D&D Dads Crazy Fitness Dad Incites RPG community
There is this great new site about D&D&Dads from Jeff Greiner, The Tome Show and buddy Mark (he's a D&D celeb but I don't know him...you old schoolers will have to fill me in)
Anway, they have offered space on their site for any D&D Dad to talk about what it's like to be a dad, play D&D and be an all round geek.
They recently gave a new guy an account and this is what he posted.
dndndads.com/2011/03/26/rpg-parents-and-the-elephant-in-the-room/
dndndads.com/2011/03/28/rpg-parents-and-the-elephant-in-the-room-part-ii/
There was a bit of an uproar and Arcane Springboard posted a response here
www.myrpgame.com/2011/03/27/a-response-to-rpg-parents-and-the-elephant-in-the-room/
You all know how passionate I have become about introducing our kids as well as other kids to RPGs and gaming in a safe and healthy way. So I was taken back by this battle of the blogs. It really got me thinking and I did work extremely hard on my post at my site. Sadly Chad has to work on the comment setting for the newest version of drupal so the comments are not up on stephaniecassandrasutton.com So I am going to post everything on those sites through here. Hopefully you may see some traffic from those folks back to Lords of Tyr.
Here is what I had to say in response to all the RPG Fitness & getting your kids into gaming controversy.
stephaniecassandrasutton.com/node/12
I probably did this in the wrong order, so make sure you read my post! There are a lot of comments from the other posts. But since you all are my gamer group I know you'll get a chance to read what I took the time to write. Mostly because I cook for you when we game :)
- tyrwench's blog
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5 comments postedThat's all...thanks!
I guess to be compliant with the stereotype, we should have all of our podcasts and recorded RPG game sessions scrubbed of any references to kick-boxing, dieting competition, martial arts practice, hunting/fishing/outdoorsmanship, nutrition, child rearing concerns, children playing outside, dance recitals, healthcare legislation and its impact on society.
These are just the things off of the top of my head that have been random topics of conversation within our gaming group during the social interaction known as roleplaying or podcasting. I am sure there are many others but this short list summarizes the 30 or so gaming/podcasting interactions I have had with the Lords of Tyr. To me this seems to be a disproportionate number of topics that fly in the face of "Parents who Play RPG's are Leading their Children into a hell of Obesity and Poor Health".
Oh well...just my 2 cents thrown in. (you probably need to round that down to 1 cent...devaluation and whatnot)
rook103
That is just crazy. Everyone knows that people who enjoy a hobby are rabid extremists that are a danger to themselves and others. Only people who do nothing are safe to bring your children around and point to as examples of the highest ideals of humanity.
My favorite response to this ccontroversy simply pointed out that if you replaced RPGs with reading, few people would encourage you to keep your child from reading simply because it is a sedentary activity. I wish I could remember who said this in my Twitter stream to give them the proper credit.
I also think it is not fair to say that all gaming groups are uninterested in healthy eating or fitness. I have found that gamers are a more diverse group than most people give us credit for being. All sorts of people play RPGs and they each have their own attitude on health and fitness.
Of course it is important for parents to instill healthy attitudes in their children. Frankly, it probably wouldn't hurt to make sure healthy food and snack options are available at the games your children participate in either.
In the end though, I don't think gaming is inherently unhealthy any more than being an avid reader is.
Hell replace RPGs with baseball if you want. Do you know how sedentary baseball is? I mean you would think not, but watch an inning of play and look critically at exactly what the ratio of activity vrs waiting (either for the ball to be in play or on the bench) actually occurs.
I know I used to play. Look at it this way. 30 people to a team. During an inning of play you either have 21 or 29 of them sitting on the bench. The pitcher/batter/catcher have a few seconds of activity during the pitch/swing/catch cycle and then there is the waiting again. If the ball is in play there may be a minute of activity. How about that...and that is a SPORT!
Football...even worse.
Basketball/hockey a little bit better, but you still have the majority of the team on the bench at any given period
rook103