World of What?
Overheard a conversation while standing in line at a store, it went a little something like this:
Woman: “So your daughter still play that World of World, and not socialize with any real people?”
Man: “Yeah. I tried getting her to go out, do some things. Meet some people. She don’t listen to me though.”
Woman: “That is just such a shame. What a waste.”
Man: “Yeah. I think that is why she became a teacher as well. Like, it isn’t real. She doesn’t have to deal with real people, just kids.”
Woman: “It sounds like it.”
Wait, what? First of all, it’s called World of Warcraft. If you people don’t even know the name of the thing you are talking about, why are you even talking about it? Second, your daughter is a teacher?! The way you were talking I was imagining some 17 year old high school dropout that spends all her time in the basement huddled in front of her computer. But a teacher? She is obviously a grown woman, and teaching is a great profession. Who cares what an adult does in their free time?
If I’m fully employed, paying my bills, paying my taxes — why should anyone have a right to gripe and moan about the things I — or anyone else — does in our downtime. Maybe she gets home from a stressful day teaching those kids and just wants to wind down with a little online gaming. Whoa, such a terrible crime. I mean it isn’t like she is out on the corner slinging crack, she’s playing a freaking video game. I could rattle off a dozen things that would be worse than that. Things I’m sure a father would really not want his daughter into, and video games aren’t even on the list.
I admit though, I don’t know all the facts about this lady and her terrible video game habit. For all I know she may be an unemployed teacher. An unemployed teacher who lost her job due to video game addiction. Possible? Perhaps. From the context of the conversation though I didn’t get the feeling she was spending 24 hours, 7 days a week online. I got the feeling that her pop and the nosy friend just didn’t approve of online video games period, especially from the cynical way the woman said “real people”. As if to say nobody online is real. You are all just figments of our fertile imaginations.
Sooo, I must be writing this blog in the hopes that my fake friends will log onto their fake computers and read this. Amazing!
Some people really need to get a grip on the important things in life. These are probably the sort of people who think Facebook is for police mugshots, don’t know what the word ‘blog’ means, and thinks Google is something you wear while swimming. Really folks, you don’t need to fear every single thing you don’t understand.
