I’m not usually one to call out conservative bloggers on their idiocy.  For one thing, I just don’t have the time to devote to it, with it being a full time job and all.  But in this case I just couldn’t resist.


Columnist Kevin McCullough of Townhall.com has written an article that decries the explicit sexual content of Bioware’s RPG Mass Effect, and it is a doozy.  To try to paraphrase Mr. McCullough’s tirade would do a disservice to both him and you.  He has obviously worked very hard to structure this article in such a way that no one could possibly mistake him for someone who knows what they’re talking about, and I feel you readers should be exposed to his unique brand stupefying nonsense.  Here’s some excerpts from the article.

It's called "Mass Effect" and it allows its players - universally male no doubt - to engage in the most realistic sex acts ever conceived. One can custom design the shape, form, bodies, race, hair style, breast size of the images they wish to "engage" and then watch in crystal clear, LCD, 54 inch screen, HD clarity as the video game "persons" hump in every form, format, multiple, gender-oriented possibility they can think of.

"Mass Effect" can be customized to sodomize whatever, whoever, however, the game player wishes.”

“With it's "over the net" capabilities virtual orgasmic rape is just the push of a button away.”

Now anyone who has played Mass Effect, read up on Mass Effect or spoken to anyone who has seen Mass Effect in action knows that, unfortunately, almost none of what he’s saying is true.  First off, one cannot “custom design the shape, form, bodies, race, hair style, breast size of the images they wish to "engage"”, nor can they engage anyone but Ashley or Liara (in a completely tasteful scene, no less.)  Secondly, there is no sodomy in the game, nor is there any implied sodomy, so that second statement must come entirely from Mr. McCullough’s apparently vast imagination.  Finally, as anyone who bothered to even look at the game box would know, Mass Effect is not an online game, which makes the “virtual orgasmic rape” options extremely limited.

 

Mr. McCullough


A tip for Mr. McCullough:  If you want to tear down the game industry and rail against the sexual content in games, it might be helpful to do at least a little bit of research on the topic.  Is a quick playthrough of the game too much to ask?  How about a freakin’ wiki search, for God’s sake?!  There are certainly games like Leisure Suit Larry, Dead or Alive Extreme Beach Volleyball and pretty much anything released only in Japan that would do a better job of supporting his asinine arguments, but that would have required him to actually research the topic, and that’s just not his way.

 

The single most offensive moment in Mass Effect.  Shocking, I know.