ExploderWizard
Hero
Sadly, ignorance on an epic scale does not prevent parenthood. It has always been and shall ever be the case.
D&D Still Satanic? "So my mom threw away all my D&D books..."
- Thread starter Katana_Geldar
- Start date
Rel
Liquid Awesome
Sometimes quite the opposite!
Crazy Jerome
First Post
My experience, centered around North Alabama, in the same time frame you reported from, was that it was a "medium town" issue. Small towns, everyone knows everyone else, and this kind of stuff just can't stick long enough to become an issue. Fully half the kids at our school had at least dabbled in D&D, and while atypical for the area, the game was well known enough in other nearby small towns to innoculate against this particular brand of stupidity.
Ask the parents or teachers in our area, and you always got this kind of response: "A problem? No. So and so is doing it, and he or she is a good kid. If they are involved, it is not a problem. Our problem is teen pregnancy and underage people getting soused--not unrelated problems, either. I think an activity that is all pretend, using basic writing and math skills, is not an issue."
You need a town big enough to accumulate a critical mass of stupid, but not so big that other masses can say, "Say what? You kidding me?" It wasn't an accident that the only times I encountered even a ghost of the issue, it was in Montgomery and Huntsville.
This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes:
"Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups."
TheAuldGrump
First Post
I am kind of sad to say that I have much more often encountered the opposite - gamers acting like jerks to more religious folks on the grounds that 'they all hate us anyway', generally without much, if anything, by way of proof.
This includes a LARP where a werewolf player 'full mooned' a religious convention that was scheduled on the same campus as the LARP. The werewolf got booted, the religicos never even complained, and I am afraid that the incident may have confirmed some folks beliefs that 'gamers are jerks'. Not Satanists, not evil, jerks.
I have also met one (1) gamer who did claim to be a Satanist, though I think that the proper spelling may have been P-O-S-E-R. An excuse for sex, drugs, bad rock music, and antisocial behavior. (That was in 1981.) My opinion of the fellow was that he was a waste of carbon compounds.
The Auld Grump
This includes a LARP where a werewolf player 'full mooned' a religious convention that was scheduled on the same campus as the LARP. The werewolf got booted, the religicos never even complained, and I am afraid that the incident may have confirmed some folks beliefs that 'gamers are jerks'. Not Satanists, not evil, jerks.
I have also met one (1) gamer who did claim to be a Satanist, though I think that the proper spelling may have been P-O-S-E-R. An excuse for sex, drugs, bad rock music, and antisocial behavior. (That was in 1981.) My opinion of the fellow was that he was a waste of carbon compounds.
The Auld Grump
All hail Poser the Posarian!
pawsplay
Hero
Just outside Tulsa, OK, home of Oral Roberts University.
Camelot
Adventurer
Looking at the book, I can see how a misunderstanding might occur in a set-minded mom.
"Okay, 'Heroes of Shadow.' Let's see what this is about. Table of Contents, blah-de-blah, too small for my weak eyes, let's turn the page...Oh, what a nice picture. And the title...Into the Dark? Subtitles are...Shadow Magic? Soul Sacrifice?! Waitaminute, let me read that.
Soul Sacrifice
Those who wish to connect to the innate power of the Shadowfell must forge a strong bond with the plane. To do so requires nothing less than a shard of the supplicant's soul, given over to the unknown of death. How this gruesome task is accomplished varies among practicioners.
WHAT?!"
Just reading that, you don't get the vibe that this is a fiction book. It does seem sort of instructional. In fact, if you have no idea you're reading a game book, and you ignore the "About This Book" sidebar on the first page (page 4), it's not until page 10 that it even mentions a "DM" and a "campaign," then mentions some game elements on page 11. This is probably not even as far as this woman read, so I can see how in her view it looks like satanic instructions.
Of course, that makes it excellent writing in my view. I hope her son can show her that it is actually just fiction for a game and in no way will influence his religious practices.
"Okay, 'Heroes of Shadow.' Let's see what this is about. Table of Contents, blah-de-blah, too small for my weak eyes, let's turn the page...Oh, what a nice picture. And the title...Into the Dark? Subtitles are...Shadow Magic? Soul Sacrifice?! Waitaminute, let me read that.
Soul Sacrifice
Those who wish to connect to the innate power of the Shadowfell must forge a strong bond with the plane. To do so requires nothing less than a shard of the supplicant's soul, given over to the unknown of death. How this gruesome task is accomplished varies among practicioners.
WHAT?!"
Just reading that, you don't get the vibe that this is a fiction book. It does seem sort of instructional. In fact, if you have no idea you're reading a game book, and you ignore the "About This Book" sidebar on the first page (page 4), it's not until page 10 that it even mentions a "DM" and a "campaign," then mentions some game elements on page 11. This is probably not even as far as this woman read, so I can see how in her view it looks like satanic instructions.
Of course, that makes it excellent writing in my view. I hope her son can show her that it is actually just fiction for a game and in no way will influence his religious practices.
Traveller From Afar
First Post
Maybe if one is inclined to see Jesus in one's scrambled eggs. Seriously, there is no place to hide from the kind of mindset that objects to exciting interactive fiction for religious reasons, they won't be satisfied until they have control of your very non fictional life.
G
Guest 85555
Guest
I think in the 80s this did often boil down to where you lived. I was born in Massachusetts, but moved to Southern California to a very conservative christian community in 1984. Started playing D&D in about 86 I believe. While most people really didn't care, the episcopal church my parents attended was filled with people who thought it was satanic (and they convinced my mother that playing D&D would lead me to satan and PCP under the sewers). Basically had to stop gaming openly until we moved back to Boston where people really didn't care about that kind of stuff.
The difference was literally night and day. Went from going to a church where people spoke in tongues and banned movies like Willow, to a church (both episcopal mind you) where the priest encouraged D&D (heck his kids played) and movies like Willow were fine.
Similar Threads
