Well gang, it’s that time of year again – the guys over at Penny Arcade have put out the call to gamers everywhere to open their hearts and wallets for this year’s Child’s Play charity drive.
If you’re joining the show already in progress, back in 2003, Gabe and Tycho over at Penny Arcade read one too many articles that painted gamers as anti-social, uncaring slackers. You see, they knew that the gamer stereotype wasn’t true and that with the size of their fanbase, they could prove it.
What they did was simple, yet beautiful. They didn’t ask for a boycott or for people to write letters to these media outlets telling them how wrong they were – what they did was ask gamers everywhere to open their hearts and wallets to help children who were having a pretty rough go of it by donating to a local children’s hospital… and open their hearts they did. The rest, as they say, is history.
Since that day in 2003, the Child’s Play charity has grown to include more and more hospitals around the world, resulting in more and more children who may have been given a much needed smile – if you don’t believe me, just read a few of the letters they’ve received from people who have experienced the benefits of this generosity.
By now, I know you’re just dying to find out how you can help – well, it’s simple. Just go to the Child’s Play website at http://www.childsplaycharity.org/ and select a children’s hospital you wish to donate to. You’ll be taken to that hospital’s wishlist over at Amazon.com, where they’ve listed items that they could use. From there, you decide what items to donate (the selection generally includes books, dvds, toys and yes, video games.), add them to your basket and go to checkout. Amazon will then ship your items directly to your selected hospital and get them in the hands of a child.
I don’t know about you, but I think knowing that somewhere out there you made a total stranger smile during rough times is something to feel good about – and with the way things are this year, maybe people knowing that someone out there cares can make all the difference.
Normally, I’d finish off my yearly Child’s Play post joking about how donating might make up for some of your gaming related sins – I’m not going to do that this year – this year I’m just going to ask that you give what you can out of the goodness of your heart – and let the people on your friends list decide if you’re worthy of forgiveness.
Thanks again for listening guys and gals – I’ll resume my regularly scheduled not posting much now.
