Legal Niches

Pokemon Panic Makes List of Most Absurd TIME Covers

By gamepolitics

Reason Online has posted a fascinating look at what it calls The Top 10 Most Absurd Time Covers of The Past 40 Years.

While TIME's investigations into the occult, dirty words and obesity are among the topics making RO's list, we took note of the November 22, 1999 cover which addressed what some parents and teachers saw as a scourge at the time: Pokemon. Reason Online explains:

This Time cover story breathlessly warns that children are printing counterfeit cards, cheating friends and classmates, and even stabbing one another over Pokemon trading disputes. Time doesn't dwell too long on any substantive data (there isn't any) that might show what sort of sustained violence and mayhem would make Pokemon an 'addiction" (Time's word). Instead, it quickly cuts to what the authors see as the real dark heart of the Pokemon phenomenon: crass capitalism! ...

GP: Ten years on, the frenzy over Pokemon seems so silly...

Full post as published by GamePolitics.com on June 16, 2009 (boomark / email).