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Tofu Activists Spoof Meat-Based Indie Game 420

Posted by Soulskill from the have-a-burger-to-celebrate dept.
Faulkner39 writes "In response to the recently released independently developed platformer Super Meat Boy, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has released a Flash-based spoof game titled Super Tofu Boy. The spoof attempts to mirror the original by featuring a protagonist made of tofu and an antagonist made of meat in a statement promoting animal rights. Ironically, however, the original game is about a human boy who is vulnerable because he lacks skin (Meat Boy), raising the question: 'is the spoof in reality really about cannibalism?'" The Super Meat Boy team posted a response on their Twitter feed.
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Tofu Activists Spoof Meat-Based Indie Game More

Tofu Activists Spoof Meat-Based Indie Game

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  • Streisand effect (Score:4, Informative)

    by BadAnalogyGuy ( 945258 ) <BadAnalogyGuy@gmail.com> on Thursday December 02, 2010 @04:58AM (#34414842)

    I had never heard of Super Meat Boy.

    • Re:Streisand effect (Score:5, Insightful)

      by mcvos ( 645701 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @05:04AM (#34414868)

      That's wht the PETA spoof is so important for them. On their site [supermeatboy.com] they explain how they've been trolling the PETA forums, hoping for this to happen. Apparently with success. It's a weird kind of PR, but it works, because now you've heard of Super Meat Boy. Thanks to trolling, PETA and Slashdot.

  • They offer downloads for PC and Mac. What, no Linux version? You mean I have to play the version on the website to play in Linux?

    If they won't give me Linux Tofu Boy, then I have absolutely no incentive to cease my consumption of meat. Clearly, they don't care about me, so I will continue to not care about them.

    I should go have a double down or something later....

  • PETA (Score:4, Insightful)

    by guyminuslife ( 1349809 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @05:08AM (#34414888)

    You know, maybe they could have spent some of that development money on outreach for their shelters, so that they wouldn't have to kill 86% of the animals they shelter.

    But no, I guess making video games, stockpiling red paint, and placing ads of naked hippies should really come first.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by vidnet ( 580068 )

      You know, maybe they could have spent some of that development money on outreach for their shelters, so that they wouldn't have to kill 86% of the animals they shelter.

      Instead they spent in on a campaign for livestock, 100% of which are killed. PETA don't consider livestock inferior to pets, or any less deserving of ethical treatment.

      • And they have pretty much zero effect there. Why? Because they alienate people with combativeness. They get attention because people love to hate them. And they seem completely oblivious to that fact.

      • I think they have it backwards then. They could start by showing proper stewardship of their own animals. PETA putting down 90% of the animals they take in is rank hypocrisy especially when that's triple the rate of a non-PETA shelter. "Do as I say and not as I do" is just not the way to run an advocacy program. If they trail the industry in pet treatment, why should anyone listen to them on the treatment of any other kind of animal?

      • Then why don't they offer the subjects of their animal jails to the livestock industry thusly (pardon the irony here) killing two birds with one stone? They would reduce the number of animals they kill while simultaneously reducing the number of livestock *the opponent* kills? Also, since when is it more humane to incarcerate a living being for years before inevitably killing them than it is to simply kill them without the long drawn out torture?

    • I got sent this on twitter today:
      How many Peta members does it take to change a lightbulb?.... None, Peta can't change anything.

      http://twitter.com/#!/SuperMeatBoy [twitter.com]

      Apparently people are saying that Super Tofu boy cost more to make than super meat boy.

    • "placing ads of naked hippies should really come first."

      And for that reason alone I completely support PETA. (NSFW [nakedprotesters.com] probably NSFW [petaasiapacific.com])

  • We all know PETA is crazy (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Dracos ( 107777 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @05:17AM (#34414932)

    They'll attempt to demonize any mention of carnivorous behavior, often without a complete grasp of what they are attacking-- as seen here. A boy with no skin must be countered with a lump of tofu? Obviously no one there actually played Super Meat Boy.

    PETA can't rightfully preach about animal rights while euthanizing tens of thousands of unwanted pets every year. Hypocrisy at its finest.

    • Re:We all know PETA is crazy (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dafing ( 753481 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @07:46AM (#34415494) Journal
      As a Vegan, I'm always interested when these issues come up on my usual websites. I, like many of the other Animal Rights people here visit Slashdot, Ars, Engadget, Gizmodo etc daily, we dont cause any fuss, but when these "stories" arise, "ohhhhh, they're hypocrites", or "I'm gonna have me a big steak, yummy mc yum yums!!!111!!!" are the usual posts.

      I'm also quite against PETA, they have a New Welfarist approach, I despise how they have Women pose and RE promoting Veganism, "screw the principle" http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/ingrid-newkirk-on-principled-veganism-screw-the-principle/ [abolitionistapproach.com]

      "PETA can't rightfully preach about animal rights while euthanizing tens of thousands of unwanted pets every year. Hypocrisy at its finest.".

      They can "preach" Animal Rights while also practising euthanasia you realise? Just as I love being alive, but were I to have Cancer such as others in my family, I could well imagine rather being dead, than to die slowly over the months. Now, I much prefer the idea of No Kill shelters, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-kill_shelter [wikipedia.org] , I dont know how practical they are in real life. I've had family members who've volunteered with the SPCA etc, I myself have no hands on experience of this kind.

      I agree with practically NOTHING coming from PETA, I think it must obviously be wrong that they "put to sleep" so many animals each year.

      However, please dont write off Animal Rights because of PETA's actions.

      http://www.abolitionistapproach.com/ [abolitionistapproach.com] and these shows http://bit.ly/veganpodcastinfo [bit.ly] were useful for me.

      I also promote Veganism through videos of my Chicken Friends (such as "A Day in the Life..." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zj8gL8lj-Yg [youtube.com] ), and through my show http://coexistingwithnonhumananimals.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Urkki ( 668283 )

        As a Vegan, I'm always interested when these issues come up on my usual websites.

        Hey, maybe you can give your personal opinion, if you've thought about it. What do you think should happen to animals that currently earn their living by being eaten by humans, like pigs? Should humans stop breeding them and let them go extinct? Should they be preserved in some kind of "domesticated animal zoos" in small numbers, so they could earn their upkeep by playing with kids or whatever? What should happen to them?

        I personally find eating ethically raised animals just fine morally. The animal gets to

      • Now, I much prefer the idea of No Kill shelters, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-kill_shelter [wikipedia.org] , I dont know how practical they are in real life.

        No-kill shelters are good and all, but they generally only accept animals with a high probability of being adopted. A no-kill shelter isn't going to take the three-legged, one-eye pit bull with a history of attacking people. That dog is probably gonna end up in a high-kill shelter.

        I don't know much about PETA's shelters other than they have a reputation for killing

      • I need to preface this by saying that I have absolutely nothing against vegans, especially when their viewpoint is presented logically and clearly and calmly, as you have.

        I have issues, however, when some vegans decide to claim the moral high ground over me, because I continue to eat meat. Let alone when they try to evangelise me. And I realize, baby with the bathwater. It's not fair to lump all vegans together in the same boat in the same way that it's not fair to lump all the Christians in the same boat:

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by c ( 8461 )

      > PETA can't rightfully preach about animal rights while
      > euthanizing tens of thousands of unwanted pets every
      > year. Hypocrisy at its finest.

      Not at all. Animal rights groups are strongly against the ownership of animals. Euthanizing instead of running an effective adoption program is actually seen as the lesser evil. They obviously don't connect those dots in their public fund raising materials...

      • I think the point is that if you skip the "right to life", no other rights really matter*.

        * Excepting, of course, the right of your descendants to profit from your copyrights for at least 50 years after your death, which will only rarely come into effect in the animal kingdom.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by c ( 8461 )

          > I think the point is that if you skip the
          > "right to life", no other rights really matter*.

          Nature doesn't recognize any "right to life". For the vast majority of creatures, it's more like "a right to live a short, nasty life constantly running and hiding in fear, only to die starving and/or screaming".

          Animal rights see the "right to not be property" as implying a kind of "right to life". That is, if you stop treating them as property, then you can't just go around killing them on a whim. I guess tha

      • I'm not quite sure how euthanizing animals is any more consistent with PETA's proclaimed ideals than owning an animal. What gives PETA the right to decide that an animal should die? If they were consistent, they would just release the animals. By euthanizing the animals, they are acting as if they own them.

  • Peta (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Teun ( 17872 )
    Peta should stick to their valid core business of fighting ill treatment of animals.

    Vegetarians are a whole different and sad subspecies of humankind, they try to deny we've been eating meat from animals since many millions of years.

    As a matter of fact we've become the creatures we are because we ate animals, for example there is strong evidence of a correlation in humanoids starting to eat seafood and a jump in intelligence that led to the making and use of tools.

    • Well, it is a more concentrated form of protein, which leaves you more time from gathering roots and berries, to like, build stuff, like pyramids, dams, hospitals , a civilization and the like.

      This guy had a good take at it all: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Bronowski [wikipedia.org]

      My girlfriend had a veggie book, that claimed that eating meat was against human instinct; "who would ever think of eating a nice, cuddly squirrel?"

      I countered with a quote from Benjamin Franklin, "hunger never saw bad bread'.

      Veggieism

      • Well, it is a more concentrated form of protein, which leaves you more time from gathering roots and berries, to like, build stuff, like pyramids, dams, hospitals , a civilization and the like.

        Well, not quite. The basis of all civilizations has been the ability to grain of some kind, which allows a few people to create a lot of food, to feed enough people to allow a division of labor and the creation of a class structure. It actually takes each member of a civilization much more labor to be able to feed the

    • While I'm not a vegetarian, I find your argument invalid. There are plenty of examples of things we've done since many millions of years which are not socially acceptable anymore, at least in our society.

      Appeal to tradition, also known as proof from tradition, appeal to common practice, argumentum ad antiquitatem, false induction, or the "is/ought" fallacy, is a common logical fallacy in which a thesis is deemed correct on the basis that it correlates with some past or present tradition. The appeal takes the form of "this is right because we've always done it this way."

      An appeal to tradition essentially makes two assumptions:

      * The old way of thinking was proven correct when introduced. In actuality this may be false -- the tradition might be entirely based on incorrect grounds.
      * The past justifications for the tradition are still valid at present. In cases where circumstances have changed, this assumption may be false.

  • Bunch of dicks (Score:5, Interesting)

    by GF678 ( 1453005 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @06:21AM (#34415150)

    No, not PETA, the developers of Super Meat Boy.

    After hearing about this game I was curious as to whether a Linux version was available or in the works. I ended up at http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2010/10/indiegamescom_podcast_5_super.html [indiegames.com], and a commenter put a link to a podcast with the developers here: http://www.levelfortytwo.com/2009/12/talk-is-cheap-12-21-09/ [levelfortytwo.com]

    The relevant bit starts at 43:55. Basically, they think that a Linux version would mean it would have to be open source, which obviously it doesn't. To quote one of the developers: "Linux can fuck off as far as I'm concerned." Gee, thanks. I don't mind if you're not going to bother making a port to Linux, but to not even bother to understand what people are asking and instead resorting to profanity shows these guys are a bunch of closed-minded dicks.

    • It's dicks, all the way down... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by adamofgreyskull ( 640712 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @07:20AM (#34415368)
      Indeed, I hate PETA as much as any right-minded individual, but these guys pulled a dick-move. They basically trolled the PETA forums with a bunch of sock-puppet accounts in order to goad them into action and to get publicity for their game, which seems, judging by the /. comments, to have not made it onto many peoples' radar. Yet again, PETA have made the world a worse place in which to live. This time by giving these tumbling tumbling dick-weeds the publicity they are so obviously desperate for.

  • To do this, they HAD to look beyond the title.

    Super Meat Boy has nothing to fucking do with meat on a dietary level. What the hell went through the minds of those at PETA?

  • How can someone relate to an animal in order to sympathise with it and support its "rights"?
    Don't get me wrong I'm not some sadistic freak that tortures animals but c'mon here...

    I can relate to human torture because I can mentally put myself in the shoes of the tortured person a bit.
    But no, I wouldn't/don't care about animal rights and I'll keep devouring them for a long, long time.

    Until they take over and make us their pets no...no sympathy from me.

  • It's probably about cannibalism... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Grapplebeam ( 1892878 ) on Thursday December 02, 2010 @06:30AM (#34415176)
    Because their president wants to be cooked at a barbecue when she dies, to disgust people from eating meat. Or something. Honestly, the idea was so nuts, I forgot to take notes on why, and merely listened to the what. Because when you're spoon-out-your-eyeballs crazy like that, it's hard not to be inadvertantly entertaining and terrifying at the same time.

    • It used to be SOP to eat the dead in many cultures. There's still tribes where the custom is for the new chief to eat the heart of the old one when he dies. What's crazy about that? People are made out of meat. Crazy would be killing them to eat them when the alternative is not starvation but merely menu boredom.

      • It used to be SOP to eat the dead in many cultures. There's still tribes where the custom is for the new chief to eat the heart of the old one when he dies. What's crazy about that?

        There are several rather serious diseases that are only transmitted by eating the flesh of humans. You rarely hear of these diseases because they only appear among cannabalistic cultures of which there are few. However, I remember reading somewhere in the last 10 years about a culture that was confirmed to have certain cannabalistic traditions because of the occurence among them of one of those diseases. Up until that disease was diagnosed among them, it was believed that the references to that culture eati

  • Animals die, you know, so it's mostly a matter of how and at what age. Me, I'd rather have my head clubbed or my neck slit in a farm than be eaten half-alive by a predator that just mauled me enough to keep me still. And while that's not a true dichotomy, the odds of dying peacefully, surrounded and guarded by my peers are small.

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