Hillary, GTA, and High School Football

The LA Times is running a really worthwhile story discussing the recent attack on video games in congress. It talks about GTA, the decline in youth violence, and mentions that football actually encourages real aggression, causes real injuries, and is treated totally differently. It's worth a read. Unfortunately I'm fairly certain that very few U.S. Senators are listening over the sound of hype.

Comments

Do-gooder

[HyperChicken]

Hillary is doing what do-gooders always do. She's saying: "I'm smart enough to handle this and you're not." (Paraphrase of Penn Jillette)

Re:Do-gooder

[SharkJumper]

Hillary is doing what Presidential candidate hopefuls always do. She's getting some media time.

Re:Do-gooder

[Tackhead]

> Hillary is doing what do-gooders always do. She's saying: "I'm smart enough to handle this and you're not." (Paraphrase of Penn Jillette)

Do-Gooder psych is more pathological than that, and it's not limited to Sen. Clinton. Nor is it limited to her party. But it usually starts off with something "We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good" and metastasizes from there.

Spend enough time behind the counter at the welfare office "helping the less fortunate", or enough time behind the security barricades of TSA "keeping the Homeland secure" and eventually...

It's doing something horrible to me. I'm beginning to hate people, Uncle Ellsworth. I'm beginning to be cruel and mean and petty in a way I've never been before. I expect people to be grateful to me. I...I demand gratitude. I find myself pleased when slum people bow and scrape and fawn over me. I find myself liking only those who are servile. Once...once I told a woman that she didnt appreciate what people like us did for trash like her. I cried for hours afterward, I was so ashamed. I begin to resent it when people argue with me. I feel that they have no right to minds of their own, that I know best, that I'm the final authority for them. There was a girl we were worried about, because she was running around with a very handsome boy who had a bad reputation, I tortured her for weeks about it, telling her how he'd get her in trouble and that she should drop him. Well, they got married and they're the happiest couple in the district. Do you think I'm glad? No, I'm furious and I'm barely civil to the girl when I meet her. Then there was a girl who needed a job desperately--it was really a ghastly situation in her home, and I promised that I'd get her one. Before I could find it, she got a good job all by herself. I wasn't pleased. I was sore as hell that somebody got out of a bad hole without my help. Yesterday, I was speaking to a boy who wanted to go to college and I was discouraging him, telling him to get a good job, instead. I was quite angry, too. And suddenly I realized that it was because I had wanted so much to go to college--you remember, you wouldn't let me--and so I wasn't going to let that kid do it either....Uncle Ellsworth, don't you see? I'm becoming selfish. I'm becoming selfish in a way thats much more horrible than if I were some petty chiseler pinching pennies off these peoples wages in a sweatshop!"

[ ... ]

"Dont you see how selfish you have been? You chose a noble career, not for the good you could accomplish, but for the personal happiness you expected to find in it."

"But I really wanted to help people."

"Because you thought you'd be good and virtuous doing it."

"Why--yes. Because I thought it was right. Is it vicious to want to do right?"

"Yes, if it's your chief concern. Dont you see how egotistical it is? To hell with everybody so long as I'm virtuous."

- Dialogue: Katie Halsey, distraught and unhappy social worker, with her uncle.
Excerpted from Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead.

Rand's a bit of a nut, and her epistemology may be from somewhere out past Zeta Reticuli, but I think she nailed the psychology of the compulsive do-gooder dead on. To hell with everybody, as long as you're feeling virtuous about it.

Re:Do-gooder

[intnsred]

Hillary is doing what do-gooders always do.

Hillary? Do-gooder? Gimme a break.

She's doing what all slimey politicans do -- she's jumping on an issue which will offend the fewest possible people (young people don't vote very much anyway) in order score points and look like a hard-fighting politician struggling for truth, justice, and the American way.

I mean, just look at this completely worthless Congress: they ignore the US military's widespread and continuing torture, they ignore Bush's wholesale and blatant lies to start the war in Iraq, they ignore Karl Rove's lying and outing of a CIA spook just to score points in a game of political revenge, and they whitewash everything from the 9/11 investigation to Halliburton robbing taxpayers blind.

Yet they find time to rant about baseball players on steroids, Janice Jackson's nipple during the Superbowl, and Hillary's whining about cyber-sex in GTA.

The founding fathers aren't just rolling in their graves -- they're vomiting with disgust and the coffins are getting full! :-(

Re:Do-gooder

[lgw]

That's the problem with American politics in a nutshell. In the days of my youth, the party affiliations were clear: the GOP wanted to control my sex life, and the Dems wanted to control my wallet. Everyone wanted a "socially liberal, fiscally conservative" party (i.e., the smallest possible government), but voted on whether money or pornography was more important to them. At least it made some sort of sense.

Now there is no "small government" party, it seems. They both want to meddle and they both want your money (OK, technically, today's GOP just wants to spend your money, they don't actually bother to collect it first, but that's a minor quibble). How did America become a choice between two nanny-state parties? Do we have to wait for all the Boomers to die before we can get back to small government?

Re:Do-gooder

[modecx]

I'm a self-described gun-nut. I have lots of guns, and if many of my close friends knew the extent of my collection they'd probably be freaked out. I don't want my collection taken away, and I'm against legislation passed that limits good, well-intentioned, honest people from getting weapons for whatever reason.

That said, I can say decisively that careless use and storage of guns has killed and scarred far more kids than any form of pornography--yes, even goatse... "Conservatives" have been under the anti-pornography/anti nonmoral "think of the children" banner forever, which is to say--just as long as the "liberals". I don't mind guns or gay marriage. I'm for conserving our forests and oil, water and air. I don't think abortion is a good thing for the mind/body/soul, but I wouldn't deny it to those who need it. I didn't like Clinton, and I sure as hell don't like Dub'ya--they're both fucking liars. I guess it's just a bitch being a rational, moderate person.

If you're too stupid, arrogant or scared to pull your head out of the ground and realize that all of our parties use the same bullshit tactics, are completely full of crap, and only seek power then that's your problem.

Re:Do-gooder

[x_man]

Even if seatbelts and airbags weren't mandated, car companies would still offer cars with them, because consumers would demand them

If you go back and read the papers from the 70's and 80's, you'll see that the majority of car manufacturers did not provide shoulder-harness seatbelts and airbags until legislation was passed mandating their inclusion, despite widespread public support of these devices.

The restaurant you're eating at has a damn good reason to ensure that their workers handle the food you're eating properly: if they don't, they lose profits. All it would take is one or two cases of food-borne illness before word would spread and that restaurant's business would dry up pretty quick.

1. If this is true, then why are the rates of food and water contamincation higher in countries like Mexico? Shouldn't the free-market method of quality control have weeded out all of the bad restaurants by now?

2. What if all of the restaurants and food sellers in your area subscribe to the cheaper-is-better business model?

3. Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle to understand what life was like in "free-market" America before the FDA

4. Please explain why the notoriously unsafe aluminum wiring was used in just about every structure built in the 70's until the building codes were changed to prohibit its use. What happens to the free-market system when everybody uses the inferior and unsafe solution despite the consumer's wish.

Remember that if you don't like some what some business is doing, you can exercise your ultimate right as a sovereign consumer and not patronize that business

I really don't like Wal Mart and would like to shop elsewhere for my camping equipment. Unfortunately, Wal Mart has wiped out the other two stores in my town that sold camping equipment. What do people do when the free-market system creates a monopoly or a cartel as usually happens in unregulated economies?

In the absence of government regulations, Consumer Reports-type publications will open up to test, survey and measure how well car safety devices work, how many people have caught food-borne illnesses from Bob's BBQ or Joe's Gyros, and whether or not the wiring in those restaurants is safe or not.

1. If I were a restaurant owner, I would simply not allow that Consumer Reports person to inspect my kitchen.

2. What's to stop me from just paying a nice fat "consultation" fee to this Consumer Rating Company so they give me a good rating? (If you've ever been through ISO 9000 certification, you'll be especially aware of this little trick).

3. Assuming I can find an uncorrupted for-profit Consumer Rating Company, it's going to cost me more than a non-profit governmental entity.

And I now I hear you asking, "what if people don't take the time to buy these consumer watchdog magazines

I have an idea. Since it would be a real pain in the ass to have to constantly check up on every little thing like house wiring, car safety, food quality, etc, let's pool our resources into some sort of not-for-profit entity that monitors all of these things for us in an unbiased and fair manner. Give this organization some teeth to enforce our collective wishes and we might have something. We could call it...hmmmmmm....government?

Very Nice Article

[coop0030]

Many juvenile crimes -- such as the carjacking that is so central to "Grand Theft Auto" -- are conventionally described as "thrill-seeking" crimes. Isn't it possible that kids no longer need real-world environments to get those thrills, now that the games simulate them so vividly? The national carjacking rate has dropped substantially since "Grand Theft Auto" came out. Isn't it conceivable that the would-be carjackers are now getting their thrills on the screen instead of the street?

I was wondering this same thing. Could this be a conceivable conclusion? Could it be possible that kids these days are actually getting their adrenaline fix from these games instead of causing real-life crimes (or vandalism)?

When I was a kid the games were much mellower, and less realistic, and I was a hoodlum. I could speculate that if I had these games I would have caused much less trouble when I was a kid.

Re:Very Nice Article

[Qzukk]

So, the net result of videogames is that when threatened, you respond faster? Sounds like standard issue eye-hand-coordination boosting to me. Instead, let us address the real issue of how the population of Nazis have been utterly decimated due to kids playing Wolfenstein 3D and being trained to go out and shoot mutant Nazi soldiers 20 times in the face with a shotgun. And don't even get me started on the population of demons since the release of Doom. When was the last time you've heard a demon mating call? I thought not. Clearly these murder simulators are decimating our endangered species!

Won't someone think of the Nazis?!

Heh. Football...

[TWX]

If the allegations of football and videogames as stated above are true, that would explain a lot about my high school football team. The spoiled brats had all of the video game systems that their parents could buy them, and a 0-10 record on the field...

Let's make really important issues moral ones!

[garcia]

Of course, I admit that there's one charge against video games that is a slam dunk. Kids don't get physical exercise when they play a video game, and indeed the rise in obesity among younger people is a serious issue. But, of course, you don't get exercise from doing homework either.

heh, sure, those kids are really spending all that time doing homework and not nearly as much as becoming more aggressive playing after-school sports or killing, fucking, and carjacking!

Down with homework and more carjacking! Oh wait.

The most amazing thing about this is that Hillary can get so many people up-in-arms and pissed off about a stupid fucking video game and no one else can mobilize parents to "protect their children" from real harms that go virtually unnoticed in the political arena.

Someone really needs to link serious environmental issues to religion-based morality. Maybe then people will get mobilized. Afterall, it seems to be quite the rage recently...

Action

[creeront]

I've read so many stories on the (unjustified) outcry over GTA:SA. What I haven't read are any stories asking the readers to Write their public officials in an effort to stop this political witch-hunt.

Clinton's Real Agenda

[CFTM]

Mrs. Clinton is attempting to put herself in a position to be the democratic candidate for the 2008 Presidential election. This has nothing to do with GTA and everything to do with her attempting to strengthen how she is percieved with respect to traditional family values. I am not a fan of Bush and consider much of what he does to be fascist, but Hilary makes Bush look like a libertarian.

Ahhh fun times!

And another thing

[gowen]

Here's a nice article, neatly summarised by its headline -- "There's Sex In My Violence!
What's this lame soft-core porn doing in my ultraviolent "Grand Theft Auto"?".

This reminds me of one of my first experience of US TV. I was watching "The Godfather" on TBS, in the middle of the day. When Santino beat the living Bejeesus out of his sister's husband on the street, they showed every frame of the violence. 5 minutes later, they pixelated the 3.5 seconds of nude breast (the only nudity in the entire film) in Michael's wedding night scene.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

true, sort of

[I8TheWorm]

and mentions that football actually encourages real aggression, causes real injuries, and is treated totally differently

I think Taco failed to read into the author's sarcasm regarding football, but that's ok.

The author of the article seems to have taken some of their ideas from the recent Discover Magazine article titled Your Brain on Video Games. A very interesting read, a lot of which I agree with.

I'm a parent, a geek, and a former athelete (yes, it's possible). Our children (ages 8-15 now) have their homework time and we (they?) split their entertainment up between going outside to play, video games, nonsensical tv, and educational tv (of course, with a few random things thrown in to boot). On top of that, we ask that they play one sport of their choosing, and one instrument of their choosing. The mention of football in the description is a bit misleading. Some of the good things football teaches are

1. How to work with other people
2. How to get along with people you may not like
3. Discipline and focus, with regard to achieving a goal
4. Planning and stragety
5. Competitiveness, which certainly can help later in life if applied correctly

Other things are learned by playing instruments such as math (in different bases), appreciation for different cultures, etc... but that's a bit off topic here.

Video games can actually teach children as well. However, when they start to focus all of their freetime on video games, rather than other forms of entertainment, I think they're mission out on quite a bit. Everything in moderation.

Politicians and the Hype

[Dark Paladin]

Unfortunately I'm fairly certain that very few US Senators are listening over the sound of hype.

The bigger problem is, I believe, that they don't hear anything but the hype. Most politicians don't troll Slashdot or gaming sites. They have enough to do with meetings, looking at bills, more meetings, campaigning, photo ops, and the rest.

I wrote a small piece on this not too long ago that talked about this issue. It's not just that Senator Clinton is believing the hype - that's all she's probably hearing! Who in the gaming community is really going to her and the other politicians who discuss the issue?

Where's the Hollywood style lobbyists from the gaming industry? Isn't this what the ESRB and other gaming organizations should be doing - going to politicians and explaining how an R rating is the same as an M rating, how they're working with stores to keep M rated games out of the hands of minors (and if they aren't, then they damn well better be before Washington does it for them), why the "Hot Coffee" mod was never meant to be played and discovered by people voluntarily choosing to play the nude scene (and if they are minors, do you really think they can't get nude people easier than installing a mod in a $50 PC game?).

Yeah, I'm pissed at Ms. Clinton and Thomson and all of the ilk who "don't get it" - but I don't entirely blame them, because odds are there are few people who have really taken the time to explain it to all of them. (Well, except for Thomson - in my opinion, he's just a money grubbing lawyer now using nudity-in-games claims to line his pocket).

Of course, this is just my opinion. I could be wrong.

The f'd up logic of it all.

[gosand]

heh, sure, those kids are really spending all that time doing homework and not nearly as much as becoming more aggressive playing after-school sports or killing, fucking, and carjacking!

To be fair, there was a backlash for the violence in the game. And honestly, I don't think kids should be playing it. I am by no means conservative, but I think the game is just in bad taste for impressionable youth. But whatever. The game was given a rating, I don't think it should be outlawed.

What pisses me off is that all the recent uproar is because there was sex in there. You can beat a cop to death, but for Jebus' sake don't show animated boobs! Oh the humanity! Violence is OK, but sex, something natural and essential to our very existence of the human race, is taboo. Superbowl? OK. Boob at the Superbowl? Congressional hearings. Unjustified War? Hmm, OK. The F word is uttered in public? the decline of our moral civilization.

Re:Keep going further left, Hillary...

[Aix]

To tell you the truth, I really see this as moving to the right, in order to set herself up better for the presidential run. The Democrat/Republican divide these days has less to do with legislative intervention and more to do with "family values," whatever that means.

If you're Karl Rove, planning the 2008 election, you want to go after Hillary on her ethics and her family values. You want to neutralize her female base by making her appear to not care about family and good parenting. This is a calculated move by Hillary to move to the *right* on this issue, not the left. It doesn't matter who she blames, it matters that she's in the papers sticking up for some kind of "family value."

(I blogged about this here.)