I am appalled at this story. The “game” involves
“Players begin the game by stalking a mother on a subway station before violently raping her. They then move on to attack her two daughters described as virgin schoolgirls. ”
Once exposed Amazon have beaten a hasty retreat with this :
“Amazon spokeswoman Patty Smith said: “We’ve removed this title from our site. We determined that we did not want to be selling this particular item.”
Patty has to apologise quite frequently for Amazon wanting to make money despite offensive behaviour by Amazon.
Banning sales of the Koran? Click here.
Infringing patents? Click here.
Exploiting UK workers? Click here.
Fiddling the accounts? Click here.
I could google on. What’s pretty clear is that Amazon’s corporate culture, is one of make money first, ask questions second.
I think it is very sad that Patty Smith just keeps on apologising rather than tackling the corporate culture. I do not want anybody sacked, but I do want Amazon to be open about what happened. I want to know which “executives” bought this game. I want to know how many “executives” played this game and thought it was “fun” I want to know their names. I want to see the notes on who they thought their market was? How much money they projected making. All these seedy, sleazy men and women who work for Amazon and thought making some money out of rape was mighty fine by them.
I want to know the names of all the contaminated people, not one of whom had the conscience to whistle blow.
Then let’s publish the names on the internet they make their living from, so their friends, neighbours and colleagues know these are the people who think rape is a nice fantasy, and “just a bit of fun”.
If one of them goes out and rapes a woman having been allowed by Amazon to consider rape is something that is just a game to make money out of; up will pop Patty Smith, Director of Corporate Affairs claiming this is just an “isolated” lapse.
In one of those you could not make it up coincidences Amazon sell a film called “The Shame of Patty Smith” and it is about gang rape.
Are you stupid? Do you think Amazon “executives” play every game and read every book?
I’m sorry, but do you really think that people at Amazon play every single game they sell? It would be logistically impossible. Chances are that no-one at Amazon played the game, otherwise it would never have been released for sale. Don’t you think that anyone from Amazon who played it would immediately see that it had massive potential to cause a huge amount of negative publicity?
I expect you to take back your slur on the people at Amazon and make an apology. If you want to have a go at anybody then have a go at the people who designed the game.
it’s also interesting to note that the koran incident you cite was actually not due to the direct action of either Patty Smith or any Amazon employee, but rather a third party reseller that held it’s own (used) stock and despatched it directly to the customer.
Regrettable, certainly, but how is it the fault of anyone at Amazon? If you were to buy a can of beans say, from you local supermarket, which were not sold under their label but another manufacturers, and then found they were substandard, how could you truthfully say it was the direct fault of the supermarket or one of it’s employees? Frankly, I think by admitting their mistake and swiftly making amends Amazon have acted entirely correctly – an action quite a number of your colleagues at this time would be well to follow the example of, and if they were to would be of far better benefit to this country than the banning of a computer game very few people will play – or indeed would have even heard of before now.
Or do you really think, in the situation facing the UK at this time, this is a sensible use of your time?
I’ve seen films and played games with content such as murder, torture, drug taking, drug dealing, robbery, assassination, bisexuality, sexual violence and the list goes on and on.
Mmmmm, what shall l do tomorrow? l know, l’ll go to work and earn a living for my wife and two kids as l always have. After work l’ll take them out for tea and go bowling. Mayhem will have to wait for another day.
Maybe you can’t distinguish between fantasy and real life and feel a need to protect all us poor citizens. Well Miss Know-it-all l’m sorry to burst your bubble but we can tell the difference so butt out!
You clearly have no idea how the real world functions.
Oh dear dear dear. Thats the catholics, videogamers, internet users, libertarians, smokers, deviants, and the zanier parts of the pro-palestinian left now alienated. Never mind. The last time you had a go at a major corporation–ryanair–they deserved it, so I suppose this just balances the karma. Be careful of m’learned friends though, Mary.
As an aside, where has your strong condemnation of corrupt Labour ministers disappeared to? It was one of the last posts on your old blog and seems to have mysteriously been lost when it comes to your new one, though of course I may be mistaken.
I do not expect this comment to be edited.
OK, so once you’ve published executives’ names on the internet , ‘so their friends, neighbours and colleagues know these are the people who think rape is a nice fantasy, and “just a bit of fun”‘, what do you want ‘their friends, neighbours and colleagues’ (and everyone else) to do ? Attack their cars ? Smash their windows ? Firebomb their homes ? you realy are a nasty, vindictive piece of work, aren’t you ?
Well, isn’t this set of comments a perfect illustration of India Knight’s point http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/india_knight/article5733634.ece
Come on guys, you may disagree with Mary, but why not debate the issue in an adult and polite way?
Mary – I tend to agree with you that Amazon could do a lot better. Even if they can’t vet every 3rd party product they could have some sort of flagging system so customers could quickly alert them.
However, I think the bigger issue is that this game exists at all. What sort of sick person wants to play at rape?
Fiona. I think the truth is that the internet is a free space. What amazon does approximates to that–it brings people and the products of people’s minds or wishes together. Allowing offence to be registered and to lead to some then inevitable ban procedure would mean that Amazon suddenly had some huge cost and its business model was complicated. So public decency, in a sense, depends upon outrage being filtered ‘upwards’ unless you want some censorious policy that ends up worrying about everything.
What about Lolita, or Germinal (there’s a horrible industrial castration by mob story there). Or photographic histories of lynching, or assaults on religion, or a book on how to cook veal, or dogs? Everyone could get outraged by these. I admit the rape game is appalling–but, really, so is any videogame that depends on killing or beating. The latter are still fun to some, who can distinguish between reality and the sicker and darker parts of human enjoyment.
I think part of the problem on this post–sorry for the long message–is that Mary has spent a good deal of time, some good naturedly or instinctively, insulting people and has stirred up a hornets nest.
My own response is to suggest either not to dish it out, and enable comment moderation, or to take it all on and engage with debate. As for your cheap shot about the whole set of comments–well, stop patronising people, take the shackles off your mind, and think.
By the way, if you are the Fiona Colley who is a Labour Councillor in Southwark, well done on the East London line
And, good god, I agree with India Knight. I once went onto Harry’s Place, which is a hate site pretending to be left wing, with a piece about the Southall Black Sisters who were under threat in Ealing. They probably disagree with everything I am, and yet they save lives, so they’re a good cause. The abuse and poison people came out with was unbelievable, and I think it’s just par for the course on the internet. One good thing I will say about Mary is that she hasn’t generally censored anything–which was why I was disappointed in her when that Labour corruption story was not moved to the new blog.
Fiona – thankyou for your support. I agree – why does this game exist at all? It’s a very bad day indeed when rape becomes a game.
It’s therefore important that more of us who believe in improving women’s lives should stand up against the likes of amazon.com when they do something unacceptable.
‘It’s therefore important that more of us who believe in improving women’s lives should stand up against the likes of amazon.com when they do something unacceptable.’
and what of the game developers? the publishers? I’m led to believe this is a Japanese game, never intended or offered for release outside of their market. As well as being sold in the US to a US customer.
As I asked you before, and you completely ignored – look at the state of this country, thanks to your fellow Party members. look at the endemic sleaze and corruption they’re engaged in, and look how deep the hole they’ve so kindly dug for is us. look at the infringements of civil liberties they are responsible for. and you think banning a videogame will make everything better?
when you do tune into Sanity FM, you will let us know wont you?
AJS and Michael I do not think Amazon play every game but they were quite happy to see a title called Rapelay and the picture should have regsitered something surely? No one could be bothered to check.
Martin thank you for your kindness yes I lost a post moving to wordpress it is back up now.
Thomas I agree Japanese authorities are wrong, but I have no locus there. On politics this country is a vastly better place after 12 years of Labour. Any examination of the facts shows that. You are welcome to your opinions but they do not seem to be based on any facts. Here are 50 facts for you and those of you who seem to ignore what Labour has delivered for everybody.
http://www.gofourth.co.uk/put_away_your_white_flag_matthew