Peace and propaganda in our time

The Snopes Urban Legends Reference pages have confirmed that certain pictures floating around the internet are authentic photographs of Muslim protesters in London during this year's unrest over the Mohammed cartoons. Behold the face of the Religion of Peace! This is the harsh reality, people. We're so much better than they are: They have placards urging the faithful to "BUTCHER THOSE WHO MOCK ISLAM"; We have Left Behind: The Videogame.

Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City. You are on a mission - both a religious mission and a military mission -- to convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who advocates the separation of church and state - especially moderate, mainstream Christians. Your mission is "to conduct physical and spiritual warfare"; all who resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice. You have never felt so powerful, so driven by a purpose: you are 13 years old. You are playing a real-time strategy video game whose creators are linked to the empire of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life.

I have to admit, after reading more about the game here, here, and here, it sounds very well-done, very entertaining. It may not be so good at providing spiritual clarity, however, judging from this article (Edit: if that link won't work, same column here, or use a search engine to find the Left Behind column by Joel Stein):

By the end, [Left Behind Games President Jeffery] Frichner had 24 soldiers and I had three. Defeated, I asked him if the game had accomplished its objective of making him feel invigorated about the believers' role in the end of the world. "I thought I was playing the devil," he said with a confused look. I took that as a no.

Personally, I think players of the game should be required to read all of slacktivist's Left Behind posts (latest one here).

In other news: "Federal authorities are actively investigating dozens of American television stations for broadcasting items produced by the Bush administration and major corporations, and passing them off as normal news. Some of the fake news segments talked up success in the war in Iraq, or promoted the companies' products."

The problem here isn't that the Bush administration is Evil: the Clinton administration and all your favorite lobbying firms have produced the same kinds of "news" and sent them to all the same television stations for years. The problem is that the major TV news organizations all pass this stuff off as real news. Look, the Republicans hate the MainStream Media because they think it's biased in favor of the liberals, the Democrats hate the MSM because they think it's biased in favor of the Eeevil Bush administration, and what they all fail to recognize is that the media are, quite simply, biased in favor of whoever will do their work for them. If you're not willing to do something to change that fact, maybe you should quit complaining and go back to playing your videogames.

Two Random Questions & Eight Rules of Life

Random Question One: I noticed just now that when referring to an enclosed collection of stores, I referred to it as a "shopping mall" rather than just a "mall," and I suspect I feel the need for clarification because I live so close to the National Mall, which has lots of monuments and museums but no Gap or Starbucks. Do any of the rest of you feel the need to say "shopping mall" instead of the simpler "mall"?

Random Question Two: When did stores stop selling colored toilet paper?

Rules To Live By: In this post yesterday, seraphimsigrist spoke about and asked about personal rules that people live by, like "Always order pecan pie when if is on a menu" or "Whenever possible, buy lemonade from kids' lemonade stands" or "Give money to beggars on Christmas Day at least." All the comments on the post make for interesting reading, but here are the first few of my own rules that came to mind:

1. If tea is on sale half-price, buy it.

2. Try to go for at least a short walk five days a week.

3. If someone says something which can be taken more than one way, choose to believe the least offensive meaning. People usually don't mean to offend anyway; and if they do, then one's absence of indignation can make them delightfully confused.

4. On LiveJournal, only use icons you enjoy looking at.

5. Say hello to people you pass by, and try to smile while doing it--but don't try to start long conversations with random strangers. Most people do have other things to do.

6. If you are passing by a library and it is possible to go inside, do so.

7. In agreement with someone else here: Always go to the bathroom before leaving home!

8. Don't assume someone else in the house will buy more toilet paper.