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Maybe Video Games Don't Make Kids Kill
diagnosis writes "MSNBC has an article on Lieutenant Colonel Grossman, an overzealous Army guy, and his new book. The book attempts to blame things like Colombine on games like Doom ("Death simulators"); the article refutes most of Grossman's claims and actually deals with the subject reasonably. I think that, given the coverage negative, reactionary material available on the subject gets, MSNBC's more reasonable view deserves at least as much notice."
Q3A is the only game I have on my machine (after I finally tired of Q2 earlier in the year), and if you look at it with an open mind it really is a simulator of death, gore, bloodsmears, injury, damage and aggression.
If it has any effect on the players, though, it is in the form of catharsis; look at the chat that goes on between people playing. And compare it to most American movies: there is a similar level of explosions/intestines per hour, and nobody raises an eyebrow.
-Andy
seeking to blame outside influinces such a TV, and video games, or whatever for violent behavor. I beleive that this violence is not the cause of video games, or TV, or movies, or the internet, or space aliens.... i believe that there is something fundamentally WRONG with these kids, and they have easy access to fire arms. if given the choice between taking a copy of Quake, or taking a gun out of a kid's hands. i would choose the gun every time. btw... this is my first post on slanshdot, ever... it is also almost 5 am in hte morning and i have been awake for 34 hours, so sorry if this doesn't make much sense
-joram
If Q3 et al, is a death simulator, its just as much a life simulator ( respawning ). Every good Christian recognizes in the FPS a celebration of the miracle of Resurrection. ;)
Correlation != causation
saying "violent kids play more quake" doesn't show any connection between them. It's like saying that lung cancer causes cigarette smoking. In fact, the opposite is true.
-Dave Turner, AC of convinience
This debate has been going on for a long time - TV was a big offender in the 70s and early 80s, movies got a lot more violent in the 80s and caught their share of flak, and from the end of the 80s it's been common for people to point the finger at videogames/computer games. It still doesn't change the fact that there has never been any hard evidence for a relationship between fantasy violence and real violence.
Personally speaking, I believe that there is a link; but it takes two to tango, and you need someone who is already on a hair-trigger for them to be stimulated enough by a game to injure or kill someone else.
Mario Bros. was the reason why I played around my local sewer.
QBert was why I broke my arm trying to hang from the ceiling.
Frogger was something I thought would be fun to play on the freeway
Gauntlet told me that drinking ale would increase my health.
Ninja Warriors taught me that in the military, only white soldiers are allowed to have guns, and black soldiers are only issued knives.
Anyone else out there been negatively influenced by a game?
It is the accpeted opinion of (most) of the scientific community that tht brain structure (and behavior) of any individual is a product of his genetic makeup and the interactions of the environmnet to which he/she has been exposed upon that genotype. Regardless of the degree which you think television and video games actually influence a person's psychology, it seems reasonable to assert that such large parts of our social evrionment (check the stats concerning averaqe # hours spent playing TV/games in US; we see somtething like 8000 murders before we turn ten) are bound to have an effect on the way a person thinks and acts.
Past studies have attempted to dicover whether or not a causal relationship exists between actual physical violence and such vicarious participation/observation--that is *all other things being equal*, whether children with frequent exposure to violent content are more likely to be violent than children which are not exposed to violent content on a regular basis. Nobody is trying to 'blame' their behavior exclusively on their environment in order to escape accountability for their actions (although I hold a determinsitic viewpoint concerning human behavior, implying that we are not morally 'responsible' for our behavior since we had no choice in it, I still maintain that accountabiulity must be preserved in order to safeguard social order until we can better figure out how the brain works [shrug]).
Given the opportunity, anyone would take away the firearms from the children you mentioned. However, the issue is whether the children who do posses firearms are more likely to use them if they are exposed to violence on a regular basis. I believe it is too difficult to tell at the moment--although I tend to see such exercises as a cathartic activity, individuals certianly become desensitized to the idea of violence and its common manifestations (entrails, death-rattles, screams, etc). It is most certainly conceiveable that such exposure does have a destructive impact upon an impressionable child's behavior and life.
My point? Be more careful before you make such huge assertions. The jury is still out on this one, and is likely to be so for some time yet. As for me, I will at least think twice before recommending 'death simulators' to any children I am even partially responsible for--the danger is too great, and my intuition tells me that something is dangerous about exposing children to too much violence too soon.
hope you get some sleep and feel better.
-Matt
The truth is out there - we'll let it back in after it sobers up a bit. -The Cube
Salon also published a skeptical article on Grossman back in May, when Littleton was in the news.
Looking back to the early 80's, when home computers were beyone the budgets of a lot of people, a lot of kids I went to school would amuse themselves pretty much in the same manner as previous generations had before them; setting anthills on fire, smashing windows, and carving pinstripes along the sides of cars with a can opener.
In all of these instances, few of the parents felt *their* child had any problem; if anything, it was "a phase everyone goes through, they'll grow out of it", etc. And through such denial and resignation, a small number of people do turn out to be okay, but the rest are pretty much neglected through such action.
Compound this with many adults wanting to take a break from watching their own offspring and it's easy to see how print and broadcast media, along with the web and simulation/roleplaying games have been villainized over the years.
Vovida, OS VoIP
Beer recipe: free! #Source
Cold pints: $2 #Product
Armies train people to kill!
Interesting that you can get a whole bunch of people to kill another whole bunch of people who they don't know at all, when under different circumstances they would "hold the door open" for each other, or even share food with each other.
Shows a certain not so good side of people.
We were born with an ability to kill abstractly
Also, does anyone else see an alarming trend in America to seek out scapegoats? It seems to me like we are engaging in one crusade after another that seeks to lay blame for people's actions on the objects that they use to act. . .blame the guns for murder and ignore the fact that the gun doesn't get up and shoot someone on its own, blame sport-utility vehicles for vehicle fatalities instead of the drivers, blame condoms for letting people have sex. I don't know, as I see it, at some point we all make the decision to behave either more or less responsibly. If someone goes off and shoots up a school full of kiddies, they made the choice to behave that way. The game certainly didn't make them do it.
On another note, I find the argument that these games increse the accuracy of these psychokids to be rather spurious. Anyone (I'm waiting to get flamed for this one)who has actually fired a pistol AND played a game that simulates the firing of a pistol knows that the computer just isn't a substitute and won't improve your accuracy. There is a big difference between holding a rather heavy firearm at (more or less) arm's length and hitting a target AND cradeling a mouse in your hand (or scrolling a trackball, pressing arrow keys, etc) to aim and fire a simulated, weightless, recoilless firearm. I just don't buy the fact that Quake makes for more accurate shooting. I don't shoot anymore, but I know that Castle Wolfenstien (sp?) didn't improve my acuuracy one bit.
But alas, we live in a society that likes easy answers and lets face it, its relatively easy to point our fingers at a computer game and say "there lies the cause of our (your) ills!" But once we take the video games away, we'll be pointing our fingers at something else, violent books perhaps. Eventually we will run out of objects to point at, and we'll see that everyone is left pointing at each other.
I'm glad the the journalist didn't fall for this guy's book because the esteemed Lt.Col. seems to have substituted military credentials for rational thought. Perhaps instead of writing/reading a reactionary book (a book that appears to shamelessly seek to profit off of recent school tragedies)we should all just sit back and invest a little thought in the matter.
Just my .02 cents
Synesthesia
--not sayin' I have all the answers, but I don't trust the ones I've been gettin'--
Quake is no more of a murder simulator than a mosh pit at rock concert is a virtualized lynch mob or gladiator pit.
Quake is a game where people fight back, are similarly armed, *have the expectation of death(and rebirth!)* built into the game design, and where, at the conclusion of a difficult match, all the (still surviving) combatants generally *congratulate* themselves with effusive praises of "gg"(for Good Game)!
For crying out loud, there's a thing known as context which pundits, attempting to earn themselves a reputation, a salary, and maybe a few cheap votes, seem to try to remove from human nature. (And it's ironic, really--programming context into a computer device is brutally complicated!) One doesn't need to be an expert on even mammalian behavior to know that violent play is a genetic predisposation--most species do so, and we're no different!
But even a tiger cub knows the difference between playfully biting its brother's neck, and just ripping the trachea out wholesale. You know what? I think there's an off chance that we do too.
The author seems a bit to enthralled with rating systems, though. The most interesting event of 1999 will probably end up being the release--and very effective suppression--of the South Park movie. What, exactly, did the mighty R rating, the model of rating systems everywhere, protect sixteen year olds from? The frankest look at the ridiculousness of rating systems ever concocted? The plain truth that life cannot be wholly described in extrasyllabic language? What? (Oh! I just stepped on a nail! I am presently experiencing inscrutably excruciating amount of pain!)
But, you what what? Blaming cartoons for the sins of the child is a time honored tradition in America. What is reality to get in the way?
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
Mr. Kent (of MSNBC) writes:
"Lt. Col. Grossman's book seems to revolve around a few basic themes:
- Exposure to violent entertainment desensitizes youth to acts of violence and leads to aggressive behavior."
Plain and simple, this is true. If you view/do something over and over again, you are desensitized to it. It doesn't have the same effect after many repetitions. Does it lead to violence and aggression? No, but it doesn't prevent violence either. I don't think the world would suffer if we reduced the amount of violence present in the media.
"- Violent video and computer games are an ultra-effective way of instructing murder."
Yes. An old military rule states that one must perform an action 500 for it to "stick" but 5,000 times for it to become second nature. I've used the MACS before to hone my marksmanship skills and it really is just a Super Nintendo with a plastic laser light gun in the mold of an M-16. Anybody who has played "gun games" at the arcades pretty much have begun to learn the basic fundamentals of marksmanship.
Computer games such as Quake Deathmatch? It teaches kids the concept that life easily restored by hitting the spacebar. I'm not talking about your 13+ kids now, but the eight year olds who have just warezed Quake 2 and are playing it. Who cares if you die? Who cares if I shoot wildly, friendly fire is OFF! Hostage down? Who cares, he'll be back next round! Some concepts of violence in video games will rub off on kids. Ratings won't stop the eight year old AOL pirates.
"- Youth crime is rising in America as is the amount of violence in video and computer games"
Probably not. The reason youth crime is rising is because of the lack of parent's responsiblity. Lock your f*cking gun cabinents. Keep your gun and ammo apart. If you see your kids making pipe bombs, stop them. If you see your kids playing a game you don't like, stop them. If you see your kids downloading hardcore porn, stop them. Talk to them. Geez, I thought it was obvious.
The only way to stop kid violence is for parents to take action. Talk to kids, talk to unpopular kids, talk to "in crowd" kids, talk to geeks, talk to athletes, talk to band members. Whatever. Anything.
People shooting people? It's been happening for a while. Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. Colin Ferguson on the Long Island train, the day trader in Georgia, too many bother listing. People like to point out that all of the sudden it's kids and their video games. Wake the hell up, it's the irresponsible parents.
To stop adults from shooting each other, make stricter gun laws. Banning guns is not the answer. However, no matter what laws we produce, some nut will go on a shooting spree. Therefore, Carpe Diem and live everyday to its fullest.
Other points: everybody knows that shooting someone in the head will do more damage then anywhere else. We don't need video games to tell us that - it's pretty damn obvious.
BTW, I play Quake X, Half-Life, Doom X, Jagged Alliance, Delta Force 2, all the violent games. Yes, I have learned military and gun related stuff from playing these games that I probably wouldn't have if I didn't, but it doesn't mean I'm going to shoot people.
Rangers Lead the Way!
There was also a follow up to the interview, plus a lot more to read at the comments page.
People pay good money to get their message (even product placement in 3D shoot-em-ups) out. Have you heard many .com adds lately? Have you tried punching in a domain name your heard/read in the media? Yes you have.
This is just one example of how the media influences the people exposed to it. Many people in many differant walks of life pay good money to get their message out to the people.
Why do they pay this kind of money to advertise? Because they know that the message has influence.
Consider this:
(1)Ford Motor Company recieved $66.15 in sales for every $1.00 they spent on ads in 1998.
(2)Anheuser-Busch recieved $17.83 in sales for every $1.00 they spent on ads in 1998.
(3)Dell Computer recieved $54.68 in sales for every $1.00 they spent on ads in 1998.
(4)Microsoft recieved $23.68 in sales for every $1.00 they spent on ads in 1998.
(5)Time Warner recieved $19.686in sales for every $1.00 they spent on ads in 1998.
(source)
So we have Ford spending $1,150,700,000 a year telling people to buy cars. Dell spending $227,100,000 a year telling people their computers are cool. Walmart spends $404,500,000 into telling you how warm and fuzzy they are. They do this, because it influences people exposed to the medium.
Now, when people sugest that perhaps the media may have a negative impact on society, the standard response seems to be "We're not telling people to do this or that"' "The media didn't tell that kid to do this or that". Then why do people pay so much for influence in that same medium?
So before you say that the media doesn't influence you think again. It does. :)
(The test: What bands logo was on the nail box in Quake 1?)
But then I played Unreal. I didn't think much about it at the time, but after blowing off something's legs and having it claw its way after me, hearing people scream in pain as their lives are needlessly wasted in a hail of rockets -- watching the news turns my stomach.
And what do people against violence in the media often suggest? Make the violence less explicit and just generally prettier. Now I think the notion of people -- children in particular, when I was watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a child it all flew over my head, I just thought Raphael was cool -- taking subliminal moral lessons from entertainment is bullshit, but if things are that way, which would you rather have your children believe -- that Wile E. Coyote can escape a mallet, anvil, and bowling ball on the head unharmed to concoct another scheme? That it might be okay to hurt someone if you're angry with them? Or that when you hurt people, they're hurt?
I think when people want to sugar-coat violence they're running from having to face the real consequences of what happens when you hurt someone, and there could be many reasons for this. To see the desensitization to the consequences of violence -- not to violence itself -- you have to look no further than the heroic way we looked at Kosovo and its ilk, and ignored the fact that we destroyed hundreds of lives that had nothing to do with our conflicts.
(A little clarification here -- "showing children what violence really accomplishes" doesn't mean showing Halloween to three-year-olds. In my mind, it means letting seven-year-olds see, say, Dragon Ball Z -- where the protagonist recognizes the consequences of fighting and avoids it even at his own peril, and the villains really hurt people, and not just physically.)
Lt. Col. Grossman's book seems to revolve around a few basic themes:
Exposure to violent entertainment desensitizes youth to acts of violence and leads to aggressive behavior.
Violent video and computer games are an ultra-effective way of instructing murder.
Youth crime is rising in America as is the amount of violence in video and computer games.
Now, you would think that a career soldier would know better than this. I know I am working with a condensation of the Colonel's words here, but work with me.
Point one: Exposure to violence certainly does desensitize, but I think that what leads to aggressive behavior is a lack of discipline, compassion and focus. If a person, young or not, does not have effective means of safely externalizing aggressive feelings and instincts while still feeling safe and cared for, they are going to go nuts and start blowing people away.
You never see a story about some 17 year old gunning down his class where the headline is "Happy, expressive, and well adjusted captain of the wrestling team and merit scholar John Smith executes school mates in a fit of undefined pent-up rage". You also never see the headline: "Disciplined and obedient Marine Private Jackson slaughters his squad for lack of purpose and direction".
Point two: Violent video and computer games are an ultra-effective way of instructing point and click techniques. Sure we can learn some strategy and conniving and learn to become very comfortable with "killing" thousands of game entities. But we all know it is not real. No matter how realistic a game is, it will never be the same as killing a real human being, face to face.
If *anything* is an ultra-effective way of learning to murder, it is enlisting in a branch of the United States Armed Forces. I don't think the Colonel can argue against the fact that most people who enlist, whether or not they are innately aggressive people, are quite definitely tought to kill. Are we to believe that the thousands of violent game players in this country are more dangerous than the thousands of professionally trained killers? I personally don't think either group is inherently dangerous, mainly because the vast majority of people in the world really are fairly well adjusted and not likely to hurt anyone without provocation.
Point three: I could swear I have seen several articles by now, citing findings that youth crime is actually down, in spite of the rise in violence in games.
That is all I have to say about that.
Nothing can possiblai go wrong. Er...possibly go wrong.
Strange, that's the first thing that's ever gone wrong.
Tyler's words coming out of my mouth.