Hindu leader Rajan Zed says the depiction of Indian-origin Symmetra “trivializes Hinduism’s highly revered Goddess.”
Rajan Zed, who is based out of Nevada and claims to represent Hinduism, has taken offence to Blizzard Entertainment’s latest shooting game, Overwatch. Zed has urged Blizzard to remove an Overwatch skin, which “trivializes” Hinduism’s highly revered Goddess. The skin (a feature that changes the appearance of a character in the game) in question is of an Indian-origin character, Symmetra, which turns her into Maa Kali’s avatar.
Zed’s blog, which claims to represent the thoughts of all Hindus around the globe, states, “Hindus are urging Blizzard Entertainment to withdraw Devi (Goddess) skin of Symmetra character in its Overwatch video game, calling it inappropriate.”
Zed, who mentions himself in the blog as the ‘President of Universal Society of Hinduism’, wrote that “In a video game set-up, the player controlled the movements of Devi, while in reality the devotees put the destinies of themselves in the hands of their goddesses”. “Controlling and manipulating Devi with a joystick/ button/keyboard/mouse was denigration.”
Zed added saying, “Reimagining Hindu scriptures, symbols, concepts and deities for commercial or other agenda was not okay as it created confusion.” “Devi was meant to be worshipped in temples and home shrines and not to be reduced to just a “character” in a video game to be used in combat in the virtual battleground.”
“Hindus were for free speech as much as anybody else if not more. But faith was something sacred and attempts at belittling it hurt the devotees. Video game makers should be more sensitive while handling faith related subjects, as these games left lasting impact on the minds of highly impressionable children, teens and other young people,” Zed added.
Although Zed made his point clear through his blog post about degrading the image of the Indian Goddess, players in India, many of whom who may be Hindus too, do not seem to agree with him too much.
On the Indian Facebook page of Overwatch, you can see many players of the game disagreeing with Zed’s claims. On a post of Zed’s demand to remove the Kali skin on the page, a user named Eric Yumnam commented, “I was so proud that there is a Hindu depiction which also represents India in a game which i love, both in Smite n in this game which is rare for any other game to put in their games. These religious pple sud (sic) stop interfering.”
Another player Rohan Mondal wrote, “Blizzard is probably going to ignore him like the irrelevant shit he is. how far can he escalate the matter? he can’t do shit about it. we as the actual players, have absolutely no problem with it.”
This isn’t the first time that Rajan Zed has made such appeals. Back in February 2016, he was offended by Shin Megami Tensei IV: Final’s depiction of Lord Krishna in the Japanese role-playing game. Even then he had said that the picturization belittled the Indian God.
Source: bgr.in
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