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Cranky Editorials About Videogames
GamePolitics has a roundup of some game-related weekend editorials. Some of them are awful cranky and not terribly well thought-out. From the Peoria Journal-Star: "Many of my college students... seem to be less familiar with books than earlier generations. In part, you can blame the influence of video games in pre-teens' lives. If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or Playstation, I think we know which one a kid will pick... In other words, good writing means good salaries. Think about that the next time you choose between taking your kid to the video store or the library..." Another piece rails against the Columbine videogame, while papers in Louisiana are duking it out over the recently passed videogame legislation.
"If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or Playstation, I think we know which one a kid will pick"
When I was a kid in the 70s they said the same thing about television. (Jesus, don't people remember that? God, I'm not THAT old!) My grandmother told me once that they said the same thing about radio when she was a kid. So what did they blame before radio? I'd imagine it was wanting to play outside instead of reading. Hint: many kids don't like reading all that much, especially ponderous books like Moby Dick
I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
I can believe this is a problem. (A coworker was recently ranting about someone who regularly sends her lengthy emails where the only vowels are the 'o's in 'lol'.) But IM, chatrooms and blogs seem like more likely culprits than games.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or pick-up a game of baseball, I think we know which one a kid will pick.
If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or going out on the lake for a day on a friend's boat, I think we know which one a kid will pick.
If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or hanging out at the local Denny's, I think we know which one a kid will pick.
If the choice is 'Moby Dick' or mowing the lawn with the blunt edge of a butter knife, I think we know which one a kid will pick.
Seriously. If we're going to bemoan the fact that kids generally tend to prefer leisure activities to poring over the great classics of Western literature, we could at least pick something that most kids might actually enjoy reading, like Shakespeare (Serial regi-patri-fratricide? Poison-tipped swords? Mass slaughter? Hot chicks? Rawk!)
But Moby Dick--well, what teen wouldn't be utterly enthralled by a several-hundred-page long account of the finer points of the early American whaler's life and amateur deck-pacing?
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Today games, yesterday TV, before that radio, before that it was the "bad books". And I'm quite sure that what we call the "classics" today were the "bad books" of their generation.
Yes, the language of our kids changes. For the better or worse, who're we to determine that? Looking back 200 years you'll see that the language was laboured, ponderous, loaded with terms and phrases that feel awkward to us today. Yet, if you spoke like we do today back then, you might have been called "simple" and "unrefined", because you use most likely fewer words to express what you want to say, and you do not try to create word constructs that make your listener doze away.
Language is ever evolving. And while I'm not really fond of the "OMG d00dZ!!!1!!1111" we find in chatrooms more often than people able to create sensible English sentences (non-native speakers are exempted from the requirement), they don't represent the language spoken. They are a minority (even though one that we, as computer users and most likely also chatroom users, tend to meet fairly often).
Don't worry. They won't write books, so our generation will not be judged by them by future generations.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Ok, random thoughts on each of the articles referenced by TFA:
The Columbine game: this is one of those times when, even as a fairly straightforward, no compromises, advocate of free-speech, I wish I didn't find myself on the same side as some of these nutcases. Yes, yes, it's their right to say it and yes, I'll defend it. I seriously wish I didn't have to, though. I feel the same way about Rockstar sometimes. Their games rock in terms of the core gameplay (even if they have started recycling of late), they've reinvented several genres several times and if they want to make a game in which you dig up and rape the corpses of the grandmothers of assorted members of congress, then it is their right to do so. But for god's sake, guys, could you not grow up a little? Would make all of our lives so much easier and not make me feel... well... soiled, whenever I have to defend video-games against the latest loud-mouthed office bore.
On games resulting in poor literacy: this article's slightly better than the snippets in both the summary and TFA. I've worked (briefly) in a school and there's no denying that standards of literacy are hideous today. Is the growth of the games industry a factor? Possibly. There's certainly an extra level of distraction that has resulted from the easy availability of games. However, I think this is missing the point a bit. The primary responsibility for ensuring a child's literacy is split between parents and schools and there are too many cases where both of these fail. I strongly suspect that many of the teachers complaining about videog games are themselves part of the problem. If they would stop chasing after the latest politically correct, culturally sensitive educational paradigm and start actually teaching kids how to write - including incentivising failure and penalising failure - then they might find that school-leavers would suddenly be able to string two words together in print again.
And the Louisiana thing: Oh for god's sake, have these people nothing better to do? They know the law is unconstitutional and will, after much time, effort and expense, be struck down. Is there not a case for prosecution here, on the grounds of misappropriation of public funds?
if you can't get past that point, I'm not surprised you hate the classics- they all take a refined reader to understand and appreciate.
The trouble is that curriculum designers expect high school students, whose brains' emotion centers are not yet fully developed, to already be "refined" as you define it. Being forced by the school system to pretend to appreciate college or grad school level themes while in high school is enough to turn a student off from reading fiction.
Correlation != Causation