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Videogame Mythbusting
AsiNisiMasa writes "MIT professor Henry Jenkins has an essay over at pbs.org that debunks eight common myths about videogames. It covers not only the topic of violence, but gender and expression as well. This is what happens when reasonable people with an education tackle the subject objectively." From the article: "1. The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence. - According to federal crime statistics, the rate of juvenile violent crime in the United States is at a 30-year low. Researchers find that people serving time for violent crimes typically consume less media before committing their crimes than the average person in the general population. It's true that young offenders who have committed school shootings in America have also been game players. But young people in general are more likely to be gamers -- 90 percent of boys and 40 percent of girls play."
This argument always struck me as being as intellectually honest as claims that Dihydrogen Monoxide was frequently found in terminal cancer tumors. Once you realize that they're talking about water -- which is found in normal tissue -- you realize it's a meaningless claim. Similarly, if you actually think about the fact that most teenagers (or at least most teenage boys) play video games without shooting down their classmates, you start to realize that the games->violence claims are similarly bogus.
It's nice to see someone actually looking at the issue and noting that gaming and violence actually show an inverse correlation. I've always thought I'd rather someone go home and blow off steam playing Doom, Quake, GTA whatever instead of getting into fights or bottling it up until they do something drastic.
This is what happens when reasonable people with an education tackle the subject objectively.
In other words, "This is my opinion, and I think I'm intelligent and well educated and reasonable, so, of course, I don't see any bias when I say that is what ALL reasonable and educated people should think. It's reasonable and educated because it agrees with my point of view."
While there aer good points, there are good points for other points of views. Just because this article says what you want to hear does not mean that other opposing points of views aren't also help and supported by reasonable and educated people.
There's always at least two sides to any discussion and if you think there is only one valid side, then perhaps you missed something in your education.
TFA brought up an excellent point, and one that I think bears repeating to those that think video games can "bleed" into real world behavior. All mammals distinguish between play and actual violence. TFA mentions primates, but I don't know about primates, so I'll talk about kittens.
Kittens fight. They kick and bite each other, pounce and paw with this wild look in their eyes. It looks like they're trying to kill each other, but this is how kittens play. They intentionally avoid injuring each other, and they have signs to tell the other kittens to stop if they actually get hurt. Yes, this play simulates a real catfight, as that's exactly what it's meant to prepare them for. Yet a kitten knows the difference between play fighting and real conflict.
Some people see kittens fighting, and instinctively jump in to stop them because they might hurt each other. Even more so because they're kittens - supposedly soft and sweet and helpless. I've seen humans peg the kitten who initiates play as "bad" because he is "bullying" the other kittens. Most people don't understand that the kittens are just playing.
I guess my point is, if a cat, an animal with a brain the size of a lemon, can figure out the difference between play and real, surely our own children can. We could at least give them that much benefit of the doubt.
I didn't see any claims that the opposing extremes of these myths were entirely accurate. In other words, he was simply debunking extremist claims of the negative impact of violent video games on children. He was NOT claiming that video games have no impact on children. Unfortunately, regulators have a habit of "picking up the torch" on issues like these. Then, they blindly run with it as though the existence of this torch is evidence enough of its superior integrity. This is, unfortunately, a common theme in society in general. The fact is, there needs to be some middle ground, which doesn't *completely* restrict the video game market or its users. As the author of the article states, "parents need to share some of the responsibility for making decisions about what is appropriate for their children." Herein lies the true root of the problem. While you can restrict the legal age for purchase of these games, law cannot entirely make up for a lack of proper parenting. However, there is one advantage to creating laws that restrict the sale of mature content to minors: namely, parents will be more likely to realize the necessity of preventing their children from playing such games if there is a hard legal opposition to it. For this reason, I encourage such laws. However, as with any law that restricts the sale of a particular product, there will be a necessary market shift. As with the tobacco industry, the video game industry will have to change its advertising techniques to correlate with correct legal practices. The author of this article obviously agrees: "Clearly, more should be done to restrict advertising and marketing that targets young consumers with mature content [...]" That being said, we should remember that the goal of such restrictive law is to force parents into the decision-making process, rather than to completely dispense of the consumer's right to choose its media for entertainment.