Warm Tea: The Bully boy-on-boy kiss goes mainstream

Been playing this game since last Wednesday, when it was released in this country. And, thus far, have not had any boy / boy kissing experiences.

I wouldn't mind if I had seen any gay action - I'm with the "whatever floats your boat" brigade. My point is, they ain't shoving it in your face. You don't want to get off with guys, you don't gotta.

Not that this would put off the mighty Mr Thompson, whose beef with GTA rested on something your couldn't get to without third-party software.

I personally have no problem hating other people for hating me. This whole PC idea about "to be truly tolerant, you have to tolerate those who hate you" is crap.

In other words, if you yell "faggot" at me when I'm kissing my partner goodbye, you better hope I never find out where you live. Not that anyone ever does that.

I'm absolutely certain that my post is going to make everyone here pretty much hate me. And you know, that's ok. We all have opinions.

My take on this Bully issue is this: Rockstar did it so the controversy would sell copies of the game. They didn't do it because its "open-minded", they weren't trying to raise "gay awareness", or anything like that. They did it so that you, me, and everyone else would take notice and say "Hey, did you know that in that one game...what's it
called...Oh...Bully..yeah..well, you can kiss other boys in that game?" And guess what? The marketing ploy has served it's purpose. And another gimmick-game turns into a money-maker for Rockstar. And I have to say, I'm disappointed. No, I'm not a supporter of Jack "On Crack" Thompson. But I am also not a Rockstar supporter. If they took half of the time they spend trying to stir up controversy in their games and spent it actually trying to make their games fun and interesting to play, we'd all be better off for it. GTA games sell simply because people feel like they are playing a game they shouldn't be allowed to play. At least, that's my opinion. People like to think they are getting away with something they shouldn't be doing. They love feeling and acting "rebellious". It is driving society into the ground. And you can't disagree with these actions because, if you do, you must be some bible-selling homophobic racist and become hated by all of the "tolerant" people. I'm disappointed that schemes like these haven't been seen through by my fellow gamers. I'm disappointed that a company can make a poorly-produced sub-par game and garner blind support for said game from such a large populace when the vast majority of said populace have little to no affiliation with the views represented in the media the company is providing/utilzing to conduct their money-making scam yet they provide unconditional support for said software. Question to each and every person who has posted in support of this game so far, gay or straight: If you saw two 15 year old boys making out in front of a school, in person, are you saying you would view such an event as common place and appropriate? My guess? Most would say "Oh yes, of course, I would because I'm tolerant!" To that I say that you, sir or madam, are most likely a blasphemer. It is easy to say this or that when you aren't actually in the situation being discussed. The fact is, and I use the term "fact" very loosely as failure to do so would open myself up to various claims of "prove it", but the human psyche is conditioned over time as we see certain activities/actions performed repetitively over time. For example, when you see a man kiss a woman, how many people here would say that they are appalled/offended and think it is wrong? Assuming an honest answer, I'd argue not many. Now, what about a man kissing a man? I would expect 70% of people to approve of it. However, I'd also expect that, of that 70%, a good 40% would be agreeing only to look like they are "tolerant" and "part of the gang". I don't want to sound like I am anti-gay or whatever you want to call it. In fact, my mindset is that if you are happy, then so be it because life is just too short to worry about what other people think. My whole point is that to say that Rockstar put this into Bully because it is socially acceptable or that the company didn't think it would cause a buzz about their game is an incorrect statement IN MY OPINION. 15 year old boys kissing other 15 year old boys is not common place*. I'll go so far as to say this as well, as nothing more than simply an aside: I purchased Enchanted Arms for Xbox 360. After 30 minutes of play, I returned the game and got my money back. Graphically, the game was a wonder to look at. But the overly-pronounced gay character who played the love interest of one of the other main characters was so annoying, it murdered the game. This is what the gaming industry needs to be wary of. If you want to diversify your game, then fine. But by shoving divirsification down the throats of your customers, you are directly being counter-productive to your own cause. Choice is a good thing...so long as all the choices make sense. If I were going to have a restaurant, I certainly wouldn't have a "Plywood Sandwich" on the menu..it doesn't belong. And, as is the case with Bully, the homosexual overtones do not fit the scene. In my personal opinion, this is just another foul accredited to Rockstar and makes me feel good about boycotting their products until they can actually make a decent game that doesn't have controversy in it. And no, the 2006 version of Pong that they call Table Tennis does NOT count.

*Statement reads that boys kissing is not commonplace. It in no way holds itself to say, either expressly or implicably, that boys kissing is wrong. So please refrain from roasting the comment over that sentence.

zbarron: Being tolerant of intolerance breeds intolerance. Being intolerant of intolerance breeds tolerance.

You had it right the first time: Hating homosexuals == wrong. Hating gay-bashers == right.

In any sort of sane moral code, anyway. I understand there are some "low thought/low effort" moral codes in the world that come to different conclusions, but clearly, they won't help you live a better or more joyful life, so they should probably be ignored.

Hah! Now that you mention it. I also notice the "other" Rockstar game "table tennis" also featured interracial one-on-one male balls action.

Damn you Rockstar!!!!!!!!

@zbarron

Your argument, saying nothing of YOUR personal beliefs, is the crutch of intolerant and hateful people. It's also completely illogical when you actually think about it for a second instead of just pointing out the cursory "irony" of it.

You are arguing that intolerance should be combatted with tolerance. You are arguing that racism or sexism (forms of hatred) should be seen as "just someone's opinion" and should not be fought against.

If an employer denies someone a job, despite having the best qualifications, due to sexual prefference, that is hateful discrimination. By YOUR OWN argument, we should tolerate this, because this employer's hatred is his own choice, and LORD NO, we don't want to be hypocritical!

Outrage and hatred against those who impose their own hatred on the innocent is not only logical but NECESSARY.

Danielle Bunten Berry died in 1998.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danielle_Bunten_Berry

There were psychological studies that showed that many bullies, bullied only because they were insecure about themselves. Maybe what Rockstar is trying to say is that many bullies are insecure of their sexuality...and that they use bullying as an outlet.

*Shrug*

Just speculation.

So what if he's kissing another guy? I mean what's the big issue? The middle east is in turmoil, politics itself now is practically a scam, and yet here we have some middle class christian americans whinging about how its teaching our kids this that nd the other blah blah blah you shouldn't be giving yer kid a rated game anywayz.

Furthermore, I don't hate homophobes, I just think there is no excuse for them to behave like that just because of their 'environment'. My bro and some of my friends where raised in a Commie environment and yet tehy're not nessessarily communists. There is no excuse for ignorance, be it religion, 'discomfort' with sexuality or anything else at that.

They're are bombs going off in the middle east, politics is a scam, the world is in turmoil and yet all people can do is get worried over a same sex kiss in a game? I don't get it- is it because the gaming market is 'macho' and 'male dominanted' or has the world finally succumed to the prissy christian white American views of the bible belt?