That isn't entirely true. Those who get highly involved in them tend to drop out of their other social circles, so those social circles are also affected.
This is no different than when a person gets highly involved in *any* hobby, though. MMOs just happen to have drawn millions into them pretty much all at once.
Okay, fine...they have an effect. However, it is neither a positive nor negative effect
objectively. It's only negative if one chooses to take a selfish view of it. Being upset at somebody because they don't want to have
your fun, is selfish. Getting upset at the thing that took them away from you is also selfish, and more than a little bit entitled. Nobody has a right or priority to their friends time as concerns requiring them to participate in the pursuits that
you find fun. If your friends want to play MMO's rather than playing in your tabletop game, you only have two rational choices: either go play MMO's with them (because it's more important to you to do things with your friends, and not necessarily always doing what
you want to do with your friends), or find more friends that do want to play tabletop games. Anything else is irrational, foolish, and entitled. And comments like
"If only MMO's would die off!" and
"If any help is needed, I have a shotgun here...", are incredibly blatant examples of that irrationality, foolishness, and entitlement...with the latter of the those two statements being completely inappropriate and unacceptable by any standard.
However, I do find it ironic that some will quite quickly point out some posters opinions for even a
hint of exhibiting a sense of entitlement, but this time support those now clearly showing exactly that without even a comment addressing the display of entitlement. I also find it very disapointing that such an inappropriate post was completely ignored by others reading this thread. In todays climate, and in light of recent events, I would think that threatening firearm violence, or even hinting at firearm violence, whether a joke or not, would be viewed as absolutely inappropriate...period.
But all of this is still of no concern to the subject of this thread or the source article. If people are set on talking about their dislike of MMO's or the effect of MMO's success on other pursuits, I would request forking the thread for that conversation.
