RCTI’s “Dua Sisi”, Draws Heavy Protests by Gamers

Lately, you might hear about “Dua Sisi” program, broadcasted by RCTI, which gained strong reaction from online gamers. On its latest episode titled “Baik Buruknya Kecanduan Game Online” (Pros and Cons of Online Gaming Addiction), the program aired an opinion on the pros and cons of online gamers that gained popularity in Indonesia.

However, the program was met by a strong reaction from online gamers due to the overall tone of the program. The program did show the negative and positive impact of online gaming addiction. Yet, some gamers saw that this program did not balance the pros and cons but put more emphasis on the negative impact. This was seen as an attack to the online gamer community where they were perceived as people who do something negative. If you missed the program, you can watch the clip below.

There are several sentences that talked about the negative impact of online gaming addiction, such as “Playing online games which was arranged to be done continuously without regards to time, is like an addictive drug that binds its players and made it hard to stop.” or “If a person had gotten the addiction, not only it will cause severe physical and psychological harm but also drives them to do criminal act.” The program also aired the health problem of online gaming addiction. When people played the game for a long period, it will cause finger muscle inflammation, eyesore, etc. The program also stated that another negative effect of online gaming addiction is criminal act.

Many online gamers who were angered by the program then attacked RCTI’s fanpage with negative words. Not only that, but it was reported that some online gamers were really upset to the point they attacked RCTI’s server with DDos attack that made the server cannot be accessed temporarily plus planned to boycott RCTI. We still found upset posts and threats to RCTI up until the time this article was written.

RCTI then finally “surrendered” and wrote a public apology. Through its official Facebook page, they wrote the apology and reveal some proofs and facts of online gaming’s positive effect as follows:

Although the apology had been put out, some gamers still gave cold shoulder and some still posted upset messages to RCTI. There are even some gamers that demand that RCTI aired an episode that discusses the positive impact of online gaming to redeem the upsetting episode plus the apology through the same media.

As a gamer, it is understandable that some are upset with the program. However, we have to respond to it with a cool head, not by blindly attacking and using swear words. As for RCTI, this is a great experience so that they can be more objective and balanced in seeing a phenomenon. Being a gamer can be a positive profession if we did it properly, as discussed here.

[Source: Kaskus/RCTI Official]