For the complete discussion on chess, see the Awake of 1973, 3/22, pp. 12-14. I'm an avid chess player, as attested to by my handle. Reuben Fine was one of the best American players ever. :-) He was even quoted in the article.
I remember this crap because of my life-long interest in the game. There was even talk at the time that when any games were played among brothers that you don't even keep score! It's interesting to note that the Catholic church at one time, for about a 200-year span in the Middle Ages, refused to allow the priests to play because it became an obsessive passion. I guess the only obsession allowed is devotion to the borganization.
For your viewing pleasure, below are a couple of paragraphs of the crap. To my knowledge they never retracted their BS statements. As far as I'm concerned the game always appealed to me because of ultimate justice.........there is no luck as in dice or card games, and if you lose you made the wrong move and that's all you can say. Hmmmmm..............wonder why an escape to a game that offered real justice applealed to me?? hehe
"However, pitting one mind against another, with the element of chance eliminated entirely, tends to stir up a competitive spirit in chess players. In fact, chess is frequently characterized as an 'intellectualized fight.' For example, dethroned world chess champion Boris Spassky noted: "By nature I do not have a combative urge. . . . But in chess you have to be a fighter, and of necessity I became one."
This helps to explain why there are no topflight women chess players-the more than eighty chess grand masters in the world are all men. Actress Sylvia Miles observed regarding this: "To be a professional chess player, you have to be a killer. If the spirit of competition in American women ever does become that strong, then I think we'll get some major female players."
Some chess players have recognized the harm that can result from playing the game. According to The Encyclopdia Britannica, the religious reformer "John Huss, . . . when in prison, deplored his having played at chess, whereby he had lost time and run the risk of being subject to violent passions."
The extreme fascination of chess can result in its consuming large amounts of one's time and attention to the exclusion of more important matters, apparently a reason Huss regretted having played the game. Also, in playing it there is the danger of "stirring up competition with one another," even developing hostility toward another, something the Bible warns Christians to avoid doing.
Then, too, grown-ups may not consider it proper for children to play with war toys, or at games of a military nature. Is it consistent, then, that they play a game noted to be, in the opinion of some, an "intellectualized equivalent, of the maneuvers enacted by little boys with toy soldiers"? What effect does playing chess really have upon one? Is it a wholesome effect?
Surely chess is a fascinating game. But there are questions regarding it that are good for each one who plays chess to consider."
I would like to conclude that chess has had a wholesome effect on everyone I know that plays it, and I'm an avid tournament player so have been in contact with hundreds of players. Teaching the game has been effective in schools to help children develop critical thinking. Besides, the nerds need somewhere to go, too! P.S. I developed social skills in spite of chess and the borganization. ;-)
