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Jesus Strikes back:

Understanding Satire and
violence in Video Games
HACU-180 INTRODUCTION TO MEDIA STUDIES: OLD MEDIA AND NEW MEDIA
FINAL THESIS | MOHAMMAD ABDULLAH KAWISH

Mainstream entertainment media is filled with violence. By inspecting video games

released by major developers that have received a large reception, a common trend

can be identified. This common variable is violence and it can be seen video games

such as Grand Theft Auto, Call Of Duty, and Fortnight. Clearly man audiences enjoy

violent entertainment. However, while some audiences enjoy such entertainment,

some detest violence in video games. This division is evident in responses to the

recently released video game, Jesus Strikes Back (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Jesus Strikes Back (2 Genderz Production, 2019)

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Jesus Strikes Back is a video game developed by 2 Genderz Productions

which features real-world scenarios, where the players can shoot Muslim, Mexican,

feminist, liberal and members of the LGTBQ+ communities. In the game, players

can choose between Donald Trump, Hitler, Putin and Jesus Christ as characters to

play missions that target specific communities. These mission, however are based

on real-world shootings, such as the New Zealand shootings (2019) where 50

Muslim men were massacred. Another mission reenacts the Orlando nightclub

shooting (2016) where 49 were killed and 53 people were wounded. Apart from this,

the game also features scenes from Women’s March where players can shoot

feminists and gain points.

The developers claim on their website, the game is designed to be played by

an open-minded audience, stating that “Jesus Strikes Back is a video-game that

aims to deliver a strong message through satire and sarcasm.” However, many

gamers and observers are disturbed by the message, which they do not interpret as

satirical or sarcastic. Some believe the ideologies at the core of the game--

Islamophobia, racism, misogyny, and white nationalism-- are problematic. Others

argue and compare video games with art made by the team of developers. In an

article by Alec Moylan, “Political correctness in gaming,” Moylan states “Most

gamers would prefer a friendlier environment, but at what cost? “Political

correctness” implies that there is certain language that’s either right or wrong, but

who’s the judge and what are their standards? Can’t we enforce our own community
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rules?” In other words, many people prefer video games to be separated by the

real-world views and beliefs which justifies the graphicness and violence in video

games. In response to the game’s release, many parents launched an online

campaign on change.org to ban Jesus Strikes Back altogether. In response to the

petition some gamers suggested that Jesus Strikes Back should be available for

gamers who want to consume such texts and that imposing a restriction on such

texts would result in a restriction on freedom of speech. The primitive graphics that

allow players to reenact real-life shootings of minorities suggest that the game

developers were less concerned with producing a polished or sophisticated game,

and more concerned with providing an outlet for angry white men to engage in

wish fulfillment. Embedded deep in the storyline of the video game are racist,

homophobic, sexist and Islamophobic ideologies. In the pages that follow I explore

responses to Jesus Strikes Back in light of relevant scholarly literature. Of particular

interest to me is discussing how public discourses around such games align with,

and diverge from, those in scholarly publications, as well as how the concept of

satire complicates interpretations and discussions of such games.

Literature Review

In Douglas Kellner’s piece “Cultural Studies, Multiculturalism and media culture,”

the author states “Media images help shape our view of the world and our deepest
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values: what we consider good or bad, positive or negative, moral or evil… they

contribute to educating us how to behave and what to think, feel, believe, fear and

desire - and what not to” (Kellner, pg 9). In other words, it could be perceived that

media possess the power to influence one's beliefs and values. In the case of video

games, the same influential power is persits. According to a study conducted by

Palo Alto Medical Foundation, it was discovered that 97% of teen and adolescents

in the U.S. play video games. The study uncovered that the domestic video game

industry brings nearly $12 billion dollars a year. This shows that the video games

industry is a powerful force in many teens and adolescent lives. Douglas Gentile, In

his study concluded that, “When a video game is “prosocial” and rewards players

for building towns or helping others, children tend to show more empathy and

helpfulness in their daily lives. However, video games with violent content are linked

to more aggressive behaviors in teens” (Gentile, PAMF). This is alarming as firstly it

expose children to violence and secondly desensitize them through methods of

repetitions that can lead to reinforcing violent behaviors.

In the piece “Violence is a many-splintered thing,” by Ron Tamborini, Reneé

Weber, Nicholas David Bowman, Allison Eden and Paul Skalski break down to the

portrayal of violence into three factors graphicness, realism and justification. In the

first factor, graphicness is believed to be the central aspect that asses content as

violent. The authors describe in their piece, “This attribute group is comprised of

judgements related to the graphicness itself (which includes portrayals of blood,

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gore, and dismemberment), explicitness (which includes the levels of focus,

concentration, and detail shown on-screen) and seriousness (which excludes

depictions of occurrences as absurd, exaggerated, or unrealistic) of the violence

depicted” (Tamborini et al, pg 104). Such portrayal can be seen in games such as

Mortal Kombat 11 (Unreal Engine, 2019) where players can dismember the

opponent’s body parts with a vivid display of blood being splattered across the

screen. The second factor that may be important is the violent portrayal is extent to

which it is perceived as realistic. The authors quote The National Television Violence

Study which define realism as “the actuality of character, settings, and events, and it

identifies four distinct types of realism: depiction of reality (e.g., newsreel footage),

recreation of reality and real events (e.g., reenactments of crime scenes), fictional

portrayals of events that could realistically happen in real life (e.g., an action scene

in a Hollywood war movie), and fantasy portrayals of events that are not possible in

the real world (e.g., a monster battle in a film or video game).” Video games with a

realistic storyline with the same physical damage to the characters is perceived to

be less realistic because the inflicted damage is not on a real person but a virtual

character. The third aspect deals with the justification of violence. The authors

describe the importance of justifications as “the debate over intentionality of an

action in prior social scientific definitions of violence. Justifying violence can include

concepts related to punitiveness, remorse, fairness, and justification for character

actions” (Tamborini et al, pg 105). For instance, in the video game Grand Theft Auto

V (Rockstar Games, 2013) shooting a criminal is less violent than shooting a

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passerby due to the perceptions of lawfulness in both actions. In other words,

depending on how the world is set in any particular video game, the justification of

violence can be altered to suit the game’s law. It could be believed, that the game

developers intentionally avoid making realistic portrayals of violent actions to

enhance the fantasy elements of such games. The authors state that “enjoyment in

some video games genres often comes from our ability to engage in a fantasy world

that we can distinguish both physically and morally from the real world” (Tamborini

et al, pg 107). However, video games that imitate violence in real-world scenarios,

dispose of real-world justifications. This is evident in video games like Grand Theft

Auto V (Rockstar Games, 2013) where the players are rewarded for provoking unjust

violent actions from the beginning till the end of the game.

Many developers, have used video games as an outlet for political satire. A

similar game to Jesus Strikes Back, called Thoughts and Prayers (GOP arcade) was

released in 2016 in the wake of mass shootings in America. The game contained a

map of the U.S. in 8-bit animation format, with target points appearing with a

number of target and “#” with the name of the city which had the target landed on.

The game also featured on clicking buttons labeled, “Think” and “pray” for gamers

to click. Upon Clicking multiple time, a third button would pop with labeled, “Ban

assault weapon sales,” which prompt messages such as, “That’s unAmerican,” “you

don’t have the votes” and “you depend on NRA donations”(figure 2).
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The same team of developers produced similar mini-games with titles such as,

“Good guy with a gun,” “Voter suppression trail” and “Trump’s pussy grabber.”

These video games share a common thread of political satire, which can be

believed is intended well by the developers, however it is to be considered the

different interpretations by the audiences. In the article “Political satire and indie

games,” George Bailey explains the limitations developers have faced in the past

when publishing satirical video games. Bailey describes the limitations in

technology, finance and demographics in the past had prevented satirical video

games. This, however is changing due to the boom of internet technology, which

Figure 2: Thoughts and Prayers (GOP Arcade, 2016)

has streamlined the process of

production, marketing and distribution. With softwares enabling developers to

produce games efficiently and then publishing the text on gaming-centered social

media (Such as, Steam), has had an exponential growth in distribution. Apart from

this, these gaming-centered social media network enables audiences with similar

views to connect making political commentary in video games more accepted.

However, these video games are often target the right-wing politics in America.
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Methodology

For the purposes of research, I analyzed the public's views of the Jesus Strikes

Back’s trailer and gameplay videos in the comment section on social media sites

such as, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. I then compiled these reviews into

three discourses which I based as foundation for researching scholarly papers and

articles, by journalist and analysts.

Discourses

Discourse 1: So what if it’s problematic?

Figure 3: A commentator’s post under Jesus Strikes Back’s game-play video

The first set of views dealt with people who considered themselves as “unfazed” by

the release of Jesus Strikes Back (Figure 3). These commentators would relate video

games with to an expression of art by the developers. Hence it was considered that

banning Jesus Strikes Back, can be equated to banning art which is considered to

be against freedom of expression. This response was based on the online petition
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to ban the distribution of this game. In an article by Nathan Deardorff for Forbes

Magazine, “An Argument that video games are, indeed, high art,” the author states

“video games are a medium of mediums. Composers create soundtracks and

effects, artist create 2D images and 3D models, writers draft story arcs and

dialogue, and programmers choreograph all the moving pieces into a seamless

world. The art is a hodgepodge of art.” In other words, video games takes extensive

work in production with an array of artist, writers, modelers and coders. In the case

of Jesus Strikes Back, the similar process of production applies. A story was written

by writers which was passed to artist who then worked on developing the images

with coders, and banning the game would result in rejecting their expression and

efforts. As one of the commentator states, “I don’t agree with it. But they should

have a right to make content and sell it if people want to buy it.”

Discourse 2: Video games are supposed to be edgy

The second discourse deals with views regarding the belief that video game are

supposed to be violent. In study conducted by ProCon.org, it was concluded that

50% of the top-selling video games contains some form of violence. Hence it could

believed that the audiences enjoy such video games, as one of the commentators

state “If your offended by this u (you) have to be offended by any war game it’s no

different than cod (Call Of Duty: Video game, 2003) or any war game on market

only difference is the teams are different!” Defenders of violent video games argue

that research done on the violent video games effects on social behavior is deeply
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flawed. They argue that video games provide a safe outlet for consumers to vent

out their aggressive and angry feelings, which may ultimately lead to a reduction in

crime.

Discourse 3: Jesus Strikes Back is problematic

The third discourse deals with people who believe Jesus Strikes Back’s narrative is

deeply rooted with problematic ideologies, such as Islamophobia, racism, misogyny

and homophobia. One of the commentators state, “this is advocating murder of

people whose lifestyles bigots can’t accept, via a supposedly benign, silly game.

Too many bigots take pretend to a reality level. There is no place for sh*t like this in

society.” In other words, people believes that Jesus Strikes Back perpetuates the

problematic ideologies against minorities and that it will influence people towards

separatism.

Upon analyzing Jesus Strikes Back, the discourses revolving it and the

scholarly papers I have referred to for this paper, I believe that this particular video

game is highly problematic. At the core of its narrative are Islamophobic,

homophobic, misogynistic, racist and white nationalist ideologies which is shown

through game-play version of real-world shooting. This perpetuates hatred and

enforces these problematic ideologies onto the gamer who plays Jesus Strikes Back.

In Steven J. Kirsh’s article, “The Effects of Violent video games on adolescents, The

overlooked influence of development,” the author states that “exposure to video

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game violence would evoke behavioral mimicry, reinforce already existing

aggressive habits, and increase internal arousal. In turn, this internal arousal could

be interpreted as anger, which increases the likelihood of aggression” (Krish, pg

379). In other words, the author explains that violent video games have an impactful

and aggressive influence on young adults and adolescents. In instance of Jesus

Strikes Back, the video game may influence young adults to become racist,

islamophobic, misogynistic and homophobic.

In conclusion, I believe Jesus Strikes Back is very problematic game which

should be prevented from distribution. Though the developers of this game insist it

being satire, there is no denying the dire implications of having this satire taken

literally. When considering the researches regarding the influence of violence in

video games and the devastating attacks humanity have suffered over the past few

years, is this game worth the risk?

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Works Cited

• “Violence is a many-splintered thing: The importance of Realism, Justification,

and Graphicness in Understanding Perception of and Preferences for Violent

Films and video Games.” Authors: Ron Tamborini, Renè Weber, Nicholas David

Bowman, Allison Eden, and Paul Skalski

• “Cultural Studies, Multiculturalism, and Media Culture” Authors: Douglas

Kellner

• “The effects of violent video games on adolescents, The overlooked influence

of development” Author: Steven J. Krish

• “Jesus Strikes Back: Video game gives you points for killing gay people”

Author: Hemant Mehta

• “Political Satire and Indie games” Author: George Bailey

• “One year later, ‘Thoughts and Prayers’ the video game is more relevant than

ever” Author: David Britton

• “The impact of video games” Authors: Andrea Norcia, M.A.

• “History of Violent Video games” Source: procon.org

• “An Argument that video games are, Indeed, High Art” Author: Nathan

Deardorff

• “Political Correctness in Gaming - An Argument for and against enforcing it”

Author: Alec Moylan