Dear Amritsar,
For Valentine's Day, my parents got my brother the video game Deathdealer VIII: The Bottom of the Deck. That's the one where, to finish a fight, you stick your hand down your opponent's throat, pull out his spine and, with a pair of your victim's tibias, play it like a xylophone. I, on the other hand, got the Pinky Pinkerton in Pinktown video game. What? You've never heard of Pinky Pinkerton in Pinktown? Shocker! It's a game where you get to dress up one of six female characters in over 1,000 different outfits, all of them pink! I mean, I'm practically an adult - I'm almost seven - and this is the kind of Valentine's Day gift my parents get me?
Oh, Amritsar! When will there be cool games for girls to play?
Jessica Wabbit
Hey, Babe,
Life sucks, and then you're buried in something pink.
Let's be honest: the digital game industry (video is your grandparents medium) is dominated by teenage boys or men who wish they were still teenage boys - sort of like the bar scene in Seattle. But, uhh, that's beside the point. The point is that it should surprise no one that the games they create are geared towards the interests of this very small, but very lucrative market.
Oh, and, I wouldn't consider the ultraviolent games in the Deathdealer series "cool." Not unless you think the events depicted in the novel Lord of the Flies are "cool." The whole thrust of human evolution has been to tame the violent impulses inherent in man's nature. I'm not sure that the best use of this amazing technology is to pander to the barbaric violence that lies at the heart of every man's -
Tech Answer Guy here. If I may interject, I think your take on masculinity is too -
The Tech Answer Guy
Hey, Babe,
No, Tech Answer Guy, you may not interject.
But, I was going to quote science at you! I was going to be all well-reasoned and intellectual! You see, in evolutionary terms, what has come to be considered masculine behaviour was -
The Tech Answer Guy
Hey, Babe,
You've got your own space where you can quote Darwin at readers. Please, do not clog up mine.
Come on, baby, you know how it works. There's a three week lead time between when a column is written and when it appears in print. By the time I could respond to you in my own column, you would already have moved on to how to coordinate your bra and shoe size, or some shit like that. I didn't wanna -
The Tech Answer Guy
Hey, Babe,
Brenda! The Tech Answer Guy is intruding on my column again!
Aww, Jesus Begesus, do we really have to get the Editrix of the Alternate Reality News Service involved? Can't we settle this like Bogosian Snow Sheep?
The Tech Answer Guy
[BRENDA BRUNDTLAND-GOVANNI: Again? Seriously, you two, why can't you get along like adult advice columnists? Jesus Begesus, the two of you are lucky that my slapping gloves are out at the cleaners!]
So, about my question…?
Jessica Wabbit
[BRENDA BRUNDTLAND-GOVANNI: Nice shoes little girl. Did you choose them yourself, or did you go shopping with Frankenstein's monster? Tech Answer Guy! This had better be the last time you interrupt one of Amritsar's columns, or, so help me, I'll move your desk next to the Bogosian Snow Sheep pen!]
Yo, Brenda Brundtlandt-Govanni,
I hear, and I obey.
The Tech Answer Guy
[BRENDA BRUNDTLAND-GOVANNI: You better. Oh, and, Amritsar, would it kill you to grow a pair and deal with the Tech Answer Guy on your own? You should play a few rounds of Deathdealer VIII: The Bottom of the Deck - that'll toughen you up! I recommend Jorge the Jamaican Splatterer's foot removal move. You'll have nightmares for three days, but you'll be a better person for it!]
Hey, Babe,
So, there you have it. You should feel free to play games designed specifically for boys. And, if you're lucky, you, too can grow up to be a highly successful, if borderline psychotic, transdimensional journal editor!
Now, if you don't mind, Amritsar feels the need to sit in a candle-lit room and listen to a looped tape of waves washing over Hugh Jackman until the bad thoughts go away.
Send your relationship problems to the Alternate Reality News Service's sex, love and technology columnist at questions@lespagesauxfolles.ca. Amritsar Al-Falloudjianapour is not a trained therapist, but she does know a lot of stuff. AMRITSAR SAYS: Amritsar probably shouldn't admit this in public - she should probably save it for her Facebook fan page - but, there is something satisfying about putting your enemy's head on a pike and displaying it at the city gate. And, playing Deathdealer VIII can be fun, too!