Computer games – the thing that prevents me from going mad.  Is there any better way than to unwind than hopping online and shooting some poor fool in the face?  Unfortunately, in the last month I’ve hardly had time to touch any of them.  Perhaps this explains the tension in my shoulders…

World of Warcraft – I think I’ve mentioned my love for this a reasonable amount since it’s been released.  I’m sure most of you know about it already.  I belong to a really friendly guild who, I’m ashamed to say, I’ve been neglecting of late. 

Chromehounds – A ‘Mech combat’ game for the Xbox 360.  I love the stalking around firing rockets at giant robots.  I completed the single player campaign in a couple of days and was looking forward to the online section.  Unfortunately it’s proving near impossible to find a squad and pick-up games are often tricky to get into with hosts disbanding games should they start to turn against them.

Oblivion – A beautiful game spolit somewhat by the way creatures level up at the same rate as yourself.  A bad design decision in my opinion.  Still I believe that it is correctable by modifying the game, something that the games creators encourage.

City of Heroes/City of Villains – I still get a kick out of flying around a city in a cape.  So sue me.  I also like playing healers in this, not that I come home from work only to do it all over again.  With City of Villains I can be evil(ish).

But…

Second Life – I love the potential of this, hampered as it is by crappy graphics, a machine specification that is ridiculously high and a preponderance of ‘sex clubs’ and ‘Lesbian clubs’ and ‘animated penis wearables’ and ‘S&M clubs’ and other things that will make my google referral logs interested once this post goes live.  If only I could run a local server rather than have to connect to the main ‘Grid’, then I could have more control of my environment and wouldn’t have to worry about someone erecting a ‘Lesbian Sex Animation’ shop next to my reflective shrine.  I *do* love the building aspect though, and the scripting.  But the social tools need taking out back and shooting.  Still good enough for me to play around with, but not the ‘future’ that many bloggers believe it to be.

Finally there is Warhammer Online which I am waiting for with bated breath. Actually I'm looking for someone with a Beta key who has been injured so that I can refuse to treat them until they hand it over...

Once upon a time, in the far depths of internet time, back when the Lynx browser was pretty much the standard, I signed up to be a ‘Humanist Priest of the Universal Church’ or some such.  Don’t ask me why, I think it was set up so that Americans could get tax-breaks.  Not much use for myself who (a) wasn’t American, nor (b) as a student wasn’t paying taxes at the time.  I printed off the certificate. laughed about it and forgot about it.

If only I’d known that I’d end up working on an ambulance I may well have paid extra (that is paid anything) to get the Advanced certificate.  Let me tell you why…

Every so often we get sent to ‘person behaving strangely’, sometimes this is an adult and sometimes it is a child.  When we reach the patient we are told, with a straight face nonetheless, that the patient is possessed by ancestors/spirits/demons*

*Delete as applicable.

Despite being (currently) an evangelical atheist, I have to take this sort of thing seriously, there is however a problem – our training guidelines pull us in two directions.

 

Direction one – We should respect the culture and traditions of our patients.

Direction two – We should never collude, or reinforce the delusions, of someone who is psychotic.

(Psychosis is defined as ‘irrational beliefs not shared by the patient’s traditions or culture)

 

You can see the problem that we have.

I have been to a thirteen year old boy who has been possessed by spirits and, when the police arrived, ran off like Linford Christie.  Of course they reckoned without the police van coming around the far end of the street.

I’ve been to a teenage girl who has been ‘protected’ from demons by some wall hangings, but that they may have found a way through and this is what is making her sick.

I’ve been to mothers who are channelling spirits in order to drive out the evil ancestors plaguing her daughter (who, unsurprisingly perhaps, has mental health issues).

I’ve been to evangelical Christian cults who have been trying to drive evil spirits out of their elderly relative by throwing salt at them.

I’ve been to countless people who have believed that they were possessed, and have had near superhuman strength to prove it.  I’ve seen them ‘levitate’ off beds despite their father sitting on top of them.  I’ve seen them running down the street naked, covered in their own excrement all in order to fulfil some direction from God.

 

So where do I stand?  Do I respect the culture and agree that ‘yes, it might be demons’, or do I not reinforce their delusions by reminding them that a urine infection can cause similar symptoms?  More importantly, where does madness end and religion begin?