Dad Hires Digital Assassins To Murder His Son (Digitally)
from the awwwwwww dept
While the overwhelming evidence continues to show that video games aren't responsible for turning children or adults into little murder monsters, that doesn't mean there are no negatives to gaming. I don't have children, but I imagine some parents can find it a pain to get their kids to take care of their responsibilities when all they want to do is play games. The question is what do you do about it?
Well, according to one dad in China, you murder the s%@$ out of you kid over and over and over again. Digitally, that is.
Frustrated by his adult son's incessant gaming habit, a man in China reportedly hired a number of in-game master “hitmen” to annihilate his son's avatar over and over again in an attempt to deter him from playing.
Quoting China's Sanqin Daily, Kotaku reports that the fed-up father, identified only as “Mr. Feng,” decided to embark on this cyber murder plot as his son seemed incapable of pulling himself away from the computer long enough to find a job.
I have to admit, I love this guy. Your kid likes to play games too much? Hire a bunch of better gamers to make his gaming life a digital nightmare. I imagine if the kid wouldn't stop playing basketball, Dad would get LeBron James on the phone and hire him to shadow the young man and block every shot he attempted.
Regardless, I think we may have to tip our hat to this guy. It would have been quite easy for him to blame the games, call it an addiction, or do any number of things to abdicate his responsibility as a parent. But no, Mr. Feng scrapped some money together and paid people to digitally shoot his son. That is parenting, people.
Filed Under: china, parenting, video games
Comments on “Dad Hires Digital Assassins To Murder His Son (Digitally)”
Now, that is creative parenting.
Is this cyberbullying?
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yes
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Pretty freaking awesome cyberbullying though.
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No it’s not.
In fact it’s quite ethical and well thought out on the fathers behalf.
Bullying is continued harassment, in no way is this actual harassment since its part of the rules of whatever game the son is already playing online and there is always the chance for the avatar to be destroyed/killed within game anyway.
The only place this could backfire if if the son gets good enough at the game to then destroy the assassins, who in that instance might then (they would be silly not too) offer him a job as a ‘cyber assassin’, therefore fulfilling the fathers original goal to get his son working.
Mr. Feng has been added to my list of personal heroes!
This shows everyone how to do Parenting in the 2010s right.
Maybe pulling the plug would have come out cheaper… (and more effective).
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Perhaps, but that can backfire. His son might have looked at his father as a meddling interloper in his hobby, making him more defiant and more determined to keep spending his time on the computer.
Instead, his father tried to alter his son’s experience in his virtual world, to make his son no longer want to play.
Now, his son has found out his father was behind it, so he may end up going back to play anyway, but it does appear at least to have encouraged his son to stop and think about what was going on and why.
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I’ve been doing something similar. The idea is to make the experience worse so that your loved one can more easily kick the habit. Though I suspect this is safer than the asbestos I’ve been adding to my son’s crack stash.
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How are you finding asbestos?
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I’ve been selling it to him on the black market.
Want some, real cheap.
Only down side is, this house I live in gets pretty cold.
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Good asbestos is harder to come by than crack.
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My old high school’s old cafeteria was closed due to asbestos, little do they know I’ve been harvesting it the whole time.
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From personal experience the biggest problem today with parenting and video games is a complete gap in knowledge between the two sides.
A lot of parents generally take the all or nothing approach, do it now or else. Completely ignoring the point that there are more convenient points to stop at (ie waypoints / save points, in between multiplayer matches, etc). It’s really rather unfortunate because in a lot of cases waiting for that point of convenience is within 5 minutes.
In such cases it’s easy to get upset at being inconvenienced for no discernable reason. When a scenario like that is constantly repeated well, it’s not a good situation for anyone.
In the particular case in the highlighted article, seems to me that by the time they need to be looking for a job, a parents ability to enforce their will upon them is quite limited. This method leaves the choice up to the kid, “Yeah sure you can keep playing, but I’ve hired cyber goons to repeatedly gank you, good luck =). I’ll call them off if you do as you were asked and make an effort to find a job.”
It’s a rather ingenius way of dealing with the somewhat extreme situation in his hands. As for being expensive, well this did happen in China…
abdicate
(BTW, it’s “abdicate”.)
Sun Tzu would be proud.
There's a service to start
See all of the new business opportunities opening up?
Come One! Come All!
Is your child engaging in too much HALO? Have they abandoned shoveling the driveway in lieu of World of Warcraft? Are you tired of having to move their feet to vacuum the living room floor?
Fear Not! We have the answer!
Our experienced Digital Assassins will kick their ass so quickly that they will spend more time creating new characters than actually playing! We can make their gaming experience suck so badly that shoveling the walkway sounds GOOD!
Then there is the flip side…
Come One! Come All!
Would you like your gaming experience to not suck? Are3 you tired of our experiences gamers killing you as soon as you enter?
Fear Not! We have the answer!
Our experienced Digital Assassins will stop kicking your ass so quickly for the low, low price of $10 per month. Or, perhaps you REALLY suck and would like one of our Digital Assassins to follow and protect you? We can offer that service for an additional $7 per month! For $15, we will target the avatar of your choice for 30 straight days simply because you don’t like them!
Re: There's a service to start
New Xbox Live Message
From: xX Jimmy Hoffa Xx
Message:
That’s a nice Spartan you’ve created there. Would be a shame if something were to happen to it. We can protect him for 800MSP a month.
Re: There's a service to start
Digital bodyguards to the rescue.
Re: There's a service to start
Help Wanted, Digital Assassin
Minimal Requirements:
No less than five years experience
Able frag fifteen times before getting fragged once
Must frag target no less than twenty five times an hour
Recommended Requirements:
Must be good at taunting, name calling, and making the target feel worthless
Base Pay $8 per hour plus $.50 per frag commission
If you are interested call me at 555-555-5555
Re: There's a service to start
you should play eve. that’s actually a viable and well practiced business strategy.
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To a point.
While EVE doesn’t have a problem with contract killings, (Death is a big deal in this game) but doing so over and over again is considered griefing and will earn you a ban.
Online game companies already go after gold farmers because they make the game less fun for everyone else. Next thing you know there will be a huge crackdown on organized griefing for the same reason.
I like it
I was thinking of stealing my daughter’s video controller and hiding it until she got a job. But then she finally did get a job so I didn’t need to.
Re: I like it
Your daughter’s a gamer?
…is she over the age of 18, per chance?
Cue up a new excuse: “But dad! I’m being paid to kill this dude. I have a real job.”
Have (digital) sword. Will travel(digitally).
Avatars slain, dragons castrated, if you’re willing to pay for it, I’m willing to do it. @Paladin
Re: Have (digital) sword. Will travel(digitally).
You forgot the “virgins cured for food” part 😉
Re: Have (digital) sword. Will travel(digitally).
OP Paladin
All you need to know is that I’m the best at what I do, and all I need to know is the target. Names aren’t important…
Meet me at the Pig and Whistle Tavern in the Stormwind Old Town, we’ll talk details there. I’ll be the lvl 90 rogue sitting in the corner.
The arms race around this is going to be brilliant.
This makes me wonder whether my parents are far more cunning then I give them credit for… or if I just suck at online gaming.
It’s funny he’s earning so much respect from you guys considering he obviously doesn’t have his son’s respect. Otherwise he could just say, “No more video games until you get a job” and that’d be the end of it. Instead he has to resort to this bizare plot to cajole his son to doing what he wants. Pathetic.
Especially considering the “kid” is 23 years old. How about, “Get a job or get out”?
Re: The Law of Unintended Consequences is not Mocked
“It’s funny he’s earning so much respect from you guys considering he obviously doesn’t have his son’s respect.”
“Another implication of the one-child policy is what’s referred to as the ‘little emperor’ syndrome. Some social psychologists contend that many Chinese children, because they have no siblings, are not properly socialized into society. And in fact, these so-called Chinese singletons have been accused of being over-indulged, lacking in self discipline and having no adaptive capabilities.”
Do the math.
Re: Re: The Law of Unintended Consequences is not Mocked
It’s wrong to blame the fact that a kid is spoiled and/or unsocialized on being an only child. It’s entirely possible to raise an only child and provide plenty of socialization and proper discipline.
The real problem is bad parenting.
imma going to take a different position from everyone else so far, yes its creative, but it is still fundamentally a lazy fix to bad parenting, if a kid has gotten into one of the worse cases of gaming addiction(like the guys starving to death) taking it away is not a solution and it will make things worse even if u dont see any over superficial issues op up
im thinking of a experiment done where they repeated the “heroin is addictive” rat experiments but they went out of their way to treat the rats well, and they found they can make heroin non-addictive if they give the rat a non-awful life
now what does this have to do w/ videogame addiction? well u kinda have to be far more unhappy then a rat in a cage to find video games addicting, right? and then form a practical stand point what does “addiction” actually do; if not a emotional release valve. now what can we say about removing a release valve does, the pressure will either move up towards a higher tier release valve or fail to release at all; and these “happily ever after” i stopped a addict storys by using any other means then solving the root issues are in fact just ticking time bombs or issues the kid were already working on; without ur meddling(and u made their life harder while they were working on it)
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Exactly. Sounds like the son is suffering from depression.
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The son is 23 years old.. Bad parenting has nothing to do with it anymore if ever .
Instead the son’s learnt behaviour and responsibility of his OWN actions has everything to do with it.
Though with your ‘hugfest’ response to is this cyberbullying above (read my response) I can see how you are jumping to conclusions based on fallacious hearsay, rumour, and unscientific evidence [your “well u kinda have to be far more unhappy then a rat in a cage to find video games addicting, right?” response speaks volumes]
Yes there might be underlying psychological or psychiatric issues, though blaming it on ‘bad parenting’ is just another form of avoiding consequences and self responsibilities for the actions of others.
imma going to take a different position from everyone else so far, yes its creative, but it is still fundamentally a lazy fix to bad parenting, if a kid has gotten into one of the worse cases of gaming addiction(like the guys starving to death) taking it away is not a solution and it will make things worse even if u dont see any over superficial issues op up
im thinking of a experiment done where they repeated the “heroin is addictive” rat experiments but they went out of their way to treat the rats well, and they found they can make heroin non-addictive if they give the rat a non-awful life
now what does this have to do w/ videogame addiction? well u kinda have to be far more unhappy then a rat in a cage to find video games addicting, right? and then form a practical stand point what does “addiction” actually do; if not a emotional release valve. now what can we say about removing a release valve does, the pressure will either move up towards a higher tier release valve or fail to release at all; and these “happily ever after” i stopped a addict storys by using any other means then solving the root issues are in fact just ticking time bombs or issues the kid were already working on; without ur meddling(and u made their life harder while they were working on it)
Where can I apply to be a game bounty hunter?
internet spin on an old techniqe
Seems like a current spin on a technique that happened years ago. Son announces plan to drive trucks after having little luck getting work after college. Father counters that son’s degree was paid for with good money. Son will now pay the local going rate for rent until he earns some of that money back. Son soon lands intended tech job.
Certainly better
Well this is certainly better than breaking the flow of concentration (which in the case of some of my clients, they flip out more violently when that happens). My hat tip of general parenting goes to this guy…Instead of spending the money he earned on spoiling the kid, he just made sure the kid took a break from gaming for a while. Good for him. The kid got a slightly better social life out of this for when he becomes an adult. That itself is good parenting.
As hilarious as this is, its not good parenting. If the kid isn’t getting a job (and so I assume 18+), kick his lazy ass out of the house unless he starts paying rent.
Your house, your rules.
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It might not be good parenting but it’s good politics. Whenever an adversary overextends himself he becomes imbalanced and his own actions provide the solution to the problem.
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“It might not be good parenting but it’s good politics. Whenever an adversary overextends himself he becomes imbalanced and his own actions provide the solution to the problem.”
Perhaps there’s a way of applying the same concept to the actions of copyright maximalists and patent trolls. We need to brainstorm.
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It applies to virtually every form of conflict. It’s 3000 years old and universally relevant.
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For the record, Sun Tzu trumps Machiavelli EVERY TIME.
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Dunno ’bout that…they’re both dead.
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The Art of War is one of my personal favorites.
What if his son just gets better from all the fighting?
What if he becomes so good even the mods cannot kill him?
This very well could be the end of the world ….. of warcraft.
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What if his son just gets better from all the fighting?
What if he becomes so good even the mods cannot kill him?
This very well could be the end of the world ….. of warcraft.
Well, maybe the son can get a job killing other unemployed gamers then his dad would be proud!
Darn and I thought I had the best answer by just choking down his bandwidth
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You evil evil man… brilliant, but evil.
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Online gaming is more sensitive to latency than bandwidth.
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Find the port the game uses and limit the bandwidth to less than the game needs to run properly. Result is high latecy, loss of packets and terrible gaming experience.
I love the fake screenshot in the article. While I have no problem with older games, 90% of the “gamers” today would take one look at that game’s graphics and turn it off in disgust because it doesn’t look photo-realistic.
Send in Bart Simpson as The Black Knight.
That is parenting, people.
Indeed. But hey, why let parents be parents when we can screw the internet with filters and produce infantile adults by severely limiting what children can experience or insanely increasing the age bar to whatever the legislative way. You know, for the children.
This story is not real. It is fake. Sure, the BBC and HuffPo have published it, but no one checks the sources.
Go and read the original story in Chinese and you’ll find no facts. No names, even (just Feng). No corroboration. Just a urban legend that Westerners can now enjoy as news.
http://sinopathic.com/lost-in-transit-oration-or-there-are-no-ws-in-sensationalism-let-alone-5-of-them/
VBScript
And I thought I can just download VBScript and make looped popups and make it so you can’t click anything else on the computer. Then when your kid has stopped playing so much, you can use a hard drive and get rid of the script.