Main > A rebuttal to Michael Prabhu and the Metamorphose website

A rebuttal to Michael Prabhu and the Metamorphose website

A few years ago, I discovered a website titled "Metamorphose," hosted at www.ephesians-511.net. It is the website of a Catholic ministry based in India, and it boasts a collection of many .doc files on various subjects that the keeper of the site, Michael Prabhu, considers dangerous to the spiritual lives of Catholics - things like meditation, yoga, color therapy, divination, and many other New Age types of activities.

I discovered this site because it makes mention of my website, in two different document files - Toys R Not Us and New Age Children's Entertainment - both about the alleged dangers of certain children's toys and popular games. As I read these two documents, I discovered a lot of claims about the nature and purpose of my site that are untrue. Therefore, I have prepared this rebuttal to the claims made by Mr. Prabhu on his ministry website, in the interest of setting the record straight.

In a nutshell, Mr. Prabhu makes the following claims about thescapist.com and the advocacy work that I do here:

- That theescapist.com is an anti-Christian website
- That I have no concern one way or the other over whether fantasy games are dangerous for young people
- That I mock "Christian concerns about fantasy"
- That by posting the articles about murders and suicides that have been connected to RPGs, I am supporting the claim that these games are dangerous

I CARE - I REALLY DO!

Rather than paraphrase Mr. Prabhu's words, I would like to quote each of his statements directly. First, from "New Age Children's Entertainment,"


First, a brief history lesson - the Magic: The Gathering and Pokémon collectible card games were both wildly popular in the early years of this website's history, and both were drawing lots of attention from concerned parents and religious groups alike. Lots of claims were made about the dangers that these two games could present to players - claims that bore a striking resemblance to the claims made about Dungeons & Dragons and other RPGs. The fact that both of these card games were produced by the same company that owned the D&D brand was even more fuel for their fire. For these reasons, I used to include stories about CCGs here on the site, confronting the myths and addressing the concerns just as I did for roleplaying games. Since the CCG craze has died out in the passing years, I have narrowed the focus of the site once more to promoting the roleplaying hobby.

Now, to Mr. Prabhu's comment about the site. For some reason, he has the impression that my site is simply a collection of articles about crimes related to fantasy games, and that I "couldn't care less" about whether these games are bad for the players or not. Perhaps he hasn't browsed the old Advocacy page archives to see my commentary on these stories, or read the main FAQ page, where I explain the nature of these games and address the concerns directly. Maybe if he had, he wouldn't have this impression of the site.

Here's the truth: I do care. I would never endorse a game that was dangerous for young people. I have no reason to. I would get no benefit from  it.  I do, however, happen to be a huge fan of young people, and I know from firsthand experience that many of them enjoy fantasy games. I also have firsthand experience that games like Dungeons & Dragons, Magic: The Gathering and Pokémon are great for developing strategy, problem solving, teamwork, and social skills, all of which are beneficial to young people.

...and, in a rational, level-headed manner, examines the claims that those crimes are in any way actually gaming-related. (You forgot this part, Mr. Prabhu!)

QUOTE MINING, AND WHY IT'S BAD

Here, Mr. Prabhu does a bit of "quote-mining" - a deceptive practice in which a person's own words are turned against them. This is a quote from the paper I wrote in 1995 that would eventually grow into this website: Roleplaying Games: The Stigmas and Benefits.

Mr. Prabhu leaves out a whole lot of context surrounding this quote. If you don't have the time to read the paper, I'll summarize for you: This part of the paper was discussing how all of us have participated in play violence as children (playing cops and robbers), how fantasy violence isn't necessarily bad for you, how many people consider Karate-based self-esteem programs - which involve actually hitting real people as opposed to pretending to - to be positive for children, and, most importantly, that fantasy games like Dungeons & Dragons can easily have the violence "turned down," since the players and gamemaster control the story - unlike any other form of entertainment.

You can easily see why Mr. Prabhu chose to leave all of that context out. It would have completely defused his point.

Quote mining is a particularly annoying practice to cope with, as it usually requires a lot of rebuttal to correct.  Allow me to demonstrate: 

"The Escapist ... a gaming advocacy site, established 1995 - is one of the best sources of general information available on role-playing games and related issues." - Michael Prabhu, "Metamorphose" (www.ephesians-511.net)

While this quote is direct from the author (I only edited out the word "Archives" from the title), it doesn't accurately express what was being said. I would be proud to put such a glowing review on the front page of the site, but I won't, because what's missing is the context:

“THE ESCAPIST ARCHIVES”- A GAMING ADVOCACY SITE, ESTABLISHED 1995 -IS ONE OF THE BEST SOURCES OF GENERAL INFORMATION AVAILABLE ON ROLE-PLAYING GAMES AND RELATED ISSUES. 

“THE ESCAPIST” IS ALSO PRO- RPG AND ANTI-CHRISTIAN. AFTER MUCH DELIBERATION, I DECIDED TO INCLUDE IN THIS ARTICLE INFORMATION FROM “THE ESCAPIST ARCHIVES” THAT I BELIEVE WILL CONTRIBUTE TO A GREATER UNDERSTANDING OF THE COMPLEX ISSUES OF THE GAMING SCENARIO.

Here, Mr. Prabhu begins shouting to us about my site. Since all-caps text makes my head hurt, I will try to quickly address the main contention I have with this wall of text.

The Escapist is not an anti-Christian site.  I have always made every effort to respect the religious beliefs of others in my work here. Anyone who doubts this should look here and here - two answers on the basic FAQ page that all are encouraged to read when they first visit the site. Those answers would be very different indeed, if this were an anti-Christian website. The front page of the site even hosts links to the Christian Gamers Guild and Fans For Christ (and is linked to from them, as well) - something that would not likely be seen with an anti-Christian site.

I am aware that some would view the site as anti-Christian in the "either with us or against us" sense, that it is not specifically a PRO-Christian site - in much the same way that a site about crocheting, softball, or the Fender vs. Gibson debate would also be considered anti-Christian. I'm not really interested in entering into a discussion with that sort of mindset. It's wrong, period.

And what in the world is "gladitorial gaming?" I don't think I've ever heard that term used before.

BACK TO THE QUOTE MINES!

From there, Mr. Prabhu does something very deceptive and dishonest. He copies large portions of my website, including the aforementioned paper, and edits out the parts that do not support his opinion. For example, a section of the Stigmas and Benefits paper mentioned the possible downsides of roleplaying games and collectible card games - they can be addictive, expensive, and there are a few on the market that are graphic and may use occultic themes. (By the way - this, Mr. Prabhu, is called being objective.) But the paragraph after that one, in which I explain how most hobbies are just as addictive and expensive, and how the violence and occult issues can always be changed to suit the players' needs, is absent from his exerpt.

Again, this is another example of quote mining. Patricia Pulling, the mother of a boy who killed himself in 1983 and who would begin a campaign to hold Dungeons & Dragons responsible for his death, used to do the same thing in her anti-D&D literature (for an example, visit the FAQ page). It is dishonest, underhanded, and often illegal.

Mr. Prabhu, what you have done here is wrong. It is a bearing of false witness, and I'm certain if you check your Bible, you'll find that there's a commandment against such things - check Exodus 20:16. While you have it open, have a look at Leviticus 19:11, Deuteronomy 5:20, Proverbs 12:22, Ephesians 4:25 (just one chapter in front of your website's namesake), and Revelation 21:8.

The page continues to snip text from various parts of the archived articles, with some choice words of text highlighted in red and with any opposing viewpoint carefully cropped out (please check those verses again, Mr. Prabhu!). He quotes a story from the Stephanie Crowe murder, but leaves out the story about how the crime was committed by a local transient, and not her gamer brother and his friends. He does the same with the Jason Blad case, quoting the original crime and the attempted connections to role-playing, but leaving out the story where Blad admitted that he was inspired by Marine recon training.

Rebutting the whole of this would take a very long time and be of interest to no one - all that I can do is suggest that if you are looking at a particular part of this document and would like to read the full, unabridged story, please try to find it in my website's archives. If you need assistance, I would be glad to help - just drop me an email and I'll do what I can for you.

TOYS R NOT US

That pretty much wraps it up for the first document.The second document, "Toys R Not Us," makes one brief mention of the site:
 
There is a lot to cover in this brief mention, however - so I'm going to have to break it into parts.


The articles that I "unashamedly" link to and archive are put here to point out the problems of blaming a game for emotional and psychological problems. The suicides, murders, and other crimes that I report on here are all terrible, and I never enjoy finding new ones - but I'm also troubled when people who are desperate for answers and closure (or in some cases, eager to collect tithes or sell something) point to a game as the sole, root cause of corruption.

From reading this, a person would likely think that the only articles covered on this site are about murder, suicide, and other crimes connected to gamers. It doesn't take a lot of clicking to find articles on the benefits of roleplaying in schools,  libraries, and the military,  interviews with gamers (many of whom are Christians), gamers and game companies doing charity work, and much more positive promotion of the hobby. But then, if Mr. Prabhu pointed these out, it wouldn't help his case very much. It's much more convenient to simply pretend they don't exist.



One of my favorite ways to get a point across is through humor. You will see examples of it in this very rebuttal, in fact - and there is no better way to expose a crazy idea for what it is than by mocking it. You won't find me mocking anyone's religion here, but you will see the occasional mocking of ideas like "Dungeons & Dragons teaches children how to cast real occult spells" and "roleplaying games are an indoctrination tool for Masonic Satan-worshipping cultist vampires."  Those are the types of crazy ideas that need to be mocked, not spread as gospel truth.

As for discussing real, actual Christian concerns about fantasy, check the FAQ page again, where you'll find that I conduct myself with much more maturity.


Fantasy, for the most part, is harmless. I'm not sure what "turning those fantasies inward" is supposed to mean (and I have my suspicions that it really means nothing), but all of us played make-believe as children. Many adults still do it - professionals role-play to better understand their clients and customers, police and the military role-play to help prepare themselves for hostile situations, actors and actresses role-play to better portray their characters. Recreational role-play is no worse than any of these things.

There are some who bring pre-existing problems to all of these situations. There are some who honestly believe that they are vampires, and may even bring that to a game with them beforehand. That doesn't make the role-playing dangerous, nor does it mean that no one else should be allowed to play.


I am amazed at this statement. It's one of the biggest examples of someone totally missing the point that I have ever seen. Posting and archiving the articles here does not contradict the argument, it supports it.

Consider again the case of Stephanie Crowe, a young girl murdered in her home by a local transient, whose brother and his friend were blamed for the crime based on a coerced confession that both played Dungeons & Dragons.  Or the first ever suicide to be blamed on Dungeons & Dragons, that of James Dallas Egbert, which was really the story of a confused, troubled child. The investigator hired to find him used a game as a smokescreen to protect his family from rumors and gossip (and inadvertently gave a kickstart to the entire myth that roleplaying games are evil and dangerous).

Consider all of the other articles that are archived here, that attempt to make the link between fantasy games and crime. Blaming a game for these terrible acts not only propagates an untruth, it clouds our vision when looking for real answers in the future.

IN CONCLUSION

Mr. Prabhu, it appears from the comments on your site that you have an impression of me as a depraved man who gleefully collects articles on murders and suicides, promotes games that help destroy lives, and hates Christians and Christianity. If you were to meet me in person, you would find this to be very far from the truth. In fact, I would even go so far as to suggest that if you looked around my website a bit more, rather than scanning for articles to quote mine, you would get a much more accurate picture of the kind of person that I am.

I certainly cannot control what you put on your website, and I would never want to. I also happen to be a huge fan of free speech, and that includes all speech, no matter how mistaken, misguided, or misleading it may be. The greatest thing about free speech is that it works both ways - you do not get to control what I put on my site, either. I have included a link to this rebuttal on every page of my site that you have linked to in your two documents. Everyone who comes to my site from yours, no matter what page they enter from, will have an opportunity to hear my side of the story and judge for themselves. 

Since my side of the story is free from conjecture, superstition, paranoia, baseless accusations, and quote mining, I am confident that the more rationally-minded among your readers will realize that the truth is here.

Thank you for your time.

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