Do video games contribute to violence?

[Eldritch Knight]

Well, its not so much a question of whether the kid can differentiate real from unreal as it is mere conditioning. Virtual or not, the kid's subconscious is being trained to aim and shoot at human-shaped objects. There are recorded instances of totally untrained people being able to make amazingly accurate shots without even thinking about it (based totally on FPS-built instinct - kill everything that moves). Remember back to when you were REALLY young? Isn't it a bit difficult to sometimes sort out what you saw on TV and what actually happened? That's simply because a young child's mind registers EVERYTHING that it sees as reality. You can tell a 5 year old all you want that its not real, but that doesn't help their learning subconscious very much.

 

[Makalakumu]

Now, put some LSD in the water supply to "open" peoples minds, feed them violence and destroy their ability to designate the enemy, and mentally train them to kill so that when a gun is put in their hands they need very little training to use it....

Whew that is far out, I know, but can you see where the conspiracy theorists are getting thier information...

 

[Rich Parsons]

Originally posted by Eldritch Knight
Well, its not so much a question of whether the kid can differentiate real from unreal as it is mere conditioning. Virtual or not, the kid's subconscious is being trained to aim and shoot at human-shaped objects. There are recorded instances of totally untrained people being able to make amazingly accurate shots without even thinking about it (based totally on FPS-built instinct - kill everything that moves). Remember back to when you were REALLY young? Isn't it a bit difficult to sometimes sort out what you saw on TV and what actually happened? That's simply because a young child's mind registers EVERYTHING that it sees as reality. You can tell a 5 year old all you want that its not real, but that doesn't help their learning subconscious very much.

Good Arguement point.

Question?

Since I played war as a child and had wood shaped like guns and used them in pointing at others to shoot them. I would have been influeneced by the iet NAm in TV and all the WWII movies on TV? THat I might have become a trained killer because of this?

May I take this a step further?

Since I was spanked by my parents and also in Elementary school (* Once, Never wanted that humiliation again *), I was abused, and therefore a prime target to abuse children in the future?

Since all of this occured in my childhood, it was all real?

I am not making fun here, I am following the thought, for furhter discussion.


I have another question, dos anyone remember doing someting as a child and knowing it was wrong? Yet they did it anyways? Because either you did not know the ramifications or punishment or believe in they would occur?

If A child gets into a fight and is told this is wrong, then they can learn this is wrong. If the continue to get into fights without punishment, which is why both parties would get detention or suspension in the old days, then there is no real deterent. No effect to the cause.

If the child is 'babied' and allowed to beld abstentia from any responsibility until the day of their 18th birthday by law, then you have not helped this child to become a positive member of society.

Now the horrible case of Columbine. Did these children, young adults ever show a violent revenge streak? Were they allowed to hold in there frustration until they broke and lots their temper or their control? I honestly do not know. If they were allowed to explode from time to time then they had a pattern set and that was approved by the adults in their life.

As A child myself, I was bullied. I was the quiet, silent type that did not like to hurt others at all. I would even cry when I would get into a fight before a real strike had happened. Why? Because I did not like hurting others, and I knew I would have to hurt someone now. To the point of one bully who constantly pushed me down and or tripped me or tackle me ad try to get my head to hit a bench or a poll or the ground. So, on one day, when I (Age 6) had lost it, I chased this guy down no matter how many of his friends got in my way or knocked me down. I kept going, i had lost it. It took four adults to pull my fingers from his throat as I was bashing is skull into the pavement. Now, you can imagine, that his parents and the school were upset. And they all wanted me expelled. Yet, all I had to say, was I kept telling the adults and nothing was done, so I has to stop him. He kept hitting my head so I hit his head. So he would know how it feels and would not do it again. Of course I was crying over the memory. The adults told those involved that I was crying the whole time I was chasing him and pounding his skull into the pavement. I did not get expelled, and neither did the bully. No one got into trouble at school. I did get into trouble at home. A few years later, I realized I could not go through life afraid my size would hurt others, so I learned a gentle touch and also learned that when others went passed the first round of physical assault without any response, I would reply hard to stop it. This stopped the situation from getting out of hand or to a point of someone getting seriously hurt. Then it became know not to go too far with me, because I could fight and hit, only choose not too.

Now I had to learn that loosing your control and temper was nto aceptable behavior in public. Even though I was the one picked on and many of the adults would take pity and not want to punish me, yet my parents continued with their hard fight of trying to make me a responsible person for society.

Now, I am not saying it is all the fault of any parent. As I said above I do nto know the complete history of those involved. Their are people and children that just do not understand right from wrong. There are children that will never learn. No matter, if the cause be chemical ( natural or induced ), or psychological, or what have you.

Sorry for the long rant.
:asian:

 

[Makalakumu]

Perhaps bullying is part of nature as social primates. As children we attempt to build the pecking order that is so common among our evolutionary cousins. Usually no one gets hurt hurt, but sometimes injuries happen. That is the name of the game in domination violence and we have all played our parts in this game.

Do we use guns and kill people when we participate? No. For kids who do not have a good grasp on social skills or reality, maybe. As with anything, most people are good, but a few are always going to be susseptible to violent influences. To say that games and movies CAUSE violent behaviors would require more of a direct correllation between the violence done and the violence viewed. In essence, it would have to happen more and more people would have to be involved.

I don't know if the blame can be laid at the parents or the game. I think that the problem lies with the kid and how they view what is going on in the game. If you look at school shooters you can see that they fall on a spectrum of borderline sociopath to full blown psychotic.

Kids can just be born this way and there is nothing we can do about that.

 

[hardheadjarhead]

Did the Columbine shooters know right from wrong? Yes. Did they know they would cause pain and suffering beyond the level they suffered...no doubt.

That is what it essentially boils down to...personal responsibility. Sociopathic/psychopathic individuals KNOW the difference between right and wrong. They understand the penalties. They just don't care.


(note how I won't honor their memory by using their names?)



Steve

 

[OULobo]

Originally posted by hardheadjarhead
Did the Columbine shooters know right from wrong? Yes. Did they know they would cause pain and suffering beyond the level they suffered...no doubt.

That is what it essentially boils down to...personal responsibility. Sociopathic/psychopathic individuals KNOW the difference between right and wrong. They understand the penalties. They just don't care.

(note how I won't honor their memory by using their names?)

Steve

I agree totally. This was a personal decision with recognition of the consequences to themselves and price paid by the victims and their families. However it does illustrate the despiration that must have been in their minds to drive them to this point. Too many things in their lives went bad and all the hurt from that humiliation, regression, repression, aggression, ignorance and angst focused on the thing they probly delt with on the most frequent level, social ridicule in school daily.

Originally posted by Eldritch Knight
Well, its not so much a question of whether the kid can differentiate real from unreal as it is mere conditioning. Virtual or not, the kid's subconscious is being trained to aim and shoot at human-shaped objects. There are recorded instances of totally untrained people being able to make amazingly accurate shots without even thinking about it (based totally on FPS-built instinct - kill everything that moves). Remember back to when you were REALLY young? Isn't it a bit difficult to sometimes sort out what you saw on TV and what actually happened? That's simply because a young child's mind registers EVERYTHING that it sees as reality. You can tell a 5 year old all you want that its not real, but that doesn't help their learning subconscious very much.

This is an response that is detached from emotion and moral choice of action. Giving someone the ability to do something does not mean they will choose to use it or in what capacity. I would guess many people in this forum are quite efficient in their capability of caueing harm, but most choose to only apply this ability responsibly. There are many cultures around the world that teach combat skills in childhood and formative years, but aren't inherently aggressive or warlike.

 

[hardheadjarhead]

However it does illustrate the despiration that must have been in their minds to drive them to this point. Too many things in their lives went bad and all the hurt from that humiliation, regression, repression, aggression, ignorance and angst focused on the thing they probly delt with on the most frequent level, social ridicule in school daily.

Sorry, I can't accept that. While it certainly is a cause for many ills, "social ridicule" doesn't mitigate homicide (I'm not saying you're suggesting that, but it could be taken that way).

Many of us suffered social ridicule, harrassment, beatings...and we rose above it.

The mere suggestion of them being a product of their environment robs every disadvantaged person of the dignity of rising above their circumstances. I myself said earlier that multiple stresses lead to this sort of thing. I'm not sure either of them went through that sort of stress.

Some kids are born psychopaths. I think these two were.

Steve

 

[OULobo]

Originally posted by hardheadjarhead
Sorry, I can't accept that. While it certainly is a cause for many ills, "social ridicule" doesn't mitigate homicide (I'm not saying you're suggesting that, but it could be taken that way).

Many of us suffered social ridicule, harrassment, beatings...and we rose above it.

The mere suggestion of them being a product of their environment robs every disadvantaged person of the dignity of rising above their circumstances. I myself said earlier that multiple stresses lead to this sort of thing. I'm not sure either of them went through that sort of stress.

Some kids are born psychopaths. I think these two were.

Steve

I'm not one to believe in "born sociopaths", but I do agree with the multiple stresses idea, not just the stresses found in school, although those may be the most frequent, and therefor the focus of the attackers. That is what I was trying to say in my earlier post. I also can't abide by the comparison of anyother generation. The whole time that adults are complaining about how kids have it so easy, I think the kids are experiencing it getting worse and worse. I don't think adults understand how much the intensity of the experiences of youth has evolved. Things have become harsher, more brutal, more unforgiving, more confused and it has become impossible for adults to understand, because they see school as never changing from when they were there. Environment's not just about lifestyle, it has a temporal factor to take into consideration. The problem is that temporal circumstances cannot be accounted for because they can never be experienced again. We can't go back in time.

Just like war. Sure combat has a lot of similarities, but was combat in in WWII Europe like combat in Vietnam or in Iraq now. No, and not just because of terrain or technology, but because of the different morals, attitudes, social constructs of the time. Just like cops and robbers (good vs. bad), is different from Cowboys and Indians (not so good vs. not so bad) or Blood vs. Crips (pretty bad vs. pretty bad).

 

[hardheadjarhead]

My personal outlook on life reflects a reluctance to accept what I call "The Chicken Little Syndrome", wherein people say that our lives are worse than ever, that morality is waning, that crime is on the rise, civilization is on the decline, etc. It is an argument embraced by both ends of the political spectrum, and one held by people for the last 100 years at least. It may be a perennial attitude, and persistant.

The stresses on children today may or may not be worse than days past. As you've said, OULobo, we can not accurately compare generations. Still, I'm hesitant to say that kids have it worse insofar as stresses go. I hear this quite often, though, so you clearly have company. Many concur with you.

As I type this, I'm watching CNN interview the Greg Easterbrook, author of "The Progress Paradox", who writes that people are no happier than they were in the 1950's, in spite of an incredible increase in material wealth. Yet the studies he references apparently don't indicate that we're any unhappier, either. It might be worth the read for both of us...perhaps it'll give us some insights into where our culture is.


Steve

 

[OULobo]

Originally posted by hardheadjarhead
My personal outlook on life reflects a reluctance to accept what I call "The Chicken Little Syndrome", wherein people say that our lives are worse than ever, that morality is waning, that crime is on the rise, civilization is on the decline, etc. It is an argument embraced by both ends of the political spectrum, and one held by people for the last 100 years at least. It may be a perennial attitude, and persistant.

The stresses on children today may or may not be worse than days past. As you've said, OULobo, we can not accurately compare generations. Still, I'm hesitant to say that kids have it worse insofar as stresses go. I hear this quite often, though, so you clearly have company. Many concur with you.

As I type this, I'm watching CNN interview the Greg Easterbrook, author of "The Progress Paradox", who writes that people are no happier than they were in the 1950's, in spite of an incredible increase in material wealth. Yet the studies he references apparently don't indicate that we're any unhappier, either. It might be worth the read for both of us...perhaps it'll give us some insights into where our culture is.


Steve

True 'nuff

 

[DeLamar.J]

http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_Violence.htm



Read and learn.

 

[hardheadjarhead]

Thanks for the article!

I'll have to look for the Professor Jenkins listed in it. I'd be interested in his work.

Steve

 

[rmcrobertson]

The anomie of the landscape of contemporary capitalism, into which all sorts of ugliness can flow.

Have you ever seen the beginning of, "The Deer Hunter?" As one of my teachers pointed out, what's extraordinary is the violence of their lives, lond before Vietnam is even mentioned...DeNiro shooting that deer is actually the LEAST violent thing in that movie...

Sexual repression, adult hypocrisy, the disappearance of the master-myths that gave life meaning when I was a kid, urbanization, the utter ridiculousness of high school...video games are the problem? If so, ONLY because they are an escape from the contemporary--and where we escaped into books and fishing and walking and games and idle daydreams, now the unhappy kids escape into the motiveless violence of video games...which we have got to sell, or a whole industry might collapse...

Sheesh. It's a wonder there aren't MORE Columbines...and the fact that there aren't is a tribute to the essential sanity of children...makes me suspect that we should be putting a hell of a lot of more effort into teaching them martial arts, and, for all the complaining we do about kidds "diluting," the arts, making the teaching stick...

Or, we could vote to raise our taxes so that their libraries and sports fields would be open on Sundays, and there'd be good adults on hand to talk to...

Video games. Love that alibi.

 

[someguy]

Heres one thats kind of scary http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/fun.games/03/16/boy.videogame.reut/index.html
So I guess in one case it did but I'm SURE there must have been something really wrong there.
I know this topics kind of dead but bah to that.