Moms who banned DnD

[Mercule]

My family was pretty ok with it (my mom bought the books at my request) because my uncle had really been into it too.

*sigh*

My mother actually made me give her a Christmas list every year (in fairness, I was a picky ingrate).

After several years of not getting a single D&D book on the list and the excuse that they could never find the books, I gave her a list of 10 or 15 ISBN numbers, publishers, and titles as well as instructions on ordering them from the local Waldenbooks as well as the addresses of the two hobby shops that carried the books. There was nothing else on the list and I dodged out of any further discussions on Christmas gifts.

What did I get? You guessed: not a single book. The only thing I remember for sure was a Bon Jovi CD. I HATE Bon Jovi (the music, not the person).

I've been playing for 20 years, now, and still haven't gotten anything even tangentally related to D&D or roleplaying from my family, including crpgs. I don't have any other hobbies that require equipment besides computer programming. Oh, well, at least I can count on a couple of DVDs every year.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

eh...

Reading posts like these make me glad I live in England. I'm sure it was never so bad over here as it was there. The Bible Belt in the USA still worries me sometimes.

As a general rule, there's not much about the Bible Belt that should worry you from a general outsider looking in perspective.

True, we are generally as ignorant as most other Americans when it comes to foriegn policy, but that's not likely to change anywhere or under any circumstances and that ignorance is certainly less than total. Mind you, in each section of America that ignorance covers different areas and aspects of the total equation.

Bible Belters are generally courteous. For every nasty one there is another willing to pick you up from where you landed and treat you with the utmost dignity.

It's a corallary to the 'Japanese culture is conformist' maxim and interpretation, which is only true if you deliberately ignore all the radically non-conformist elements which make the culture as a whole one of the most personally, as opposed to ethnically or religiously, diverse anywhere.

Our politics are nasty and very very passionate, but we rarely block traffic. And that's a discussion for another board.

To illustrate the corollary, my brother and I were taught about DnD by our sister's babysitter, who was a family friend. The babysitter's parents found out about this and came over to brief our parents about how DnD would be the best thing to happen to us. We would develop lifelong wonderful friends out of it, have people over all the time, and be generally more pleasant as a result.

This in a city where every block has a church or church related society or two or three. So many churches, that when I visited New York state I became radically disoriented by the lack of them. For me a block is a church, unless its on campus, then a block is a street preacher or flyer promoter.

Which isn't to say that you shouldn't be happy to live in England, most places have their own special joys and attractions.

 

[Baastet]

My story

Wow you folks had alot of cool parents! Were I so lucky when I was younger.

I started playing D&D late in life (I was 15 when itroduced by some friends of mine). Needless to say I was sheltered as a child. My parents can only be described as fundamentalists.

I had been given books from my gaming friends for Xmas and my birthday. I had finally amassed an entired 1st ed. set of books! (including a 1st printing Deities & Demigods!!). I was estatic but I knew what my parents would think. I had heard how evil, dangerous, and satanic D&D was. I honestly hoped it would have blown over in my chruch and I could convince my parents through reasoning and logic that D&D was no more harmful than cartoons or barbies. (Oh how naive I was). Well I had been hiding my books in my locker at school but then spring break rolled around...

We were starting a new campaign in the Oriental Adventures setting, So I had to bring my books home with me to read. I was kinda sneaky in bringing them in. I had them hidden, spread out in between my matress and box spring of my bed. I would have been fine, but 2 days into spring break my older sister caught me reading them when my mom wasn't home. She threatened to tell on me if I didn't do all the chores around the house and basically put up with her lording over me...

I tried really hard to comply, torn between my love of playing and my inner-anarchist. I did finally make it through the whole week. (it was a BIG struggle) School was about to begin on Monday. Only on Saturday disaster struck, My lovely sweet sister got busted for some piddly thing, so to take the heat off of her she decided to let mom in on my little secret!

My mom came busting into my room demanding the books. Screaming about how I brought dangerous things in the house and how they were filled with witchcraft and how to summon demons. I tried to explain what it was really like. But she wouldn't listen. She tore through my room. I hoped she wouldn't find them, but she did. She took all my books away and threw them in the trash.

I snuck out early Monday morning to get the books from the garbage (Garbage men came that day) hoping to sve my books and give them a good home at my friends house. But my mom was wise to me. She caught me bringing them back into my room to put in my bookbag . I told her I would take them away and she would never see them again. But she wouldn't listen to reason. She told me to go to school and she would deal with me when I got home.

When I came home later that day I was immediately sent to my room until my step-dad came home. When he did I heard the voices in the kitchen and a door slam and some noise form the backyard. My mom came to fetch me about 10 minutes later. She took me out into the backyard and there was a nice roaring fire crackling away. She told me that I had to throw my books in the fire and be free of the "demonic" hold D&D had on me. I couldn't do it.... So My mom and step-dad ripped the pages from the books and fed them into the fire, quoting scriptures as they burned my books.

I still get sad when I think of that time. I turned a corner that day and listened to my inner-anarchist from then on. I didn't give up playing. I decided that was the day I knew I could think and reason things for myself. It also got me to think on how many other things my parents were wrong about. (that's a different story ). It's sad but stillto this day she thinks D&D is satanic but there may be hope yet!


Baastet

 

[Rel]

So My mom and step-dad ripped the pages from the books and fed them into the fire, quoting scriptures as they burned my books.

That just really bothers me. There's a lot of stuff I don't agree with in this world, but burning books about it does not seem to be a productive answer.

I'm sorry you had to go through that.

 

[Djeta Thernadier]

*sigh*

My mother actually made me give her a Christmas list every year (in fairness, I was a picky ingrate).

What did I get? You guessed: not a single book. The only thing I remember for sure was a Bon Jovi CD. I HATE Bon Jovi (the music, not the person).

Hmmmm... I'm almost 27 years old and my mom STILL requires a detailed list every Christmas. AND she really digs Bon Jovi...

That settles it then, there is something deeper going on here....

...Although, I usually got everything on the lists I made. Gotta give props to my mom. She actually went out of her way to find me some of the weird stuff (more weird than D&D books, that's for sure) I asked for...

So I can't complain...

 

[Melkor]

I almost forgot.....

I mentioned that my dad was a non-denominational Christian pastor in my other thread...I forgot to mention that I went to a "Private" School up until my 8th grade year.

One of the kids there played Basic D&D, and hand copied some of the rules for me so I could make up a character. We played a little during lunch in the cafeteria - when some of the teachers found out about it, the next year, the student handbook had banned D&D as something you couldn't bring to school...This was probably my 4th grade year.

I think I was in 6th or 7th grade when MERP came out, and another buddy and I started bringing that to school and playing it....The Student Handbook was changed after that so that no "Board or Book Games" could be brought to school. Very crappy, but by then, we had memorized a lot of the rules, and written notes down on notebook paper, so we just played on, and snuck dice rolls under the table.

My parents, as I said in my earlier thread, were a bit fanatical about their religious beliefs....They threw out a ton of my D&D stuff. My grandfather would take me to a local hobby store every other week, and let me buy whatever games or books I wanted (within reason)....My parents had told him not to buy me D&D books, but he let me buy anything that didn't look offensive in spite of that.

Anyway, I was reading Dieties & Demigods at lunch one day when my PE Coach, who also taught World History, saw me. He said he was going to be teaching about a number of different Gods & religious beliefs during the semester and asked if he could borrow the book. He did, and he even made copies and handed out some of them to the class (mainly for pictures). I thought that he was a really cool guy.....The next thing I knew, he had called my dad for a Parent-Teacher conference and told him that he was "concerned" that I was playing that game - He showed my very religious dad pictures of all of the gods (I think some of them were even topless) from my very own copy of Dieties & Demigods.....

Needless to say, the Hypocrisy of him doing that floored me....and I got in a lot of trouble....but oh well. All is well that ends well.....My parents finally realized that the games were good for my brain, and sometimes they actually kept me out of trouble.

Cheers.

 

[Merlion]

I read the article and the little cartoon. The article was irritating a little amusing. Some of his ideas are accurate from the point of view of ANY sort of supernatural influence that doesnt come directly from God being evil(an idea which isnt supported by the Bible, especialy not the New Testament which is supposed to be the real authority for Christians), and of course the point of view that having anything to do with anything that mentions any of those things even if its pure fiction, is also evil. Of course most people have a far greater grasp of reality than that, and those that dont will find an outlet for there madness regardless, wether its DnD, gangs, drugs, or charismatic religious leaders. Its funny to me that he doesnt want people to be influenced in there beliefs by DnD(which most gamers really arent anyway) but its ok to let him or another religious leader tell you how to think.
The bit about Cthulhu and the Necronomicon was...interesting. Since Necronomicon basicaly just means Book of the Dead I guess there could be a real occult tome by that title out there somewhere...but I'm pretty sure the one old HP wrote about was purely fictious. Likewise while its entrily possible that there are many tentacled evil extradimensional beings out there somewhere, I dont think Lovecraft had actual contact with them.
I really love the way thease people will accept the Narnia stories and LOTR, but not other fantasy. Theres plenty of spellcasting taking place in LOTR.
The cartoon was what really pissed me off though. Having the girl kill herself cause her character died. Incredibly insulting and way over the top. Plus the idea that every DnD game is a recruiting front for a Satanist coven. The guy might have been a witch high priest and done a lot of research but I cant believe he actualy knows many gamers. Also doesnt it seem odd that all the players in that cartoon were girls, and they got "saved" by a boy and a man?
Anyway on topic..I never got much of that kind of trouble from my folks. My cousin introduced me to the game over distance...he lived in Michigan(I'm in Ga)...he was blinded in a car wreck a few years ago, and spent a lot of time online for a while...he and some friends got an email game going and he invited my brother and me. Sent me his old 1st edition books. My mom had some very slight misgivings right at first but a brief explanation put that to rest. My whole family loves fantasy and sci fi..although the crazy super fundementalist side of my mom does get wary of some things some times. She did give me some flak about the money I spent on it...but then the crazy half of my mom isnt a fan of spending money or time on anything that doesnt directly contribute to survival. She would also rag me cause I could remember DnD rules so well but didnt always remember the things she thought I should, but thats another story.
Overall, I've experienced very little problems. Of course I wasnt in school so that helped, and my family didnt attend a church.
People like this Chick guy infuriate me though. And people like Baastets parents...making big decisions based on no information.

 

[Altalazar]

My parents paid for my first copy of Dragon Magazine, they bought me the Basic Set for XMas (and the Expert Set the next year) and I used their good dining table and chairs for gaming for years.

Before I could drive (I was under 16) my dad would drive me to the local university (U of Michigan) Student Union so I could game with a group of gamers from the local gaming store who were all probably in their 20s and 30s. They played some interesting, different games. The only downside was that my dad did not want to stay up late, so he'd come pick me up at like 10 or 11 and I'd miss the later part of the sessions.

Obviously my parents had no problems with gaming - I wonder how many parents would drop off their 14 year old to play RPGs with adults like that. Horror of horrors!

 

[Desdichado]

Altalazar; you sure have a thing this afternoon for resurrecting old threads...

 

[diaglo]

wow. a thread i haven't posted some of my horror stories on.

i had a buddy with strict parents.

i loaned him my Rogues Gallery...he wanted to read about the Greyhawk characters in the back and other things over the course of several game sessions.

his church decided to have a book burning party in the parking lot of our county library. they checked out the D&D material from the library and burned it. they encouraged their parishioners to add to the flames. my buddy's things went up in smoke. thing is he didn't own anything. he had borrowed it all. so my stuff went up in smoke.

do you know how many bottles and cans i collected; yards i mowed; papers i delivered; cars i washed; and odd jobs i did to buy those books?

i didn't blame my buddy. but i sure didn't speak to his folks much afterwards.