I am an avid Livejournal user, a Lj-addict, if you will. I got my first Livejournal in 2002 and I’m now on my third and (hopefully) my last.
For the benefit of those of you who are Livejournal-less, the place is littered with communities on pretty much every subject you can think of. Naturally, I’m subscribed to plenty of gaming ones, a few too many about hair dyeing, and the odd random. The other day, as I browsed my friends page to catch up with a couple of days worth of lost community stalking, I happened upon the subject of gaming in a community I didn’t expect to find it in at all.
This was a Buddhist community. I almost thought I was reading an entry from one of the gaming journals until I went to reply to it. The poster was curious to know the opinion of Buddhists on the subject of computer games. Buddha had one said “We become what we consume” so going on this theory the poster wondered if it was almost “un-Buddhist” to play violent games because of this very statement. As if your actions within a game had some impact or reflection on the person you are in your everyday life, and that you are glamorizing suffering.
I was stumped, I stared at my laptop screen in disbelief. This is an argument, no matter how much I think about it, I just can’t wrap my head around. I know the media just love to sensationalize games and their effect on the mind (especially young, impressionable ones) but questioning the merit of a game from a spiritual point of view has really baffled me.
Those who know me well know that I’m a huge animal lover, I ensure everything I use is BUAV approved, and more recently I’ve become vegetarian. But as I sit here, playing through Tomb Raider anniversary (further to my post on the lovely Lara earlier this year) I’m happily shooting wolves, yelling “Argh! You little s**t!” at the screen. So does this simple act of pixellated animal cruelty make my efforts in real life less genuine? Further to this, does my reveling in a successful slaughter in Hitman make me a sadistic person? Surely the efforts I spend in my everyday life (right mindfulness, right speech, right effort) are more than enough to show I’m not a wolf-shooting, cheesewire-loving slaughter monkey.
I was disappointed to see many responses to the persons post stating that the enjoyment of these games was indeed “un-Buddhist” and representative of all that is wrong in the world.
Now, I’m sorry if this makes me less of a spiritual person, but my soul is squeaky clean AND I enjoy massacring pixels who rub me up the wrong way. If that in any way makes me less likely to achieve Nirvana then I’ll eat my own hat.
Peace out!
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.