Today while at lunch, Donna and I were watching TV - CNN to be precise. No, my TV will not ever be tuned to CNN, but when the proprietor of the restaurant has pre-selected CNN as the program of choice, I will watch what is presented.

An incredible piece aired which suggested that certain video games are now being sold which are produced by some students in Iran. The games are modeled after some Microsoft games on the market, but are nowhere near the quality of the Microsoft games.

What first caught my ear was the pro-terrorism slant of the games themselves. The story line in the games center on scientists, Middle Eastern scientists, working in military application laboratories. They are pursued by the bad guys, military types from the west. Apart from the propaganda these games represent, there is the blatant manner in which they are being insinuated into our culture, which is surprising to me, but which did not even merit a comment (at least not while I was watching).

The article however, focused primarily on the difference in quality of the special effects of the foreign versus the Microsoft game offerings. My Dad used to say of someone he thought not to be attending to the business at hand, "The light is on, but nobody's home." Hello.

As I sat eating my barbeque sandwich, I couldn't get over the manner in which the "talking heads" (newsmen and newswomen) seriously discussed the video games on the basis of how superior the western games were over those produced by the eastern students. That the message of the foreign video was pro-Islam and pro-terrorist, was not even dealt with, except in the most cursory fashion.

Then, as if to add insult to injury, the topic of discussion turned to a debate about the "value" of video games in general. "Studies" (not named) are now suggesting that eye/hand coordination is superior in those who play many video games. Our military also touts the use of videos as military training tools. Several other suggestions of the benefits of video games were discussed before there was an ever so brief acknowledgment that there could be negative results associated with video games.

Suddenly, I found myself feeling old and out of touch. I remembered hearing a lot of discussions during my teenage years about the John Birch Society, and its members, who, as right wing fanatics, were convinced there is a communist behind every bush. I remembered hearing the "Birchers" being ridiculed for their political activities, their strange ideas regarding the world and the politics of the world. I remember asking why they were so frightened? What were they afraid of?

Then I realized, "they were not asleep at the switch" regardless of their points of view. Maybe we could learn something from earlier generations. Maybe we are being numbed by the constant chatter from the talking heads. Maybe we should think for ourselves. Maybe, just a little.

Having finished the barbeque sandwich, I turned to the Brunswick Stew. Excellent. But I couldn't get the bad taste out of my mouth. Not the stew or the sandwich, but the feeling that I was watching Bizaro TV. Maybe you remember Bizaroland from the Superman Comics. Everything seemed backward.

Then I ran across an Associated Press article out of Reno, Nevada, which put my head back on my shoulders, at least a little straighter. It reported about a couple in Reno who were charged with child neglect, and their excuse was that they were so obsessed with the Internet and video games that they left their babies starving and suffering other health problems. They allowed as much while entering their pleas of guilty.

That's more like it. Video games fry your brain. Everybody knows that. - What am I saying? What about the babies? A boy age 22 months and a girl age 11 months, were severely malnourished and near death last month when social workers took them to a hospital, authorities said. Both children are doing well and gaining weight in foster care, prosecutor Kelli Ann Viloria told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Want to hear something else? "They had food; they just chose not to give it to their kids because they were too busy playing video games" . But do you really want to hear something that will make you crazy? The net upshot of the article - Is it possible to become addicted to video games, much like alcohol or drugs? Is there a new legal defense out there? Whether it is possible or not, we have a problem. We must remember, or maybe consider for the first time, our enemies will exploit anything to get to us.

Wouldn't it be a shame, if the most technologically advanced society in the history of the world was defeated by an ideology which some say has not progressed much beyond its Seventh Century AD origin? Worse yet, that they did it by numbing our minds with our own technology?

From an article in The Bartow Trader, Dated Tuesday-July 17, 2007
By: Thomas J. "Jim" Hough, Jr