Games Are Not Drugs

Kyle Orland has a considered look at some more poor reporting on gaming in the mainstream media. This time it's Chicago's WGN, and a weak report about the 'medical dangers of gameplaying'. From the article: "Sorry, but isn't this how rebellious teenagers have been acting for generations? I'd challenge the reporter to find a adolescent child whose hormones don't make them act this way at some point. I'd also like them to explain how playing fun games fails to make a child 'fun-loving' (or show some evidence that any of these children were 'family-focused' and 'totally different kids' before being exposed to the evil of games). And while it's regretful that the three children that are the focus of the story have a mother who says 'it felt like I really couldn't connect with them' it seems a bit much to blame video game for the generation gap that inevitably develops once a child passes the age of, oh, eight." Kotaku also has a nice deconstruction of the piece on journalism grounds.

Comments

Huh?

[kaldrenon]

I'm pretty sure this post's title is self-explanatory. Anyone who thinks otherwise is probably either crazy or just very badly misled.

Drugs is a misused word in the english language

[vertinox]

Drugs used to mean medication and it still does.

But mostly people refer to drugs as a bad thing.

Like "He is on drugs" or "She gives special favors for drugs" when the meaning could be just about someone having to take allergy drugs or aids drugs or some one take a pharmacy drug for medical reasons.

One can't go about and say "That guy is addicted to AIDs drugs" because he'd most likley die without them.

However, because some medical drugs like morphine and cocaine turned out to be addicted, we ended up referring to them as a bad thing. Then we started calling things that were not medical drugs as drugs. You know... LSD and pot... While not calling tobacco and beer drugs.

I mean, one does not smoke tobacco and drink beer for cure ailments... Well maybe I do, but I don't expect medical benefits or a doctors prescription to buy a six pack. Now back to my point...

Because people who speak english have a bad habbit of making analogies like how a car engine is like Microsoft windows, we eventually started referring to anything addicting to be akin to drug use.

The truth of the matter is, anything can be addicting:

You know like breathing air and clean water.
Religion can be addicting.
Sex can be addicting.
Reading books can be addicting.
Exercise can be addicting.
Eating and sitting on the coach can be addicting.
Playing poker can be addicting.
Posting on slashdot can be addicting.
Sleeping can be addicting.
Doing nothing can be addicting
Doing everything can be addicting.

Any activity that stimulates the brain can cause an addiction. That is all there is to it. Some activities are more addicting than others and some habbits are harder to break than others.

However, this has nothing to do with drugs.

Certain drugs do give a euphoria or a brain stimulas that cannot be acheived otherwise and many people can get addicted because they haven't felt anything like it before and just want to do nothing but doing that.

While, most other activities that do not affect the mind directly with a chemical injested stimulus can be walked away from.

Well... At least until my Xbox720 or Playstation 4 has a direct neural interface into my brain via a cybernetic jack.