KMIZ News Director Responds to Wii Story Criticism
Sometimes, even those with the best of intentions can get things wrong. Case in point? Missouri television station KMIZ ABC-17. Last week, the station ran a news piece warning parents about the dangers of sexual predators targeting children through online games. The focal point of the piece? Animal Crossing: City Folk on the Wii. Wait, what?
That’s right. The news report claimed that predators were targeting children via Nintendo’s virtual world, and even went so far as to show Mayor Tortimer in the game, claiming that “This character could be the man in California police are warning about tonight, that asked for images from Missouri children.” Doubtful to say the least, as anyone who’s played the game knows that, as frustrating as the aged little tortoise politician may be, he’s a computer controlled character. And in ALL my time with the game (which I wrote the Crispy review for), I can promise you that never once has Mayor Tortimer ever asked me to send him dirty pictures of myself or anyone else.
Of course, as sensationalized as the piece is, the reporter, Jacqueline Lapine, can’t take all the blame. It seems that a lot of the information came from Detective Andy Anderson of the Mid-Missouri Internet Crimes Task Force, who said, “I cannot come up with any legitimate reason that an adult would be playing that particular game.” Anderson went on to say that adults playing Animal Crossing and similar games are “likely doing it for the wrong reasons.”
After watching the story, I managed to get a hold of KMIZ News Director, Curtis Varns, to discuss the news piece. I explained how the game works, as well as how broad the demographic for the Animal Crossing franchise is. I even went so far as to point out the fact that I, myself, am a 33-year-old journalist who plays the game, and that Nintendo’s ad campaign for City Folk included spots featuring two adult women playing the game while casually chatting. Did that mean I could be considered a predator by the the standards of the story, or was Nintendo pandering to a pedophiliac crown by featuring adults playing a game which they apparently have no “legitimate reason” to be playing?
Varns responded saying, “I think Detective Anderson’s comments did take the story down an unintended path. We decided to do the story to let viewers know children had been contacted inappropriately through the game. It was not intended to be an indictment of the game or a smear piece on any form of interactive entertainment. The point of the story was to make parents aware so they could decide whether or not they needed to keep a watchful eye on their kids’ activities. The reporter even wrapped the story up by stressing police were not putting this information out to make people paranoid rather trying to make them aware. Upon reviewing the story, I fear much of the intent has been lost because of the comments we allowed into the story.”
Here’s the deal, folks. The video game industry is an entertainment industry, meant to entertain people of all ages, backgrounds, and tastes. Personally, I’m just as content to spend a couple of hours chasing butterflies with a net and digging up fossils in Animal Crossing as I am unloading a shotgun into swarms of the undead in Resident Evil 5. And while KMIZ may have said it wasn’t the story’s intention to indict or smear the game industry, you can’t help but wonder how an ill-informed parent might look at someone with a higher degree of suspicion after seeing that person playing a game that both the local police and news have said no adult has any reason to play. Detective Anderson may have been well meaning in his warning to parents, but both he and KMIZ reporter Jacqueline Lapine should have made sure they were better informed before making their statements to the public. Hopefully, by addressing the issue, the KMIZ news department can avoid a similar mistake in the future.
Only time will tell.
