The Ethical Gamer series explores boardgaming through an ethical and scriptural lens, by Josh Jones.
Over the holidays, I made the mistake of trash-talking a child. My nephew and I were playing Fibbage, and we were jokingly taunting each other. In our first game, he doubled my score and made it known far and wide to whoever would listen. It was all in fun, and we were both having a good time. But our second game turned a bit sour. I won with 11,000 points to his 1,000. So I jokingly shot back, “Hey, remind me again what you were saying about doubling my score…?”
Well, suddenly he was not in the mood for banter. He got real quiet and mumbled, “I don’t want to play anymore.” I immediately realized his feelings were hurt and apologized. And even though he accepted my apology, it took about 10 minutes for him to shake the melancholy and join back into the game.
Without realizing it, I had crossed a line and caused him pain. So here’s the question: was it wrong of me to make that joke (even though my intentions weren’t malicious)? That’s kind of hard to say. At the very least, I should’ve been more careful to gauge how my nephew was feeling. James 1:19 commands us to be quick to listen and slow to speak. If I had kept this in mind, I might’ve avoided the offense.
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