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KMIZ News Director responds to 'Animal Crossing predators' story

by rawmeatcowboy
18 March 2009
GN 1.0 / 2.0

If you weren’t around yesterday, you missed quite a crazy story. You can catch up on the full report here, but just incase you don’t feel like watching the clip, I’ll give you the quick rundown.

Basically, Andy Anderson of the Mid-Missouri Internet Crimes Task Force said that there is no reason for an adult to own Animal Crossing…other than to lure children into abusive situations. Obviously, much of the gaming populace had a bit of an issue with those statements, and now KMIZ News Director Curtis Varns has responded to the complaints.

“I think Detective Anderson’s comments did take the story down an unintended path. We decided to do the story to let viewers know children had been contacted inappropriately through the game. It was not intended to be an indictment of the game or a smear piece on any form of interactive entertainment. The point of the story was to make parents aware so they could decide whether or not they needed to keep a watchful eye on their kids’ activities. The reporter even wrapped the story up by stressing police were not putting this information out to make people paranoid rather trying to make them aware. Upon reviewing the story, I fear much of the intent has been lost because of the comments we allowed into the story.”

That’s all well and good, but does that mean that the news program will update their watchers with this new information? I surely hope so, but I doubt it.

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