Historical Perspective: 1980s "60 Minutes" segment on D&D

[Umbran]

More or less, they pretend not to take a stand - but the editing makes it clear what they really think.

Now, now, let's use Occam's Razor for a moment:

You have people who are clever enough to re-film and edit stories to get across whatever it is they desire to get across. They are skilled at manipulation and deception, and make commercial business out of it.

Are they going to tell you what they think, or what they want you to think?

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Now, now, let's use Occam's Razor for a moment: ...

60 minutes is part of the CBS new department. Always has been. Heck, Andy Rooney was a younger version of Ernie Pyle, except he survived WWII. For most of the 60 minutes run, as noted earlier, the staff is not exactly "spring chicken" material.

CBS long had a particular tradition and reputation of doing the news by the rules--being objective reporters to a degree not achieved elsewhere. Whether this was deserved is another question (and probably not fit for this forum), but suffice it to say that they were so perceived, by much of the public and themselves.

Ergo, it was not possible for them to convey an agenda any other way. They not only had to fool the public into thinking they were being fair, they had to fool themselves. Fooling yourself is hard, at least until you've had some practice. It was vitally important to them that they have the appearance of being objective.

Contrast this to, say, John Stossel, who routinely does pieces with transparent agenda. He doesn't care if you see the agenda. Thus, he never uses any of these dishonest editing tricks. To see the difference, imagine that 60 Minutes and Stossel decide to do a piece on the popularity of D&D 4E.

60 Minutes: Interviews a carefully selected, highly non-representative slice of fans and non fans. Depending on whether they want to laud it or slam 4E, they make sure that the appropriate fans are edited to look good and bad. If they don't actually find what they are looking for, will use even more editing to convey the preferred agenda.

Stossel: Decides up front that he wants to laud or slam 4E. Goes out and finds some representative fans for that purpose, with some mild dissent for leavening. Tells you at the beginning of the piece that this is what he did. Tells you at the end that he didn't really cover the other side, as that wasn't the purpose of the piece. If he doesn't actually find what he was looking for, will either can the story (if it was boring) or run it anyway, with the, "we were surprised to find" twist.

You can blame Stossel for his agenda story selection, if you want, but at least he is honest. Hmm, now I want Stossel to do a story on D&D.

 

[Merlin the Tuna]

You can blame Stossel for his agenda story selection, if you want, but at least he is honest.

And don't forget his amazing moustache.

Man, as a younger member of the boards, this is really one of those things where I can only shake my head and give it the "People seriously believed this?" treatment. I mean, the portion where they mention parents seeing their child actually conjure up D&D demons? Really?

Which of course isn't to say that 20 years from now I won't be telling my kids about all the crazy things we used to do when I was a whippersnapper, but man, it always looks so insane in retrospect.

 

[WizarDru]

Man, as a younger member of the boards, this is really one of those things where I can only shake my head and give it the "People seriously believed this?" treatment. I mean, the portion where they mention parents seeing their child actually conjure up D&D demons? Really?

You have to remember, this was 1985. It may sound ridiculous looking at it now, but D&D was a relatively new 'game' that didn't fit any known category. It was weird in the eyes of folks who didn't understand it and the game had virtually no good public faces other than Gary. At best, it was considered some sort of nerdy 'brainiac' pursuit, like the chess club. At worst, it was the gateway drug to the Occult and to real, actual cults. And the 1970s were RIFE with pop-culture fascination with cults like those shown in 'The Omen' and 'Rosemary's Baby', so the idea that a game that has violence, magic and demons in it was, on its face, upsetting to many people. D&D was a fringe thing, then. Put another way: in 1984, Gencon only had 3600 attendees. In 1985 it grew to about 5000 attendees. Compare that with 1994, when it got the record high 30,000 attendees, or even this year's 26,000.

D&D, like things like Rock and Roll, video games and the Internet, was threatening because it had skyrocketed to popularity virtually over-night, from the perception of outsiders. One day, D&D was something you could only find in special Hobby stores...the next day, it was displayed prominently in your local bookstore. So when the most prominent investigative journalism show on television makes it look like your children are in danger....many parents paid attention. Obviously, a large number of parents took a look, decided that the game was perfectly harmless and promptly ignored further hysteria. But some parents took it as a validation of their fears or suspicions and used it as a justification to get rid of the game. This report prematurely ended or interrupted more than a few gamers careers.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

... At worst, it was the gateway drug to the Occult and to real, actual cults. And the 1970s were RIFE with pop-culture fascination with cults like those shown in 'The Omen' and 'Rosemary's Baby', so the idea that a game that has violence, magic and demons in it was, on its face, upsetting to many people...

Wasn't Jim Jones and that mass suicide in 1977--people drinking Kool-Aid they knew was laced with, what, cyanide? That's where the expression "drinking the Kool-Aid" for cult-like behavior arises. This was fresh in peoples' minds. So, certainly there were a handful of people that attributed this to "demons" or what not, but the real fear was that D&D was a cult-like thing that would lead to their youngsters believing all kinds of crazy stuff from some "leader", and following him off the deep end. ("Hotel California is about cults, not drug abuse as I heard some idiot D.J. spout just last week. That was one song that even parents knew well in the late 70's, early '80s.)

You've also got to remember that there is a certain segment of the population that would describe Jim Jones as "demonic", and mean it literally. Not that someone got crazy with a spell, he got took over in a flash of brimstone, and such--but rather that demonic influence is real, and people that invite it are susceptible to it. I have known quite a few people with those beliefs in my time, some quite well. I even had one in my D&D game for awhile--before he quit because of other priorities--not his religion. The kind of things they discuss as "inviting demonic influence" are not at all what D&D is about--not even close--but it didn't take many instances of Jim Jones and D&D hysteria to give D&D a patina of being related, at least not to the uniformed.

BTW, another reason I never had anyone give us flak, was that I had a loud, public, and repeated invitation for anyone, including parents, grandparents, ministers, teachers--anyone--to sit and watch any session, any time. What really sealed the deal though, was when word got out that my Mom "caught me" doing a research report on mining techniques, not for school but to enhance my dungeon creation abilities. There were a bunch of parents that wanted that influence on their kids.

 

[WizarDru]

Wasn't Jim Jones and that mass suicide in 1977--people drinking Kool-Aid they knew was laced with, what, cyanide? That's where the expression "drinking the Kool-Aid" for cult-like behavior arises.

Even Later: November 1978. And the San Ysidro McDonald's Massacre was in 1984, not too long before this (the first 'postal' mass murder would take place in 1986, after this report). So there were plenty of precedents of crazy in the air.

What really sealed the deal though, was when word got out that my Mom "caught me" doing a research report on mining techniques, not for school but to enhance my dungeon creation abilities. There were a bunch of parents that wanted that influence on their kids.

Very true. That was, in fact, a major selling point of the game. It was a very nerdy thing. D&D players had to expand their vocabularies to follow Gygax's writing, expand their knowledge of history to appreciate the setting and ideas and improve their math to understand game theory. D&D promoted a lot of good educational qualities, which is why it showed up in schools as often as it did.

But stuff like this '60 minutes' report are why players of my generation are still somewhat hesitant to admit we play D&D to folks we don't know that well, yet. It's just a conditioned reflex.

 

[Nifft]

D&D players had to expand their vocabularies to follow Gygax's writing, expand their knowledge of history to appreciate the setting and ideas and improve their math to understand game theory. D&D promoted a lot of good educational qualities, which is why it showed up in schools as often as it did.

Worked on me. The expanded vocabulary and interest in mythology are in effect to this day.

Cheers, -- N

 

[ProfessorCirno]

As someone said earlier, one way of understanding how people could believe this is to understand that D&D wasn't the only "EVIL SATANIST CULT" scare going on. There was a lot of that kind of thing. People who were a large discredit to their education even became "specialists" at it; to put it in slight perspective, imagine if those loons that host unofficial therapy groups for UFO abductees were suddenly allowed to freely work with and give advice to the police, who in turn earnestly believed that UFOs WERE abducting people, and that they as the police needed to get involved. There were quite a few murders that were thought to be the work of "EVIL SATANIST CULTS" only for the police to discover later that these "specialists" had no true education in the matter and were generally very, very loopy in the head.

The horrifying thing about the whole mess is that, as Gary stated, teen suicides were very strongly on the rise, but parents constantly went out of their way to find new and interesting things to blame. I can't help but wonder if it was perhaps this behavior that lead to some of those suicides.

 

[Wormwood]

and there's still a strong "nerd" stigma both there and in urban and suburban areas.

Heh.

Back in the early 80's my dad was far more worried about D&D's pernicious effects on my dating life than any occult mumbo jumbo.

 

[The Little Raven]

Back in the early 80's my dad was far more worried about D&D's pernicious effects on my dating life than any occult mumbo jumbo.

I've still got friends worried about that today. One of my coworkers asked me why I'm so open about my love of D&D and roleplaying games, as that's not something that would generally attract a female. I asked her what the point to hiding it was, since it's not like I'm going to hide all of my various "nerdy" hobbies every time I bring a woman to my bed, because clearing out a metric ton of RPG books, novels, comic books, miniatures, and action figures would be more effort than it's worth.