A Stitch in Haste

...this is Manchester Cathedral?

Sony Corp apologized Friday to the Church of England for a violent computer game that features a bloody shootout inside an Anglican cathedral.

The church had demanded withdrawal of the game "Resistance: Fall of Man," which includes a gunbattle between an American soldier and aliens inside a building that resembles Manchester Cathedral in northwest England.
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In its letter, Sony said it did not accept "that there is any connection between contemporary issues in 21st century Manchester and the work of science fiction in which a fictitious 1950s Britain is under attack by aliens."

I've not played the game in question and cannot comment on whether it replicates or even merely resembles Manchester Cathedral (one cannot deny that most cathedrals do look a bit alike), or whether this is just a figment of some Church of England official's imagination.

Whichever is the case, what, exactly, is the big deal?

Heck, just yesterday I blew up a monastery while chasing down a French collaborator priest. And I can't begin to estimate how many Nazis I've gunned down inside churches playing Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 3. And it's not like there hasn't been some reality-based bloodshed inside English cathedrals.

I'm sympathetic to clerics and others who are concerned about gun- and gang-related violence. And I certainly hope we never see "Flight Simulator: 9/11." But video games are simply not the problem, and their makers shouldn't be needlessly and baselessly harassed or extorted.