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Violent Games Good for Kids
fjordboy writes "Scholars from MIT, the University of California in LA, and the University of London have worked together to oppose laws restricting children from playing violent video games. The battle is currently taking place in the US Court of Appeals and the case seems to hold a decent amount of merit. From Vnunet:"Experts on childhood and adolescence have long recognised the importance of violent fantasy play in overcoming anxieties, processing anger, and providing outlets for aggression." Similar article from Reuters as well."
Personally, I see some games making people more angry and edgy. Take, for example, Counter-Strike. I've been at lan parties where people have gotten seriously pissed off while playing this game, even to the point of violence more than once. And almost everytime it's the same thing: Someone says the way in which they died doesn't count because of any number of complete bullshit reasons(awp shot, camping, even accusations of cheating).
Even I'm guilty of this. I get midly pissed off if I own someone and they go "luck" or "won't happen again". I've seen people that shout "BS" after every single death, it's pretty fucking sad.
Not every game is going to relieve stress. If you're serious about the game, and you're not playing up to your usual standard for whatever reason, you're very quick to anger. It's not very theraputic if cs is giving you a pissed-off anxiety attack.
P.S. Camping with the awp=sniping(fair, and expected). Camping with the mp5=camping(cheap).
Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
I grew up with condemned shows like the A-Team, and Airwolf. Shows that people said were too violent for kids. Were kids in the 80's as violent as ones now? Hell no, and it's because the kids growing up just after I did had crap like Captain Planet and other spoon-fed pablum created to make everyone love and respect eachother.
I've got -nothing- wrong with love and respect, great things to have. But those aren't taught by TV, they're taught be experience. When I watched action-oriented TV, I got the adrenaline rush -and- the easy comedown before the credits rolled. Great way to get rid of tension.
Hell, consider those old shows the violence version of masturbation. Probably fits.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
As a game programmer games were my motivation to study.
That's probably a rare case though =).
Perhaps that's a valid positive aspect of violence in video games. But what about the negatives: that it desensitizes us to violence, and we even grow to enjoy it? Take television as an example. When I look around in the U.S., I see a nation of television addicts, whose priorities, interests, and cultural views are largely influenced by what they absorb watching television. One inevitable aspect of watching a lot of TV is witnessing violence. This might provide a cathartic outlet for some of us, but I think it also trains us to accept, expect, and even enjoy such violence... after all, if people didn't enjoy it, it wouldn't sell, so it wouldn't be on TV. Now, maybe adults can separate reality from fantasy (I personally don't believe this, but it is arguable), but can kids? From my experience, they are *drastically* less adept at this than adults, and I think adults forget this (until they have kids of their own, and then begin to take a conservative viewpoint on it - for a reason). Video games are in the same boat. Violent video games also desensitize people to what real-life acts of violence - such as murder and war - mean. Violence becomes glorified; it gets associated with fun, recreation, pleasure, endorfins. I'm not saying that what this study says is wrong; I'm sure that video-game violence is a cathartic outlet and can sometimes play a positive role. But that's only one aspect of it; we have to look at the big picture. Now, I know a lot of you slashdotters love video games, and I expect to get ripped for this one... but please, you don't have to dismember me - let's keep the discussion fair and mature, ok? Ryan Geiss
People ARE violent. Games are not going to mitigate or ameliorate that. You know why we are violent? Because for 2 million years we've killed, eaten and dominated all comers.
Our ONLY evolutionary advantage is not big brains or stereoscopic vision or opposable thumbs. It's aggression. It's our unquenchable lust to be the last one standing, dripping with someone else's blood.
I have played Football, and GTA3 - and in my mind Football better prepares one for the life of a vilent criminal as one is actually hitting and huring real people - GTA3 you are just pressing buttons
That is not violent games causing that, its competition. Competition is at fault there and it happens in non-violent games too. Example is chess; did you ever see those grand champions that lost to a computer? I swear I thought they were going to pick up a chair and start swinging. It's the same in any game some people are graceful losers and some resort to using violence or calling people cheaters or what not.
I dunno, maybe not. While i didn't end up becoming a game programmer, programming games like the ones i was playing is what got me into programming computers at all.
Now, ~10 years later, i have a good job as a programmer and a computer science degree.