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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.
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
As well, reading is much too passive an activity. It encourages mental passiveness, instead of being aware and engaged in our surroundings.
Exactly. The fact that most of the great thinkers throughout history have been illiterates who never bothered with books further supports your assertion.
P.S. This post employs a literary device. Figuring out the literary device is left as an exercise for the reader.
Uttering logically derived and empirically supported truths to the disciples of the orthodox establishment.
I think (and will not substantiate with evidence, as is customary on this Internet thing) that the biggest problem with arguments like those mentioned in TFA is purpose and perspective. It has long been the case that the previous generation doesn't understand the current or next generation simply because they somehow forget that just a few years back it was they who were misunderstand by their previous generation. Age tends to lock us into our own perspectives, and we forget to look for others. I for one have always hated reading the "classics" because they lack relevance and tend to contain language that was long lost - yet society seems to have continued without "thee" "thy" etc.
I remember in senior English in high school reading passages from Beowulf, then trying to read the original text (in English, but in Old or Middle English). I wonder if the people in those times felt the youngsters were too radical and forgetting their heritage. Language is meant to allow for communication between people and cultures (and times, really). So long as we're able to communicate, and do so effectively, we're good.
That said, I think the more important dilemna is not youth's rejection of classical education for video games, but the lack of communication that exists between many youth and their parents/grandparents/etc. In most cases, it's not the youth's fault.
And sadly, the people who say things like what you quoted will insist the kid must read "Moby Dick" and other classics, while simultandously denigrating the reading of science fiction, fantasy and graphic novels.
I'd like to know when in the Professor's childhood, millions of kids stayed up until midnight to get their hands on a new book, or waited anxiously by the door for the delivery person to bring their finally un-embargoed book. Then maybe he should visit a local, mainstream bookstore when the final Harry Potter book is released.
Just because kids don't read what he did or thinks they should, doesn't mean they are any more lacking in literacy.
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.