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Up, Up, Down, Down: Part Two
In much the way the late anthropologist Margaret Mead predicted, the older generation and many of its leading institutions -- education, politics, media, education -- has unleashed a furious attack against gaming and its culture, so that the term has become synonymous with addiction, obsession, even violence.
Unlike any other cultural identifier, gaming is associated almost entirely with negative imagery in the non-virtual world, dividing notions of society and culture further. Gaming and its allegedly evil affects were central issues in the presidential election, and the notion of an amoral generation of thieves and narcissists crops up again and again in the public perception of computing and the Net, from hacking to free music.
The media cover technology poorly as a rule, but their shallow portrayal of gaming culture as destructive and profane is a particular scandal, more so all the time as gaming becomes sophisticated, creative and intellectually challenging.
This is the locus of the "moral panic," a severe societal response to some dramatic development that institutions don't understand and can't control, so therefore fear.
What characterizes a moral panic?
According to Erich Goode and Nachman Ben-Yehuda, authors of Moral Panics: The Social Construction of Deviance, the concept is defined by at least five crucial elements: concern, hostility, consensus, disproportionality and volatility: They involve:
- Heightened concern over the behavior of a particular group and the consequences of its behavior for the rest of society.
- Increased hostility toward the group believed to be engaging in questionable behavior.
- Agreement among a wide segment of society that the threat is serious, and caused by the group in question.
- Perceptions that the group is more dangerous than it really is, generating fear that's disproportionate to the threat.
- Sudden eruptions -- moral panics are by nature volatile -- that reappear from time to time and often, just as suddenly, subside.
On all five criteria, gaming qualifies as causing a moral panic. There is great concern about its consequences, sometimes said to involve everything from the violence of Columbine to distraction from schoolwork, athletics and other "healthy" activities. We see plenty of hostility towards gamers. The fear of gaming has always been wildly disproportionate to any real threat, and the panic over it is episodic, frequently triggered by incidents like school shootings or other media-transmitted scares.
The moral panic over gaming has also managed to obscure its growing social, cultural, even political signifance.
"Our toys, writ large, echo profound revolutions in simulation, the science of materials, and digital communication," author Mark Pesce writes in The Playful World, recently published by Ballantine Books.
"The technique of the Furby has been a hot topic of computer science for a dozen years; artificial life -- simulation of activity of living systems -- has taught us a lot about how we learn and grow into intelligence. Computers, which just a decade ago seemed useful only for word processors and spreadsheets, are now employed as digital gardens, where the seeds of mind grow into utterly upredictable forms."
Gaming has evolved far beyond play. Arguably the most revolutionary cultural force in the world right now, it's transforming the imaginations, attentions spans, reflexes and strategic thinking of an entire generation, perhaps even our neural systems themselves. Yet few people have bothered to study what this might mean.
With the release of Sony's PlayStation 2, writes Pesce, the founding chair of the Interactive Media Program at the University of California's School of Cinema-Television, "the machinery of infinite realities will be within the grasp of millions of children around the world. Unlike any videogame console released before it, the PS 2 will have the power to create realistic imaginings of breathtaking clarity. Million-dollar computers -- in l999! -- have only fractionally more power than the Play Station 2, which will challenge our ideas about simulation by making it look at least as real as anything else seen on a television screen."
But how many parents, business executives, educators, politicians or journalists recognize that so powerful and creative a force is now available to children? That future ideas about creativity, imagination, work -- and individual relationships to institutions -- will be shaped by such tools, just as they were by the PS2's more primitive predecessors, from the early Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) to game-playing computers? As pundits sound alarms about how videogames are ruining children's moral lives, as both major presidential candidates did repeateadly, during the campaign -- who in our culture is preparing for the radical changes in imagination about to be unleashed?
Pesce is right, of course. The PS2, designed to connect to the Net, is a window into a larger universe. It could easily simulate a Furby or Mindstorms, and it creates as well a million other interesting forms, if only for the eyes and ears. In fact, says Pesce, the PS2 could well be seen as a spaceship for scouring the universe of ideas.
The cultural gap between the young and the old first widened noticeably in the l960s, when younger people turned their generational backs against their elders. The explosion of the Net and the Web, which have triggered a revolution in the way information and ideas move, has exacerbated that division. The Boomers talked a lot about revolution but didn't quite make one; younger Americans are making one but don't always seem to realize it.
Our civilization hasn't begun to come to terms with this split. Panicked moralists, pundits and authority figures point to all sorts of reasons, from the decline in the authority of parental figures to the influence of new media to the lack of discipline in schools, but the truth is there is no real understanding either of this widening chasm in our politics, or in our social and cultural consciousness.
Part Three: How does gaming change people?
That's a very good article, Katz. You've summarized our society's latest fears quite well.
Society has this craving to find scapegoats. There's always got to be someone to blame for its problems and usually the different group gets the title.
This is nothing new, of course. What I'd like to add is that society is arrogant and lives in a constant state of denial.
Where is it written that men are bound to become "better" as time goes on? Where do people find proof of that?
What Katz calls the "new culture" has been attacked vehemently by everyone that belongs to the "old culture", as if the world underwent some bizarre overnight change.
Nothing changed!, and that's what must be stated. Some games may have the in-your-face attitude regarding death and violence, but what exactly does that prove? It tells us about a new way of seeing things. A new way that opens an ideological gap between different kinds of people. To top it all, a new way that won't last forever, for it WILL be superseded.
The "wide segment of society" attacks the "group" looking for the scapegoat and refuses to see the demons that lie within us all.
Flavio
Each one of them, with the exception of 1 (in a group of 20) had some serious problems with reality. The funniest of them was a kid (about 16 at the time) who tried to cast a spell on a guy who was sizably bigger (why i'm not sure.. I dont even know if he had a reason) - after the spell casting he shouted something about how he had some special token and couldn't be harmed, then punches the guy. Well, he didn't last more than a few seconds, and ended up bleeding on the ground thereafter. It was funny, but somewhat sad. The most messed guy used to flash freeze rats (not sure of the method of it) and then break them or use them as displays. He also used to speak Klingonese (or so he said, no one actually verified this) and dress up as a star trek character for fun (no reason).
The problem isn't video games.
Whatever happened to just plain crazy?
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
As much as I disagree w/Katz's articles (usually) and, point by point, arguments (ditto), the "Up-Up-Down-Down" title is great. After Part I, I asked a plethora of friends and acquaintences to finish the sequence: "Up Up Down Down ..." and, as expected, the (currently) 16-25 year olds could, while no one else had any idea.
Of course, my youngest brother can explain the phenominon that is Pokemon, while I can't even spell it.
The others will just have to use their imagination.
JonKatz actually followed up on one of his "first in a series" articles! The world as we know it is over!
Actually, Jon follows up on a good deal of his 'series' articles, just they don't always make it to the front page. If you check the side sections on the left, you'll see a story or two of his that wasn't big enough.
Now, that isn't to say that there's no legitimate concern over things like desensitization to violence, couch potatoism, and other alleged societal ills that people associate with games. But a society that questions itself is the only healthy kind of society.
I know this example is used any time 'video game/television/movie violence' but look at Japan. The most violent anime, twisted porn, and violent video games. Yet a low crime rate. Similar comparisons made with gun ownership, citing England as an anti-gun nation with low crime, and other European countries as pro-gun nations with low crime on the flip side of the argument. Given all of these comparisons, I think it's unfair to say that gaming itself is the cause for a high crime rate, violence in schools, etc. The sum of society, including gaming, must be looked at here.
I agree with you totally, games are just games for all but those who have no hold on reality. Another point is, those people will find their escape anyway. The kid who plays Doom for a week then kills his classmates would probably have killed them even if he couldn't download Doom. In fact, he might just have killed them a week earlier without that outlet for his rage.
As Dave Mustaine (lead singer for Megadeth) once said in an interview for MTV hack in 1988 - "They scream and piss and moan about the kid who kills with a metal tape in his back pocket, but what about the kid who offs with a Barry Manilow tape in his back pocket? No press there!" I wonder how many kids have killed classmates after playing freecell or minesweeper religiously.
Like this guy has the chance to change the world. I don't think he even has a chance at procreation.
I'm not stereotyping all gamers, just those who subsitute gaming for real life experiences.
This is another view of the world.
This article relies on a straw man argument that there is some sort of moral panic about video games in our society. There are no serious quotes from mainstream sources to back this up, other than the ubiquitous political fear-mongering related to the entertainment industry as a whole. So first Katz sets up this panic using circumstantial evidence (since direct evidence, like masses of parents burning their childrens' video games in quantity just doesn't exist), then he proceeds to almost knock it down.
I say almost because he goes on to equate the very limited modeling capabilities of a Playstation 2 to that of a supercomputer and then talk benignly about the wonders of technology in a discussion that avoids that issue and instead supposedly reinforces his other strawman argument: that there is some ever-widening rift between the old and the young. Then he assigns (as is typical of the rose-tinted worldview) to the younger generations' supposed side of the rift values that are supposed to convince us that the geezers just don't get it.
What he fails to recognize is that the only rift (i.e. that of the teenage wasteland) is mostly a marketing ploy used to sell kids stuff they wouldn't normally buy.
That is "hey kids, your folks just don't get these baggy pants and those stringy tanktops. Shop at the Gap and assert your independence!" The young are no more auto-dissidents than the old are auto-conformists. Much of what passes for generational rift is simply the by-product of living in a society where teenagers are given no real power and no real meaning other than consumer choices. The only way the PS2 is going to change all this is if kids suddenly start using it to hack into school computers to change their grades, or mess up the computers that control nuclear bombs.
I do not have a signature
If you want an emotionally and experientally rich life: Go swing dancing; learn to cook a new dish; learn to sail, or to roll a kayak, or to SCUBA dive; do anything that will get you out and interacting with other people of similar (or even different) interests; have great sex.
This is from a 36 year old computer professional. I program as a hobby, and do like computer games, though I don't think the current generation is any more enjoyable than the old tty-based "rogue". But I don't confuse computers with life.
Ciao
I consider this the only interesting point of discussion here.
We all brazenly assume people can tell the difference between fantasy and reality. But I have always found the most "into-it" people, including me, have some trouble with reality.
Whether the people who play this way were out of touch with reality and therefore play compulsively, or simply play compulsively for another reason and then become out of touch with reality is interesting to me personally. I believe the first is closer to the truth.
Many other compulsive hobbies, like reading, poetry, other games, or obviously D&D other hobbies over the years have been used for these purposes. Video Games, in their current incarnation are only slightly more interactive and encompassing, though some would argue less so than D&D.
-Ben
Why can't a game be part of someone's daily life?
How is this different than watching TV for hours a night?
Sure, they may seem socially unbalanced, but at least they're being more social than your average couch potato.
I recall a slew of superficial Reader's Digest-type articles in the mid-80's that attempted to scapegoat Dungeons & Dragons as an insidious, soul-sapping plague infecting our nation's youth. This hysteria -- fueled by small-town Parent-Teacher Associations and lazy journalists -- spawned specious allegations of high-school satanists and the ubiquitous urban legend of the college kid who "got too into the game" and disappeared into the steam tunnels.
Sincerely,
Vergil
Vergil Bushnell
Insects and Grafitti Photos
You see politicians crying out against not just video games, but content on television, in movies, in music, and so on. For Katz' stories to be truly insightful and effective, he needs to show how video games and gamers fit in with the other forms of mass media in terms of behavior, content, and criticism. That'd be most interesting.
As usual though, I think Katz is on the right track, and exposing us to ideas that make us think, even if we think they're crap. Just my two cents before the usual Katz-bashers rear their ugly heads.
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one
-John Lennon
Middle-aged day-trader shoots up an office center.
More than half of marriages do not last.
Decades of enslavement of an entire race in America.
Decades of spousal and child abuse in America.
Blow jobs in the white house by an intern, with a married president.
And it's the VIDEOGAMES that are causing moral panic?! Holy shit . . . Talk about blind.
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seumas.com
1) Gaming is not entirely viewed as bad.. Myst was never accused of being violent!
2)This was *NOT* central to the presidential election, anymore than the health concerns in Rwanda was. PLEASE Katz! Stop turning a single media reference into War of the Worlds! Liebermans crew want to stop TV.. and the "furor" during the campaigns was about movie ratings, and how they screened films, *NOT* about games. Basically, with the price of games and the price of game level systems, especially on the PC, (which are the *most* violent games) few people under 18 are getting them without their parents knowledge anyway, and anyone over 18 is out of the hands of the gubmint censors in that arena.
You are trying *WAYYY* to hard to tie this to hellmouth.. its not going to work.. I'm really starting to get sick and tired of "Waaah.. I'm a misunderstood genius, Waaaah.. they pick on me cuz I'm a geek, WAaaaah.. they are mean to me at school so I'm gonna blow it up" crap.. GET OVER IT! Most of us went through it.. and where are we now? In IT.. where are "they"? Would you like fries with that?
Cmon.. video games are *not* the world changer you are trying to make them be!
Maeryk
Feminine Protection? What is that? A chartreuse flame thrower?
Million-dollar computers -- in l999! -- have only fractionally more power than the Play Station 2
What, like 10000/1 ?
-... ---
Seriously, I think Katz is overstating both the severity of the "moral panic" that society has supposedly created over gaming, and the importance of gaming as a cultural force.
They're just games, people! Sure there are a few oddballs who are covinced that Doom et. al. are a tool of Satan, but most reasonable people recognize that games are just games.
Now, that isn't to say that there's no legitimate concern over things like desensitization to violence, couch potatoism, and other alleged societal ills that people associate with games. But a society that questions itself is the only healthy kind of society.
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The most valuable commodity I know of is information. - Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko, Wall Street