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Sims the New Dolls?
philgross writes "According to the New York Times, lots of girls and younger teens are abandoning their dolls for the Sims. Says one professor, "We leave most of the social work in our society to women and The Sims lets young girls, in particular, work out their desires and conflicts about those relationships." Says another, "Children generally want to create characters, but with girls we see them wanting to create a friend." Meanwhile, says Will Wright, boys will "do the same stupid thing over and over again and be happy," (and I wince looking at my vast collection of first-person shooters).
The article does quote one 10-year-old boy who plays with Sims, and has learned valuable life lessons. "I learned don't leave your baby crying or people will come take your baby away."" And I learned that if you lock Sims in your upstairs torture chamber, with no tiles to sit, they eventually cry themselves to death.
It's a little sad that kids would have to learn something like that from a game, rather than having parents that think enough of their children to explain stuff like that to them. Better yet, they should lead by example.
I think the major difference between a doll and any video game where its primarily a character simulation is that the doll is an object through which the child has nearly unlimited freedom of expression where as the video game is an exploration of a character that reacts a set way in a virtual environment. I consider this to be more of a virtual pet rather than a doll. This will show them interactions & their effects, but they do not explore the interactions on their own, they happen regardless since thats how the system works.
Action figures or dolls, I know I put mine in all sorts of roles, ranging from simply good-guy vs bad guy to space exploration, you name it. With friends, you'd extend to roles further to each other, involve more characters, and so on. My roommate was even more into it than I ever was and he'd have his entire toy collection, involved in vast, decently complex plots for a child. The fun was in the fact that you could do anything with the objects at hand and project roles upon them regardless of their origin (Cobra Commander could just be Cobra Commander or he could also be the member of the crowd that gets saved by Voltron, who is actually a robot-alien from a distant planet sent to stop Strawberry-Shortcake from... its limited by your imagination).
Dolls are about role exploration and archetype analysis by children. We read them stories (or they watch TV) which sets up these various character archetypes in their consciousness, which they use the dolls to act out. It is both a learning experience but also a reaffirmation of their character beliefs. The Sims cannot provide this, imo, simply since it is about a very static (compared to what you can do with your dolls) character that has set reactions to all stimuli in the game. Its not like your sim is going to take some new initiative, or as if you can really act out a complex story idea, since the game is too sandboxish & opened-ended for that to happen. One does not so much control as heavily influence their sim. On the other hand, if the child is fascinated by things like antfarms and such, perhaps they may enjoy it. But regardless, I do not see simulations replacing dolls; no, I see emergent game systems with easily creatable content as a place where dolls may get replaced. A game where you can define the world and the objects in it (think Spore meets Gmod meets the user definable gameplay-engine-system we've never seen). The closest we've seen to this is Spore, but while its amazing, its pretty obvious that this is not something that would even meet 1% of those requirements for a child.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
It's the scientific method applied to life - in a game environment so it encourages exploration while having fun. It encourages trial and error. I often learn best from what goes wrong - not just from what succeeds. This reminds me of a couple quotations which have helped me greatly through the years:
and:(I wish I had attribution for these... does anyone know who wrote them?)
The other thing I see is that the game is safe. The player can try things *objectively* without the risk of an *emotional* reaction that a parent might produce. "What the *&#@(% were you THINKING?" I am NOT suggesting parents abdicate their responsibilities to a game! For example: hitting my little brother got a swift reaction from my parents. I learned that I didn't want to get punished, so I stopped doing it. Playing it out in a game, I would get to see the emotional, long-term damage that it would cause -- I would better understand why it was a bad idea.
Everyone seems to be leaving that comment alone. Personally I've never really understood the appeal of first-person shooters, because they all do seem to be the same thing. You run around killing things with different forms of projectile weapons. However, I know I'm definitely in the minority on this one, at least in Slashdot.
If you enjoy first-person shooters, do you think of the games as actually very different from each other, or is there something enjoyable about the repetition of them? Or is it something completely different that makes them so appealing?
File this one under: "Clueless person looking for insight," rather than "FPS hater baits Slashdotters."
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
On the contrary, I believe that the digitial medium of video games allows for MORE creativity. I don't know a single child who plays the sims/TS2 by the rules - they're always building creative mansions with indoor graveyards or giant party rooms, and giving their sims crazy tasks to do or missions to complete.
These realizations of creativity and imagination are simply impossible in real life. You might be able to build a house out of legos or blocks, but can you paint it? Wallpaper it? Chose Carpet/tile designs or build pools? Not at all. Similarly, dolls can't be programed or ordered to complete tasks like sims can.
Simply put, the limits placed upon the gamer by the game are much less restrictive than the inherent limits of reality.
http://www.TheGamerNation.com/Forums
What... Are... You... Smoking...?
If this was intended to be a joke, it fell sort of flat.
Interesting perspective considering that the game has more romantic interactions than anything else. It has very little educational value, if any.
Hypothetical "What I learned from the sims" (from a child's perspective):
* Garden gnomes will always be stolen.
* Chinese food takes hours to eat.
* If I go across the street or next door, I need to take a car.
* All female Housemaids wear sexy clothing.
* I can dedicate my life to having as many lovers as possible.
* Mom and Dad do woohoo.
* Nannies are unreliable and rarely show up on time.
* I don't have to wash my hands after I use the bathroom.
(and the list goes on)
Seriously, the game plays by Sim rules not "real life" rules. What is there to actually learn?
Are you speaking of Bush or The Sims?
I wince when I read anyone (especially a professor, researcher, or "expert") saying "girls do this" or "boys do that," not because what they're saying isn't correct, but because the question is never asked "Why is this?" It is just assumed that this is part of their "essence" or "nature" and that's really all they think need to be said about it.
You sure 'bout dat?
Sometimes I wonder how much of human behaviour isn't as much "growing up" as groupthink. Trying to act as they think the group expects a grown up to act. My guess is that most of it is just that: groupthink.
And dolls are just a particular case of it all. Other examples include:
- girls moving from childhood dreams of becoming a scientist or a teacher to... pretending to be a completely retarded airhead, because that's what's popular in nowadays' broken culture. (Showing any interest for science would make one, like, a nerd. And that's sooo unfashionable.)
And here's what makes me wonder about that: in the Soviet block, for whatever other faults they had, they promoted a culture where being smart and educated, being a part of the "inteligentsia", was _good_. And what do you know? Girls could show interest in maths, physics, chemistry, etc, too, and that system produced almost equal quantities of male and female scientists or programmers. Some pretty damn good ones too. (Again, I'm not saying it was a good system or necessarily a good culture. Just that it was proof that, when trying to fit in a different kind of group, girls _can_ use a computer or do maths.)
- guys learning that they have to act all macho and aggressive and be obsessive about Real Man stuff, like football or cars.
And here's the thing that makes me think it's not as much "testosterone" as learning to behave like what the group expects a testosterone-soaked macho man to behave: the bushmen. Funny little culture, that, in that they don't seem to have discovered fighting each other, dominating each other and generally being more macho than thou. Or maybe it's just that life in that area is hard enough even without that kind of thing. At any rate, their culture is about _cooperating_ with the Joneses, rather than trying to humble them. So all their conflicts are sold peacefully, or if two just can't stand each other, one will move to another tribe.
Or here's another funny example: there was a documentary at some point (take it with a grain of salt, as with any media documentary, but still...) featuring a town in Italy where the culture was such, that a macho and potent man was pretty much expected to have a mistress. So they interviewed among others one guy who was obviously smart enough to realize it, and admitted that he's happily married and loves his wife, but... he just had to get a mistress or the other men would think he's impotent or something.
- for that matter, guys learning that they must be obsessive about thin women with huge breasts. (A biological improbability. Within the normal parameter of a human, someone with extremely few body fat will also have less fat in that area, i.e., small breasts.)
It may seem like there must be some biological reason, since it's _the_ norm in our culture. But the funny thing is that other cultures had _massively_ different ideals of beauty. E.g., the Greeks and Romans liked _small_ breasts. Look at the greek statues, they're A cup or so. The Romans went one step further. They are sometimes credited with inventing the bra, but what they really invented was a strip of cloth tied over the breasts to _hide_ them. They really liked their women as flat as an ironing board.
Other cultures, in fact _most_ cultures, liked their women fat. In some parts of the world the introduction of the western thin woman ideal is actually very recent, as in, the last decades of the 20'th century. There have been articles about women and young girls in those parts ending up with severe nutrition problems as they attempted to switch from one image to another fast.
Etc, etc, etc.
Basically that's that funny thing: pretty much any behaviour you take for granted looking around in your culture -- and even has its apologists proclaiming it biological or god-given -- other cultures can have something else, or the exact opposite. "Growing up" to do them is just enculturation (learning to act and think as your culture expects you to), rather than anything having to do with brain or body evolutiont.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
What are your thoughts about the concept of children challenging authority because of a need to find their boundaries?
Boundries are one of the things that kids need to learn. There are, however, better ways to impose them than yelling at them. Sticking an animal with a cattle prod in conjunction with some other stimulus simply creates an aversion to that other stimulus. Parents canna change the laws of physics, or patterning and conditioning.
If they ignore these laws and go against them, they fail as parents. Learn your Pavlov and Piaget.
Now think about just what a boundry is. A boundry is something you must not cross. It is proscriptive. Don't go in the liquor cabinet is a boundry. Do your homework is not. Boundries are imposed by negative reenforcemnt. Desired behaviors are created by postitive reenforcment. How about instead of yelling at your kids for not having done their homework you give them a hug and a cookie for having done it?
My problem with typical parental behavior is not in the imposition of boundries or the promotion of desired behaviors, but rather in the way they go about it.
To wit, they adopt strategies that cannot achieve the desired result, and in most cases actually drive the kid in the opposite direction of the desired result. They want what they want, not what is possible. They act like two year olds with regards to their own two year olds, stamping their feet and holding their breath until they turn blue and such.
Because the parents are seeking to be "authority," to control, not teach. You cannot control people. You can induce them, or you can force them, but you cannot control people. They will ultimately do as they wish.
If you wish people to adopt certain behaviors you must induce them to wish to.
Using a real, proscriptive boundry as an example, think about the difference between someone who does not rob a liquor store because he is afraid of being punished and someone who does not rob a liquor store because he does not want to.
It is very, very important to remember that kids are people, not "things." Before birth even they begin simply living their own lives. They will persist in this "undersirable" behavior after birth. Like it or not. They are incomplete people, they are people in need of care, protection, teaching and; most importantly, simple experience, but they are people.
They are your charge. They are your responsibility, but they are not yours. They "own" themselves.
Get off your psuedo-intellectual high horse and go read your Kahlil Gibran. The man knew what the fuck he was talking about.
Kids are also acutely aware of the difference between boundries that are real (such as those imposed by fire) and those that are artificial (like those that are imposed by "authority" with no natural consequences). They know when they are being told to do/not do something because essentially arbitrary reasons for the purpose of imposing will.
And, as a corralary to your point, it is very, very important for kids to also learn to oppose authority, and to do so with success, as well as failure. To push and expand the boundries to their natural limits.
Because authority itself has boundries; and it is the job of the kid to teach the parents just what the limits of their authority is, in order to come into their own authority as adults.
Parents who do not recognize that their authority has limits are going act like dumbasses. Especially since some of those limits on authority are proscribed by law. i.e., a higher authority.
An obvious example of this is that you can't beat your kids. If the higher authority learns about this their will be consequences to the parents.
There are less obvious examples, however, and they are very, very important. Contrary to popular opinion legal ad