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Looking at Video Games and Violence
rootrider writes "Mark Rahner of the Seattle Times has written a great article discussing the recent trend here in the US to outlaw the purchase of violent video games by minors. I'm sure articles have been written in the past that refute the idea that video games lead to violence, but this is the first mainstream article I've seen that details the issue and does it well." The trend isn't really that new. In the past, Ozzy Osbourne and Dungeons and Dragons have been favorite scapegoats, and when I was in high school it was gangsta rap music. I can't wait until we can attribute violence to the nightly news.
Won't someone PLEASE think of the children!!!!
Behind most "well meaning" laws designed to protect children, is a facist who simply wants to limit your freedom.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
During times of war I tend away from video games which involve killing people. Images in the news, particularly if you've gone to the Al-Jezeera site and looked at their un-censored images (yes, this is what war is really like, unlike what you see on US news broadcasts), disturb me and I tend to shift of to strategy games and D&D (where I'm hacking monsters to bits, rather than humans.)
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Actually, you ask an interesting question: what is the influence of news reporting when it comes to violence?
I see two kinds of influence:
* News reports may create copycats out of weak minds. Let's say you catch some cretins throwing rocks on cars from bridges over freeways. If you make too much publicity of the case, you'll have imbeciles doing the same thing all over.
* More importantly, news reporting may alter the way people perceive the world and human interactions.
Let us take international relations. If you're brought up in the idea that your country is the best in every domain and the rest of the world is just made of jealous jerks, you obviously have a different outlook on violence - specifically, you may not be reluctant to approve the use of violence by your government.
However, I do myself play Soldier of Fortune II and so I can understand that some might be concerned that kids playing a game all day long that involves shooting your opponent might somehow be predisposed to shooting someone in real life.
But training, as the D.C. snipers have suggested? That's crazy. Even after playing so much that my right wrist aches, I can't imagine that I'm now more capable with an AK47 than I was before SOFII.
Furthermore, when I was a kid, trying not to get eaten by Tyrannosaurus Rex, we actually ran around outdoors with fake guns or BB guns and stalked each other. Those low-tech methods were surely more effective at grooming future killers than the sit-on-your-ass and get fat video alternatives.
and I'll believe this bullshit that somehow games teach kids to kill. People in the media (and our our own representatives) claim that these games are "murder trainers" but they can't even teach you to hold a gun properly. How to aim a gun. In the games, you don't even have to look down the sights on the gun to aim!
Thats just the starting point. The fact is, the only person who makes you do anything is YOU. I grew up on good ol' PBS. Monty Python didn't turn me into a drag racing nun. Or a nude pianist. Red Dwarf didn't turn me into a cat. The Red Green Show didn't make me very handy (I wish it had though, I'm not all that handsome). And that was all before I became a teenager. Add in the Atari 2600 I swapped in for a Nintendo in my 6th grade year, and later for a super nintendo, and according to these idiots, I've turned out to be some kind of saint or something since I haven't shot anyone or tried to fry them with Street Fighter 2 moves.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
#1, The government should have no say in what I buy /. land,
for my children, this is just rediculous. #2, Most
of the games I bought for my Playstation/Computer
were bought with the mindset I want something I'll
like just as much as my son will. So does this
mean that me buying resident evil and such and then
letting my son play make me a bad father?? I don't
know how many of you have kids out there in
but the ones who do I think will agree that kids now
don't quite fit into the old catagories. I mean my
son (age 6) already has better views on life, and
understands a lot more than most people that are
older than me. I don't think it's the fact that
video games teach them anything, I think it's the
fact that most parents buy kids video games to
"keep kids out of thier hair". I mean you take
the whole colombine shooting, these kids had all
kinds of stuff in the basement (pipe bombs/whatever),
so that just shows how much attention the parents
were paying to them. I think the parents of these
kids that go on shooting sprees just don't want to
admit that they weren't doing thier job, or that
maybe thier kids had some real issues. It's just
easier to blame a game company, and not to mention
that if you actually do win a case against a game
company you get a pretty good payment. These
people need to worry more about talking to thier
kids and less time trying to take thier rights.
Just my opinion
Scoobywan
I was looking through some old stuff the other day when I came across some AD&D manuals, etc.
Whilst browsing, I came across one of my old characters, a cleric who had chronic gastric problems that would most likely be fatal. I remember having that hobbled priest when I was 15, and thinking about how damn unlucky I was to have to play a virtual cripple.
Ten years later I was diagnosed with chronic ulcerative colitis (a bowel disease similar to Crohn's disease), exactly what that cleric had. And, similarly, my situation deteriorated over an 18-month period until the day came when I had to choose between major surgery and certain death - a seemingly obvious choice but one which was still the hardest decision I've ever had to make (believe me, if you're ever in the same boat then you'll understand why).
Now, I'm not saying that AD&D ruined my life, or that playing it cast some wicked curse on my life. But I do think that, any day now, I'm due to find a ring of invisibility, boots of speed and a +3 vorpal sword, and when that day comes, I'm gonna kick some major ass.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/cv2.htm
overall, violent crime in the US has been on the decline since 1993.
interesting coincidence: the decline started the year DOOM was released, one of the first widespread, graphically violent games.
and a proven statistic: the higher the unemployment, the higher the crime rate. does this mean we can make bad economic policy illegal too?