitive" blacks who cry racism every chance I get....But damn, this is so obviously racially insensitive and/or downright intentional mockery of our black President Obama.
This is how the game is described:

Name: Crackers the Monkey
Home: Congo [Africa]
Bio: Crackers was the right-hand monkey to the King Lion before he was ousted from the throne. Rumor has it that Crackers' whole campaign is a ruse designed to restore his old boss to the throne, ensuring a cushy lifestyle for his favorite monkey.

Although this is the animal kingdom's first attempt at democracy it doesn't take these candidates long to figure out that the goal is to win at all costs. With that in mind players are free go at it alone or team up with competitors to gang up on the rest of the field. Each combination of characters creates a different special move that unless stopped, can decimate opponents, dashing presidential hopes and making an election year debate look like a tea party.

The GRR News Network
Taking political humor and satire to new levels, at least for a video game, Hail to the Chimp also features its own news coverage, the GRR News Network. Hosted by anchor Woodchuck Chumley, not only does GRR keep track of player standings in the election and broadcast candidates victory speeches direct from the podium, it also holds a wealth of additional game content regarding the candidates and their platforms. This mix of TV smears ads, talk show segments and commercials are in part available immediately on entry into the game and unlockable as the game progresses, providing relentless humor and hours worth of additional play time to a game destined to become a hit in every state whether red or blue.

Quick History Lesson
Excerpt from an article posted by the ScienceDaily website:

Discrimination Against Blacks Linked To Dehumanization, Study Finds
ScienceDaily (Feb. 8, 2008) — Crude historical depictions of African Americans as ape-like may have disappeared from mainstream U.S. culture, but research presented in a new paper by psychologists at Stanford, Pennsylvania State University and the University of California-Berkeley reveals that many Americans subconsciously associate blacks with apes.
In addition, the findings show that society is more likely to condone violence against black criminal suspects as a result of its broader inability to accept African Americans as fully human, according to the researchers
.

Click here for the full article.


Does anyone remember last year's new story about the OBVIOUSLY racist T-shirt in which Obama was depicted as a monkey?


Does the "Hail to the Chimp" video game offend anyone else? Please comment and share your thoughts.