The curse placed on Irving Pulling?

[Janx]

There's nothing wrong with holding people accountable for their actions. Grief doesn't justify starting a witch hunt imho.

...snip...

- well, I'm sure having a crazy mom wouldn't do anything for anyone's mental health.

was she crazy or just plain ignorant and self-righteous?

She certainly manipulated the media to support her argument, which supported her movement that she was right and wasn't responsible for her son's death.

She got her 15 minutes of fame at other people's expense.

At this point, I think the most fitting thing is for her name to be used as a curse against gamers who hurt other gamers. The Curse of Pulling.

 

[Umbran]

There's nothing wrong with holding people accountable for their actions.

She can no longer be held accountable. She's dead of cancer for over a decade now. BADD had only one member, Ms. Pulling herself, when she died. It is likely that few outside of gaming circles even recall her.

 

[renau1g]

What I take away from this?

"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. " Kay - MIB

 

[billd91]

She can no longer be held accountable. She's dead of cancer for over a decade now. BADD had only one member, Ms. Pulling herself, when she died. It is likely that few outside of gaming circles even recall her.

We shouldn't whitewash her impact on the hobby by holding her up just as an object of pity becuase her son committed suicide either. Her memory should be put in an appropriate context - pitiable and ridiculous, in proper measure.

Who cares if nobody outside the hobby remembers her. She affected the gamer subculture and should be remembered within it for what she did and the ignorance she spewed, all the better to counteract someone like this if another one appears.

 

[Umbran]

Who cares if nobody outside the hobby remembers her. She affected the gamer subculture and should be remembered within it for what she did and the ignorance she spewed, all the better to counteract someone like this if another one appears.

Ah, you see, remembering her with pity is humane. Ridicule serves no purpose but to inflate our own egos, or to polarize people for and against you - it does not convince someone who's mind is still open about the rightness of your position.

Others, should they appear, will not be countered with pity or ridicule. Such people are countered with facts. We do not need ridicule to display the facts we know about Pulling and her tactics. So, why get into a bad habit?

 

[WizarDru]

We shouldn't whitewash her impact on the hobby by holding her up just as an object of pity becuase her son committed suicide either. Her memory should be put in an appropriate context - pitiable and ridiculous, in proper measure.

Who cares if nobody outside the hobby remembers her. She affected the gamer subculture and should be remembered within it for what she did and the ignorance she spewed, all the better to counteract someone like this if another one appears.

Because we should be better people than that. Because we generally enjoy a hobby about being heroes, not vindictive jerks. I'd like to think that we'd be better served thinking about ways to advocate our hobby than gleefully mocking a woman who, blinded by the pain of loss, overreacted and eventually destroyed herself, before a painful bout with cancer finished the job.

Pat Pulling was not solely responsible for the anti-D&D Hysteria of the 1980s and arguably was more of a footnote. No legal case she ever advised was successful, her hysterics were often criticized or ignored and generally she faded fast as D&D moved on from being the new Rock & Roll of it's time. Her time is long since past and if you really want to do her damage, then relegate her to a footnote of history not a shibboleth of the hobby.

 

[billd91]

Because we should be better people than that. Because we generally enjoy a hobby about being heroes, not vindictive jerks. I'd like to think that we'd be better served thinking about ways to advocate our hobby than gleefully mocking a woman who, blinded by the pain of loss, overreacted and eventually destroyed herself, before a painful bout with cancer finished the job.

Pat Pulling was not solely responsible for the anti-D&D Hysteria of the 1980s and arguably was more of a footnote. No legal case she ever advised was successful, her hysterics were often criticized or ignored and generally she faded fast as D&D moved on from being the new Rock & Roll of it's time. Her time is long since past and if you really want to do her damage, then relegate her to a footnote of history not a shibboleth of the hobby.

It's not about being vindictive. From the standpoint of gaming, she needs to be remembered for what she did with respect to gaming. That's doing justice to her memory every bit as much as pitying her for her son's suicide and being a cancer victim.

And let's be realistic here. Even Gygax will be a minor footnote of history in the grand scheme of things given the niche nature of our hobby. Yet his memory stands like a giant in it because of his personal impact. Pulling's impact was smaller but still notable. She still serves as a historical example to be remembered by the gaming community for what she did and what she tried to do to it. If someone else puts themself into position to do what she was doing, the gaming community will be better able to deal with them because of the experience with her.

 

[Erik Mona]

As long as we're being PC regarding a person who absolutely does not deserve it, perhaps we should not marginalize her gender by referring to her antics as "hysterics".

Just sayin'.

--Erik

 

[jonesy]

From the standpoint of gaming, she needs to be remembered for what she did with respect to gaming.

I don't think she does.

What needs to be remembered is that the game has been accused of contributing to a lot of crap, none of it true.

 

[billd91]

I don't think she does.

What needs to be remembered is that the game has been accused of contributing to a lot of crap, none of it true.

Then you're just left with a lot of vague nothings. "Someone did something, yadda yadda, whatever." That's just the road to being intentionally ignorant and that's not a good road to be on. The hobby has a history, people should remember it and learn from it.