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Penn Gillette defends violent media (and Call of Duty) on a talk show

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ElRenoRaven

Member
Penn is the only one who has an iota of sense in that video.

Yup. I may not agree with him on several things but I have always respected the hell out of the guy. He actually examines things and actually will debate things without being all sensationalist like a lot of celebs. He's also not afraid to call people out for spewing stupid shit like in that video.
 
Yep, it is hard to make a nuanced argument in that forum. But if we're going to blast the other panelists for dumb unsupported statements we shouldn't spare Penn.

Would not agree that he was much more reasonable throughout the conversation though? I get what you're saying and I agree Penn isn't perfect but it seems ridiculous to me to equate him to the other speakers because he didn't flesh out one thing he said near the end of the segment.

But that's not really the point. They were throwing shit at a wall, and seeing what sticks and trying to find whatever scapegoat they could find.

They wouldn't be able to get away with it if it weren't for the idiotic audience. They basically cheered on demand everyone time anyone stated anything.

It is art. Art isn't a term that's used when something's good.

I don't think quality is the only concern of people who don't think games are art. I don't think most games are art. I also don't think chess is art either, even though I like playing it.
 
It's completely disengenuous for a libertarian nutbar like him to be talking about shifting our nation's priorities towards preventing traffic deaths and pool drownings when he's first in line screaming about fascist seatbelt laws and "cumbersome" regulations on pool safety holding back the glorious free market.

Penn is a smart guy. He's a funny guy. But he's a NFL lineman knocking over pee wee footballers here and he's being celebrated as the second coming in this thread.

I also don't understand why as a nation of 300 million we can't devote some time to figure out how to prevent the slaughter of kindegardeners AND improving overall public safety.
 
It's completely disengenuous for a libertarian nutbar like him to be talking about shifting our nation's priorities towards preventing traffic deaths and pool drownings when he's first in line screaming about fascist seatbelt laws and "cumbersome" regulations on pool safety holding back the glorious free market.

Penn is a smart guy. He's a funny guy. But he's a NFL lineman knocking over pee wee footballers here and he's being celebrated as the second coming in this thread.

I also don't understand why as a nation of 300 million we can't devote some time to figure out how to prevent the slaughter of kindegardeners AND improving overall public safety.
Maybe he'd like to explore safety options that don't include mandated government regulations? I don't see how his concerns with statistically more dangerous things clashes with libertarianism.

And he pretty much answered the question in your last sentence, media attention ensures that freak events remain in the public eye and are given more attention than more mundane, but more deadly, dangers.

I'd personally say that chess has an element of art to it.

I totally agree. I think high level play can be art. I think it's creation can be considered art. I don't see anything artful about, say, a game between me and 14 year old cousin.

Similarly I'd probably consider high level CoD play artful, but I wouldn't say it's just inherently artistic.
 

Pseudo_Sam

Survives without air, food, or water
libertarian nutbar

If you were trying your hardest to instantly invalidate your entire post, congratulations. That sort of knee-jerk debauchery is not needed and not helpful to the conversation in the slightest.

prevent the slaughter of kindegardeners
...We have prevented the slaughter of kindergartners, on a massive scale. How many kindergartners are there in the U.S.? (A lot). And how many "slaughters" have there been, in however many years? (One.) That's not to say what happened in Connecticut wasn't a tragedy, but to pretend like this is some routine happening is empirically absurd.
 
He was the only rational person in the entire building.

Edit- Hugs will solve everything!!

Edit- Holy shit, these women are stupid, and all over the place.

It really sucks that these are the types that represent women on tv. Nothing but irrational stupid assholes.
 

Timedog

good credit (by proxy)
That was as insufferable as reading a GAF thread on the issue.

Some of the stuff he was saying was idiotic, but he was probably the most reasonable of the bunch.
 

Fantastical

Death Prophet
I just don't understand what's wrong with closing loopholes and banning assault weapons... the thing this debate is actually over. It seems like a weak argument to say "but swimming pools, you guys".

It also seems backwards to say that movies and video games involving shooting people have no effect on children, but the media covering a shooting does.
 

Acheron

Banned
Germany, Canada, Japan, France etc. have murder rates a fraction of the US.

They have plenty of violent media, and varying attitudes on mental health care.

The three issues with this case are:

1. Guns
2. Guns
3. Guns

Assault rifles are also a bit of a smoke screen. 37 people die a day from gun violence in the US. Nearly all of them from hand guns. If you legislate from tragedies attacking assault rifles make sense, if you legislate from stats you ban handguns and assault rifles.

I live in Canada, people whine a ban is pointless because illegal guns are the issue. If the US ended its loose attitude to hand guns there would be no real black market for guns in the Americas. The second amendment must go.
 
Germany, Canada, Japan, France etc. have murder rates a fraction of the US.

They have plenty of violent media, and varying attitudes on mental health care.

The three issues with this case are:

1. Guns
2. Guns
3. Guns

Assault rifles are also a bit of a smoke screen. 37 people die a day from gun violence in the US. Nearly all of them from hand guns. If you legislate from tragedies attacking assault rifles make sense, if you legislate from stats you ban handguns and assault rifles.

I live in Canada, people whine a ban is pointless because illegal guns are the issue. If the US ended its loose attitude to hand guns there would be no real black market for guns in the Americas. The second amendment must go.

Comparing those countries to the US is implying that they've had huge issues with gun crime prior to gun control which just isn't true.

Gun crime doesn't seem to be an issue for Switzerland.
 

Paranerd

Neo Member
It's hard not to get frustrated by some of the comments the other hosts made, but I still thought Penn made his point well.
 

TUSR

Banned
Machine guns at a shooting range, heaven forbid.

The one lady on the right, the ex-CNN anchor is awful.
 

Loona

Member
Why is Penn on that show with them? He's too smart to be there.

It's just sad that someone capable of decent reasoning putting that to use in an environment like that seems to be the exception, not the rule, and that in an environment like that he might just be dismissed for being the token man.

Still, at least he managed to get some applause of his own, it's more than I expected after a few minutes of watching it.
 

TUROK

Member
He's looking at it in terms of pure statistics, an objective view. This isn't going to sit well with regular people because they don't want to hear that kids being shot in schools is actually an extremely rate problem.
 

TUROK

Member
Why can't a sensible person like Penn get a talk show? There might be something worthwhile on for once.
His opinions are too objective for everyday people, people who tend to have their emotions cloud their judgment. Too much objectivity comes across as insensitivity, and that scares people.
 

zroid

Banned
The worst thing about this is how the audience pretty much never applauds anything Penn says, but is all over the ladies' every word.
 
Would not agree that he was much more reasonable throughout the conversation though? I get what you're saying and I agree Penn isn't perfect but it seems ridiculous to me to equate him to the other speakers because he didn't flesh out one thing he said near the end of the segment.



They wouldn't be able to get away with it if it weren't for the idiotic audience. They basically cheered on demand everyone time anyone stated anything.



I don't think quality is the only concern of people who don't think games are art. I don't think most games are art. I also don't think chess is art either, even though I like playing it.
While both COD and chess are games, chess is not art. COD could be considered - interactive - art because people have designed material and presented it in a particular sequence.
 
How the fuck does a woman who has such a poor grasp of basic English grammar, that can't even remember to breath properly whilst speaking, get a fucking chat show?

That was so painful to watch.
 
I mean I don't mind different opinions but the Wendy Williams girl is probably the worst host I have ever seen in my life, and the young chick with her has about as much intelligence as my left nut.
 

Kinyou

Member
stjXb.jpg


You'd think they would change the treatment of their tv thing to not be so... out of place.
That was one of the first things I noticed as well. Weird for this kind of show to address that issue at all.
 

siddx

Magnificent Eager Mighty Brilliantly Erect Registereduser
How the fuck does a woman who has such a poor grasp of basic English grammar, that can't even remember to breath properly whilst speaking, get a fucking chat show?

That was so painful to watch.

she used to have a reputation for being "edgy and not scared to confront people" which meant she was loud and obnoxious and a complete twat to her guests and has somehow spun a career out of it. She's been terrible at her job from day one and most people in the industry she interacts with hate her guts.
 

Kammie

Member
Wendy Williams' Wikipedia page features a detailed list of the rappers who've told her to suck dicks in their lyrics.
God bless Wikipedia.

Penn tried to make rational arguments and lay blame squarely on the person who did the killings, while the others all scrambled around for scapegoats. It was really a struggle to sit through the whole video.
 
I laughed uncontrollably at the Switzerland comment.. Mainly because that country has a people's militia and no national military and most have to own guns between a certain age.
 
I'm surprised to see so many people not recognize the complete cunt that is Wendy Williams.

This is the same personality who:

- propagated the rumor that Tupac Shakur was raped in jail
- revealed that Method Man's wife had cancer before her own family knew
- is one of the few people Will Smith ever dissed

Her show was kind of cute when she'd come on The Soup and make fun of it and herself...but I'd never expect a serious discussion or debate in such a setting.
 
Wait.. she did this?

On 14 December 2011, during an interview former X Factor contestant Rachel Crow, Wendy asked the then 13 year old singer if she was a crack baby. Wendy was heavily criticized on her Facebook page and responded the following day on her show[27]. Williams defended her remarks, saying "They said that saying 'crack baby'...is not politically correct...that might be politically incorrect, but I'm gonna tell you something, let's not sugarcoat things."[28]

What the hell???
 
God bless Wikipedia.

Penn tried to make rational arguments and lay blame squarely on the person who did the killings, while the others all scrambled around for scapegoats. It was really a struggle to sit through the whole video.

That pretty well sums it up. The blond woman kept changing pointing her finger at different things to blame after Pen tried to throw an argument against them. If it's not the media or videogames, it must be the politicians faults. Blame them. You can tell that Penn Gillette really held back at the end though. I think he even knew that this debate was way too easy for him to exploit and toned himself down in the end.

I don't know myself, I would never rule out media as not having an effect on someones mental state. I think anything from music, movies, TV shows to video games can be a trigger that can ignite irrational behavior under certain circumstances. But I don't think most of these outlets can be the direct root of the problem. Usually it stems from the individual themselves.




Here's footage from 26 years ago of Frank Zappa defending "shock" or "porn" music from similarly ignorant attack.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9856_xv8gc


Same argument, different decade. replace mentally ill with people who have aspergers (things have become more categorized on the media over the years), devil worshiping music with violent video games and "Regan's America" with "Obama's America" and there really isn't much difference.
 
That Zappa interview makes me think... why don't the game developers get to justify their medium on telly? Why is it always left to fans or press? I know Whitta did a good job once but that's the closest I've seen to someone involved with games development protecting their chosen art.
 

Darkmakaimura

Can You Imagine What SureAI Is Going To Do With Garfield?
I'm surprised to see so many people not recognize the complete cunt that is Wendy Williams.

This is the same personality who:

- propagated the rumor that Tupac Shakur was raped in jail
- revealed that Method Man's wife had cancer before her own family knew
- is one of the few people Will Smith ever dissed

Her show was kind of cute when she'd come on The Soup and make fun of it and herself...but I'd never expect a serious discussion or debate in such a setting.
I never heard of her but she came off as terribly annoying. What a piss poor show. Jillette is above this. I loved this P&T BS from Showtime. In fact, there was an episode devoted to just this subject regarding video games and violence and he even had none other than Jack Thompson on.
 
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