Fox: EA invited to talk Mass Effect 'SE'XBOX
The hullabaloo surrounding an inaccurate Fox News report on Mass Effect continues today. Joystiq readers will recall that Fox News recently ran a story claiming that Mass Effect contains "full digital nudity and sex," a charge that is simply untrue. Electronic Arts, who now owns the Mass Effect property, later contacted Fox via a letter from EA VP of communications Jeff Brown. The letter asked Fox to correct the errors in the segment and also cited more than a bit of hypocrisy by pointing out that many of Fox's own programs, such as Family Guy and The OC, show sexual situations that are just as graphic (and are rated for ages under 17 by the way, unlike Mass Effect).
MTV did a little digging and got their own response from Fox on the matter. A Fox spokesperson, who would not be named, said, "Fox News Channel has extended several invitations to EA through a company representative to appear on 'Live Desk With Martha MacCallum' to discuss 'Mass Effect' and the segment which aired on Monday. We have received no response." So, in other words, Fox can apparently report as much erroneous information as they want, because the party they were defaming wasn't present to defend itself. We'll have to wait and see if EA takes the bait.
Editor's rant: Fox's stance on this matter is complete bunk. The fact remains that they misrepresented Mass Effect, and having EA on to "discuss" the game isn't going to change that. What's called for is a correction of inaccurate reporting. Sorry folks, but as a member of the Joystiq network, it's disgusting. We do our absolute best here to report the facts as they are. Should we find out that we published something that was inaccurate, we fix it and post a correction. That's the way it should be. If we tried to get away with the same things that Fox is trying, our commenting public would skewer us. It's as simple as that. If Fox really wants EA to go on the air, it should be for an apology. Will that happen? We don't think so, but it should.
