#137: Pokemon Go & The Great Millennial Life

by Jeff | Jul 17, 2016

Who’s on this episode?

Jeff Strommen @jstrommen | Dave Wager @wagerdaw

Podcast: Download

Who knew that pocket monsters could be so entertaining? In a matter of a week, news headlines went from protests of the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, followed by the senseless murders of 5 Dallas law enforcement officials to… Pokémon?

Yup. It’s true.

One of the hallmarks, in my humble opinion, of my beloved Millennial Generation is its ability to display empathy for 30 seconds and completely forget something ever happened. This week, Jeff and Dave welcome back Mike Jewel of Relational Integrity to discuss how this Millennial generation could become the least greatest generation in modern history.

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Show Notes

The term “The Greatest Generation” is the title of Tom Brokaw’s 1998 book profiling members of this generation, stemming from his attendance at the D-day 40th anniversary celebrations. In the book, Brokaw wrote, “it is, I believe, the greatest generation any society has ever produced.” He argued that these men and women fought not for fame and recognition, but because it was the “right thing to do.” (Source)

Pokemon Go Fast Facts

15 million app downloads

Read this: Pokémon Go tops Twitter’s daily users, sees more engagement than Facebook | TechCrunch

So, if this simple little game is getting people out of their parents’ basement, what could be so bad? Well, aside from the early privacy issues, there is a little known story out there involving a former shaman in the Yanomamo tribe in Venezuela known as Chief Shoefoot. Dave shares this story of Chief Shoefoot’s thoughts on the Pokemon characters.

Here’s a response to the comments about Pokemon from Mike Dawson, missionary to the Yanomamo in Venezuela:

“It has been extremely interesting to read all the comments and especially to note the defensiveness of some of the comments (regarding the Pokemon/Bautista true story). Reminds me of the last verse in the book of Judges where it says “In those days there was no king in Israel and every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” It seems the major theme I am reading is, “It might be wrong for you, but for me, I don’t see any thing wrong with it, so it is fine for me”. That is an interesting view.

The interesting thing about this particular story was that, when I was sent the pokemon book by the church asking me to see what Bautista thought about it, it had such a low priority with me that I set it back and promptly forgot it. My wife reminded me of it weeks later and I only showed it to Bautista out of a sense of obligation to the church people back home. I did not believe there was anything to it for a minute. As far as i was concerned, it was a waste of time. That all changed when i opened a page at random and showed the picture to him, (By the way, I gave him no background at all, I did not tell him about the church questioning it or anything about it it.) I only opened the page and asked him. “What do you think of this?” His response, frankly shocked me. “Oh, I know that one, it is…” and he named it. He then went on to name the attributes of this character and he was right on every count, he listed them, just as they were listed in the book. He did that repeatedly.

I had no idea this was going to be so wide read and basically just wrote it up as Bautista was talking. One thing I did not make real clear, was, that to Bautista these characters did not just remind him of demons, he recognized that they were drawings of real beings that he had seen and known. He knew each of them by name, at least the ones he recognized. He not only knew them by name, but accurately told what their attributes were, and every attribute that he attributed to that particular character, the page on that character also had that same attribute listed. There were some in the book that he did not recognize and he admitted that it would be impossible for one shaman to have met them all. There was absolutely no doubt in my Keila’s mind, nor in my mind, nor in our son Stephen’s mind, after he reluctantly started listening, that Bautista knew what he was talking about. Again, let me make it clear, I do not claim to be an expert, but I believe Bautista was.

Not sure what else to say on this. Sad to say, Bautista passed away last week. Please believe me, I have no personal ax to grind here. I only wrote down accurately what I saw and heard personally and only did this because a church sent a book asking me to do so. You can chose (sic) to believe it or not, your choice. Once I heard Bautista describe these beings as being very dangerous to young children, I chose not to allow them in any form in my own house. satan always seeks an open door to destroy, especially our children.”

Further reference

Is Pokemon Safe for Christian Kids? | Erika Dawson

Pokemon Go police blotter: Game is being blamed for a lot of bad things | Philly.com

Pokémon Go: teenagers caught playing game while driving near pedestrians | The Guardian

Pokémon Go in a Fractured and Flattened world | The Gospel Coalition

Listen to Chief Shoefoot’s story

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