My battle with the Toronto Sun

Personall, I consider The Sun closer to a tabloid. It is very very similar to The Sun in the United Kingdom and Ireland and very much modeled after it.

 

why is it that everything you write, ends up with me on the floor laughing out loud?

The Toronto sun has always been one to push the boundries, but this went to far....


Ryan

 

I have sent them a letter, where I spoke formal Danish to the new email adress.

 

Well guys, if you get a bounce back, try one of these two.
marilyn.frgueroa@tor.sunpub.com
readership@tor.sunpub.com

if one is down, they other will work for sure
and if anyone gets a reply please post it on here.

 

This person sent me this email...They sent the same copy to The Sun
Please note my name has been blocked
Good Morning Mr. Jennings,

Please note that I am very well aware of all the e-mails you are currently receiving on the cover story from last week. About the taxi driver who was killed in a car accident.

I am aware of this because it's actually been noted as a big issue for the gamer who are online. That's right, this situation has been noted online. I myself would like to state my opnion on the matter at hand, not as a gamer but just as a reader. I'm well aware that I personal have no school in publication of News papers or any other type of publication for that matter.

However I was always under the impression that News Papers where a way for the general public to find out what's been going on in the world. To be kept up to date with FACTS. What ever happened to the well known frase "Innocent till proven guilty". I know what you're thinking. What does that have to do with the article at hand. But you see Mr. Jennings, it has everything to do with it. How can you blame a game for the death of an innocent man before knowing ALL the facts on the matter.

Video games are used to entertain people, not the other way around. They are created based on peoples interests. What sells and what doesn't sell. You of all people should know what that's like. Did you not state in a conversation with Mr. ******** that you printed that cover page as eye candy so that it would sell??
People who purchase games do so based on their interests, which I'm sure is the reason why the 2 gentleman who caused the accident had the game. I know that this whole situation has gotten out of hand in your eyes. However you need to understand the views of the people who read your paper.

Many of which are now bashing many gaming industries, based on the article you printed. Other who are in the game industry and are sick to their stomach, with the rubbish that was printed. To you it may be looked at as just another cover story that sells. To other's it's looked at as an attack on all the gaming industries. I personal feel it's unfair to those in the industry. DO NOT GET ME WRONG, I personal hate gaming more then anyone. I find it to be a waste of time. However I do understand the points of those who enjoy it, and look at it as a part of their life. Which is something you're choosing not to do.
It is in your best interests to take into consideration the thoughts and views of your readers. However for some reason you felt the need to belittle Mr. ********, before getting ALL the facts on why he felt the way he did. If this is how you're dealing with readers of your Paper how am I to expect to be getting ALL the facts on article, or stories written in your paper.

Thank you for taking the time out of what I'm sure if a busy day to read my e-mail. I only hope that you allow what I've had to say to sink in a little, and maybe even take some time to try to understand where Mr. ******* is coming from.

 

btw, when i saw that topic here i thought you'd post pictures of your sunburnt back

i wrote them an email, too...

 

Writer speaks!!

I would like to thank everyone here at ASSEMbler for there support and for those who did voice there opinion to The Sun, and also to Kotaku for covering this story as well.

Thanks for writing. You may not know this, but reporters don’t write headlines. We just write the story and send it in. The editors create the headlines and the front page. Look, the lead cop said Need for Speed may have contributed to the crash. Hence the headline. But I want to send you a short opinion piece I wrote this morning. I was going to put it up on a new blog I’m starting, but we couldn’t get it to work yet. So here it is for you:


No doubt, we media hacks will be tripping over ourselves today on the issue of video games and their influence on behaviour in the wake of the alleged street-racing murder of Toronto cabbie Tahir Khan. Read my story about Khan here and the video game that may have contributed to his death.

Add your voice or comments here. Some random thoughts:

The lead cop on this case, Det. Paul Lobsinger, was careful with his words. He made it clear the game
Need For Speed, found on the front seat of one of the suspect’s cars, may have contributed to the crash, but it wasn’t solely to blame.

Indeed, drag racing, speed-addicted yahoos, car crashes and vehicular homicide date back to when the first cars rolled off the assembly lines. (Many cops will tell you, however, that attitudes have changed and kids are more reckless and more prone to race on city streets today than yesteryear, when muscle cars stuck to the remote country roads.)

So can a street racing video game influence a player to take his or her “need for speed†out into the city? Can a first-person shooter turn a young player into a real-life killing machine?

A major review of the last 20 years of research on violent video games and behaviour published last August by the American Psychological Association found a definite link between such games and increased aggression. In one study of more than 600 Grade 8 and 9 students, the more kids played video games, the more likely they were to be rated by their teachers as hostile. Read a summary of the study here.

Studies like this are ammunition for parent activists against media
violence, such as Toronto’s own The Free Radical and its founder, Valerie Smith. She’s taken on everyone, from controversial rappers to violent games such as Manhunt, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Postal 2. Check out her complaint to the Ontario Human Rights Commission against The Star.

Toronto is also home to one of the leading skeptics on the link between media violence and behaviour. Professor Jonathan Freedman did his own review of the research in 2000 and found no link, although many of his peers disagree. Freedman writes:

“The scientific evidence simply does not show that watching violence either produces violence in people or desensitizes them to it.â€

My opinion? We need to own up to the fact that we’re in a brave new world of simulated violence and insanity. Twenty years ago, gamers chased ghosts, shot down spaceships and helped a little frog cross the road. Today, it’s about killing cops, murdering innocent passersby (the bloodier the better), stealing cars and mowing down anyone in your way.

I recently played Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. The first night after playing, I dreamt I went on a violent rampage, stabbing anyone who walked close to me. So yes, the game is brutal and it imprinted on some part of my subconscious.

It didn’t turn me into a killer. None of my friends who play similar games has changed for the worse. Of course, we’re all educated adults, well-adjusted people who can easily distinguish between fantasy and reality.

But I do fear for children, my own 10-year-old nephew being one: I shudder when he tells me (with a smirk) that he’s played Grand Theft Auto.

Like everything else these days, it falls on parents to get involved. Limit your child’s exposure to violent video games, but don’t be so naïve as to think they’re not going to play somewhere else. Instead, tell them what’s wrong about the violence and images, tell them why you don’t like it, tell them why it’s unacceptable.

Give them a moral compass and they’ll find their way safely through the filth when they inevitably trudge through it.



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Just as I suspected, total bullshit.

Yeah no shit. Know what this tells me? It tells me that cop has his head up his ass.

 

http://www.myextralife.com/archive.php?date=2006-01-30