Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Note - the links in this thread are to images of paintings of the Massacre of Innocents. Both of them portray graphic violence. I also describe the photos in the post.  I'm posting this because I think the members of the forum are mature enough to decide whether or not to click them.

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My opinion doesn't mean much because I haven't touched Redemption since 2011 nats, but I agree the choice in imagery is a little surprising. That being said, I'm not sure where I stand on the actual artwork.

I vehemently disagree with the line of thinking that the imagery becomes more appropriate because it depicts a real phenomena. Persecution of Christians is widespread today in many parts of the world. For example, even though Iraqi Kurdistan is relatively safe today, the persecution and genocide of Yazidi Christians (especially the rape and sexual slavery of Yazidi women and children) can be displayed extremely graphically, and any such depictions become no less obscene just because they're depicting a very real issue. As important as it is to tackle these obscene issues, I'm not sure that every location is an appropriate place to do so.

Here's two painting depicting the same biblical story - the Massacre of Innocents.
Painting 1: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cf/Rubens_-_Massacre_of_the_Innocents_-_Art_Gallery_of_Ontario_2.jpg
Painting 2: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Guido_Reni_-_Massacre_of_the_Innocents.jpg

My intuition is that painting 1 is clearly inappropriate for a Redemption card. However, painting 2 is currently the artwork for a Redemption card. And if we're giving painting 2 the label of "age-appropriate", then it's hard for me to argue painting 1 is somehow more graphic. Both seem like they'd be highly inappropriate for Redemption - which is where I would also place the Christian Martyr art posted in OP.

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That being said, here's where I'm struggling with all of this and why I said I'm not sure where I stand:
The Christian God is the God of the Poor. Dominican Priest Herbert McCabe once summarized it as "We have to recognize that the only God we know is the God of the poor, the God who takes sides." In the gospels, every single time Jesus has the choice (with perhaps the exception of the woman he called a dog), he always takes the side of the poor or the marginalized or the disabled or the outcast or the tax collector. In American Evangelicalism there's been a trend to censor this and claim that all are poor and contort the sermon on the mount to make the God of the bible the god of America, but the fact is that I, like most Americans, would have been more likely aligned with Pharoah or Nebuchadnezzar or Ceasar in their respective stories.

And although I'm not poor, I've been traveling a lot since graduating college, and have really started to see what oppression and poverty and marginalization means on the global scale. I've been to war torn countries like Iraq and Syria (which I won't go into - as I assume we all know what's happening there), or impoverished countries like Madagascar (which has over 75% of the population living on less than $1.90 a day, and over 97% living on less than $5.50 a day), or countries recovering from genocide like Rwanda and Cambodia, or countries with all of the above like the Congo. And from all this, I've come to see that those cultures have a very different definition of obscene than me.

For example, in Liberia, brutal depictions of gore are less obscene than this image: https://i.imgur.com/K0vNSaN.jpg. It's not individual depictions of specific events that are grotesque, but rather, what's grotesque is the experience of oppression and marginalization.

And so I guess that gets to my point - going back to the Rubens picture, I said I felt like something like that (along with the Christian Martyr card) would be inappropriate for Redemption due to some of the imagery. There's a lot going on in that image that I consider highly graphic - the murder of children, a mother in the bottom right mourning over her dead child, the mother in the middle trying to protect her child from murder to no avail, an old women unable to protect herself, a woman in the middle unable to protect her child as a soldier grabs her by the hair, women on the left cowering in fear as a child reaches towards what looks like the body of his brother, a woman in the background trying to shelter her child as a man swings a sword, a woman running from her persecutors, and so on.

To me, all of those are obscene. But I'm not sure if that's actually true. Is the depiction of this obscene, or is it the actual experience that's obscene? And if it's the experience, and not the depiction, both are trying to communicate the same experience, and shouldn't both therefore be obscene?

Holy cow Rawrlolsauce. Respect man. You put a lot of thought and effort into your post and brought up a very philosophical discussion. I do think I can answer the quoted question. I think this question boils down to the core of the discussion regarding the art.

My intuition is that painting 1 is clearly inappropriate for a Redemption card. However, painting 2 is currently the artwork for a Redemption card. And if we're giving painting 2 the label of "age-appropriate", then it's hard for me to argue painting 1 is somehow more graphic. Both seem like they'd be highly inappropriate for Redemption - which is where I would also place the Christian Martyr art posted in OP.

I think it's pretty easy to label one as being too graphic and the other not. They both have the same subject matter. One contains "graphic" nudity and the other does not. The reason one is ok and the other isn't is because of the nudity contained.

The difference is that the subject matter or other "graphic material" (such as the nudity in this example) is implied at and NOT explicitly shown makes all the difference.

To look to film again and compare two famous films. It's the difference between Schindlers List and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. Both cover the atrocities of the Holocaust. One film is incredibly graphic and shows exactly what happens, no panning away. The second shows the same atrocities but cuts away and implies what happens. One is rated PG-13 and the other is an incredibly hard R.

Both cover the same material and have similar emotional impacts. Both, along with The Pianist, are some of the greatest films ever to be made on the subject. One is just far more graphic than the other. One is appropriate for a wide range of audiences. The other is not.

Art is incredibly broad by nature. The standards of the Renaissance and Baroque periods of art are not the same ones we have. This art was originally made to be hung in the halls of kings, queens and the richest patrons in the land. Not to be viewed by kids or the average joe. Just because it's old or hangs in a museum doesn't make it instantly appropriate.

Myself and others are not saying we should cover up and ignore the subject matter. Torture has happened in the bible and in history and it should not be glossed over.

But it should not be explicitly or "graphically" shown in a CCG or board game.

That being said, here's where I'm struggling with all of this and why I said I'm not sure where I stand:
The Christian God is the God of the Poor. Dominican Priest Herbert McCabe once summarized it as "We have to recognize that the only God we know is the God of the poor, the God who takes sides." In the gospels, every single time Jesus has the choice (with with perhaps the exception of the woman he called a dog]

That's the problem with the Christian God. He is man-made. The real God loves everyone with a reckless and ruthless love. The real God love people like Jesus did. Sometimes that means snuffing out people(s) who are ruthless to others (a certain Assyrian siege army), but sometimes he waits to teach valuable lessons about him self to all parties involved. For example, in the Exodus, he freed the Israelite's from slavery and their false world view about God [that the Israelite's were slaves because they were disobedient to God], proved to Pharaoh and his wicked magicians that their world view was false (The plagues and defeat of pharaoh's  army were all signs to the Egyptians that there is only one God, and Pharaoh is NOT ra incarnate), and got revenge on Egypt for ''forgetting'' about Joseph's wisdom, kindness, and bilateral good will. So I don't buy this lie that the '' the only God we know is the God of the poor and the the God who takes sides''; that's very close to a perfect description of Satan, because all you have to do is replace 'God' with 'Satan' and 'poor' with 'poor in spirit'.

Interestingly enough, I am pretty sure that the Women at the Well exception was simply Jesus telling the truth..... the ''truth'' that the 12 apostles had heard all of their lives.... A Samaritan Woman was probably considered the lowest form of human then (an perhaps now too).  Either way, that quote is so mindbogglingly, un-profound that I just powered the neighborhood. Obviously, God takes sides. He takes everyone's side. The word of God is a doubled edged sword. This sword defends the poor/weak from the rich/powerful. But when the poor and weak behave/live like animals God let's the rich and powerful end their life like a kind farmer kills cattle; however, when another hyena treats another hyena like a jackal, the Lion of Judah will get involved. Unfortunately, Jesus has to battle youthful, hard-hearted, sinners resistant to change and old, "wise'' men all the time; wise men who pretend that switching the order they put on their wolves and sheeps clothing actually matters 

I think you're going overboard when it comes to losing the mission.  I also do not have a lot of knowledge of what has transpired recently.  Is the stated mission still to promote Christian fellowship?  I'm not really sure if the art chosen for this special CM promo is detrimental to the mission but I definitely know that the elders who were making the decision had good intentions.

I mean honestly guys I shed a tear almost every time I really look at the current Christian Martyr seeing Christ...

It is definitely difficult to portray this harsh reality in any way but that. Consistently the Elders have chosen fine art work and this example is definitely up to par in terms of quality. The depiction is graphic, but this card is not in heavy rotation and you do not have to choose this version to play or look at it intensely while playing.

I think you're going overboard when it comes to losing the mission.

I tried to clarify this in my next post, but I admit that the statement you quoted was misleading. I was referring to the mission that I had used Redemption for, which was reaching primarily middle school students in the schools and churches I have worked at over the years.