Car News

The following message has been making the rounds on Twitter and
Facebook:

"40 cop cars lined up in anticipation of post-game Lakers riot. None
for E3. Now, which games promote violence?"

I would personally like to add that the same can be said for Gen Con,
Origins, and every other RPG and LARP convention ever held. Sure,
there have been security issues, and there may have been police called
to a few incidents - but a lineup of police cars at an RPG convention
in anticipation of a riot? Never happened.

It's not so much a criticism of professional sports as it is an
observation of a huge inconsistency. A handful of isolated incidents
in which gamers commit crimes is considered an epidemic by many, but
regular, consistent outbreaks of violence after sports events are
written off with a sort of "boys will be boys" mentality.

It's a point that I made myself in a column I wrote for Valkyrie
Magazine back in 2003, and while doing so, I made some amazing
discoveries about how far sports riots can go. I dug that old column
up and reposted it here, for your reading pleasure. Enjoy!

NEWS FROM THE TRENCHES
The Column for Gaming Advocacy
From Valkyrie Quarterly 26

Only a Game, Right?
by Bill Walton

Boy, am I gonna get it for this one. I'm probably going to see loads
of hate mail over what I'm about to say. But if you'll just hear me
out and read all of the way through, you probably won't even have to
pick up your poison pen.

Contrary to what you may believe, there are certain games that can be
linked to violent crimes, including assault, vandalism, and even
murder and manslaughter. In fact, one of these games was partly
responsible for starting a war in Central America. These games are
commonly known as professional sports.

Ah, ah, ah! I told you to hear me out, didn't I? Sit back down and
keep reading. I'm going somewhere with this.

Recently, in the United States, 65 people were arrested in connection
with riots and vandalism after the Los Angeles Raiders lost the Super
Bowl. Three firemen were injured, several cars were damaged by thrown
rocks and bottles, and ten cars and a local fast-food restaurant were
set ablaze.

This was the second time police from the area had responded to a fan
riot in as many weeks. In the previous case, the fans weren't angry -
they were expressing their joy over the Raiders' win in the playoffs,
using the same methods of violence and vandalism.

This isn't an isolated case, nor is it limited to professional sports.
In November of 2002, Ohio State University fans started fires and
overturned cars when the Buckeyes made it to the national
championship. On the same evening in Washington state, opposing
football fans pelted each other with bottles and debris after the
results of a game.

It's not just football, either. Do a web search for "sports riots" and
"fan riots" some day. There are baseball riots, hockey riots, and kids
attempting maneouvers that they see on professional wrestling shows.
And let's not even talk about the soccer fans. Actually, on second
thought…

In 1969, El Salvador and Honduras were not getting along well at all,
due to severe immigration and economic problems. Honduras blamed her
woes on the large amount of Salvador immigrants in her borders, and
reacted by ejecting most of them out of the country. Armed resistance
ensued among the immigrants who were reluctant to give up the farms
they had worked to develop over the years. Salvador responded by
capturing a Honduran on their soil and sentencing him to twenty years
in prison for illegal entry into their country. Honduras replied by
capturing sixty Salvador soldiers and locking them up.

Not long after the entire mess was all sorted out, the playoffs for
the World Cup began, and the Honduran and El Salvador teams were
slated to compete with each other. The tales of their misadventures
during the three-game series are worth reading, but I don't have the
space to go into them here. I encourage you to look the story up and
read it for yourself, but a brief synopsis would include the words
assault, rape, mass destruction, and murder.

Within hours, the final game of the playoffs transformed into conflict
on the border between the two countries, and that conflict came to be
known as the Futbol War. It lasted about six days, and over 2000
people, mostly civilians, died.

Okay, I hear you. You'd like me to get to my point, so that when I'm
finished, you can resume shoving the tennis racket down my throat and
stomping on me with your cleats. Well, here it is: people all over the
world, from all walks of life, love sports with an incredible passion.
It is a part of their culture, their being, and their identity - their
loyalty runs very deep, and their team's victories and losses are
their own. This passion can cause some of them to do dangerous and
irrational things in the name of their favorite sport.

But no one ever dares suggest that there's a connection. Why? Because
it is such a big part of so many of us. We'd hate to think that
something that we enjoy could be responsible for something terrible.

Gaming is different. It's a fringe activity. The pastime hasn't even
been around long enough for most people to know about it. It's
"weird," and "different," and not a lot of people are involved in it.
So it's an easy target.

Gaming has never caused any riots, or started any wars that didn't
take place on a dinner table. Yet you would be hard pressed to find an
organization of mothers concerned about sports fan violence.

This is our place, and we're going to have to learn to accept it.

Sources
"The Great Honduras - Salvador Football War," Lorenzo Dee Belveal,
http://ldbelveal.net/futbol_war.htm

"Fan Riots Are Out of Control" - Sean Pullins, www.sports-central.org

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