Christian Response to Dungeons and Dragons

Consider, for example, the level of violence and crime in a typical D&D game. One psychologist wrote, "There is hardly a game in which the players do not indulge in murder, arson, torture, rape, or highway robbery." And he likes the game!

The best thing you can say about it is that it doesn't go quite as hard on the scare propaganda as some people did back in the day - Leithart & Grant are deeply upset about the occult nature of roleplaying, but at least they don't actually claim (only hint) that it leads to actual spellcasting and ritual mass murder, for instance. But that only makes it seem more like their big fear is simply that the more people learn to play with mythology and narrative, the more they might think that Christianity is just mythology and narrative.

Note carefully the logic here: "It's just a game. The monsters aren't real. The magical powers aren't real. The gods aren't real. Jesus is one of the gods." Christ is reduced to the level of fantastic monsters, halflings, dwarves, and elves. We can give this no less a label than blasphemy.

It really shouldn't be possible to contradict yourself this many times in 22 pages, but damnit, they're going for it. Because of course, the "Our children will learn it's all just imagination!" comes just a couple of pages after warning that "Our children will think it's all real!"

One enthusiastic player admitted that D&D had made him a virtual schizophrenic. He said he would probably cry if the character he has been directing for three years were to die.

Oh no, not teaching our boys to CRY when they're sad! What else might they teach our children instead of what they should learn?

Thus, there seems to be every Scriptural reason for teaching through "role-playing" or "pretending." The value of this kind of training is seen most obviously in children. Our daughters learn something about motherhood by playing with their dolls. Our sons begin to learn courage by pretending to fight.

But wait, wasn't the violence of roleplaying (they treat D&D in particular and roleplaying in general as the exact same thing, of course) a big problem? Well, no. Teaching children to kill is just natural as long as it's the right enemies they kill.

By learning to play war, a child is not necessarily learning to do anything that God forbids. Indeed, such play can be helpful to instill in a child the reality of the Christian's life-long warfare against Satan and sin. (...) There's all the difference in the world between Hansel and a dwarf cleric who casts spells. Both may meet a witch, but they react differently. The dwarf covets the witch's power; Hansel just wants a chance to shove her into the oven.

They acknowledge that there is a problem of teenagers (ie CHILDREN!!1!) feeling bad in today's society. Their solution is simple: Just let them know that this is the role God has chosen for them! And stop them from doing anything that might help them deal with it!

This motive is apparent in many of the D&D enthusiasts quoted above. They hate their Godgiven role in the God-directed drama of history, and they play D&D in order to create their own identity and their own history.

It feels weird to bother writing this about a 30-year-old pamphlet. They lost that particular battle, after all. But the sheer panic in the tone, the wildly contradictory arguments even in a relatively tame (if still bizarre) critique, the blind fear of not being the only ones allowed to programme their children, don't feel entirely irrelevant. The kids are always doing something we need to stop them from if we want them to remain the perfect angels they would be if they weren't... y'know. Human. With gasp their own identity and their own history.

ETA: Turns out he was doing it for the money. A preacher just in it for cold hard cash? Whodathunkit!