Jared Lehman
Marlene Lang
Eng. 101
10/20/12
Violence in Video Games
In recent years the argument has been made that school shootings and
other such violent acts by teenagers can be attributed to video game violence.
Critics say that video games teach kids how to kill, and make it easier for them
psychologically to do so. This just is not the case in any way. First of all in
video games the character’s people play automatically possess the skills
required to kill. Characters are programmed to know how to use various weapons
that can be picked up while playing the game. It is obvious that someone who
has never shot a gun or used any other type of weapon before is not going to
just pick up a gun and be a master marksman because they played a video game
that had guns in it. Secondly, there is a deep psychological difference between
killing a living breathing human being, and killing a bundle of pixels on a
screen which is pretty much just an animated punching bag. Lastly, in most
video games the players are killing for a reason, often in self-defense. It is
kill or be killed, unlike when a shooter walks into a school and just begin
massacring their classmates. Why is it that some people can play these video
games just as much as a shooter, or more, and they never go out and do anything
violent? There are much more plausible explanations for that sort of behavior,
such as a rough home life, traumatic events in the shooter’s life, bullying, or
mental illness. Violent video games only really significantly influence those
with an already disturbed mind.
One obvious reason that video games are not teaching kids how to kill is
that just because they play a video game with weapons in it does not mean they
have any idea how to use said weapons in real life. They would most likely learn
a lot more about how to kill someone by watching a show like CSI or Criminal
Minds, or an old Sylvester Stallone movie like Rambo. These shows go in depth a
lot more on the ways people are killed compared to a video game such as Call of
Duty or Grand Theft Auto. Just because a child is an excellent sniper on the
game Call of Duty does not mean he is going to be able to go out, pick up a
Barrett .50 caliber rifle, and drop somebody from 500 yards. I think that
anyone would agree that the idea is ludicrous. They aren’t going to know how to
reload the gun or even turn the safety on or off much less actually be an
accurate shot. Just because a player can throw for 600 yards and 5 touchdowns
on the football video game Madden, does not mean that they are able to throw
like Brett Favre in real life. There is a definite line between reality and
video games and they do not translate to one another. Some people with mental
illnesses can struggle to make that separation, and that is when violent video
games become a problem. In The
Guardian, a British newspaper, in an interview with a former Special Air
Service (S.A.S) officer named Andy McNab, when asked if he was ok with violent
video games, said yes. He says that the whole debate is nonsense. He
said that the violence has always been there, in movies and books, and games are
just a different expression of the same thing. He said that he believes video
games actually help reduce violence because they give people a way to live out
some of their war fantasies. Whose opinion on this matter could be more valid
than an actual Special Forces officer, with real combat
experience?
Another reason video games don’t make it easier for people to kill is
because there is a fundamental difference between killing a real living
breathing person, and killing someone who is not even real on a video game. A
player can kill someone in video games and not think twice about it for the rest
of their life, because there is really no reason to. It was not real, no one was
hurt. It was just good clean fun. Unlike a soldier who has seen combat, you are
not going to develop post-traumatic stress disorder over killing someone in a
video game. That is because it is not real. If a person who has played all these
games where they have killed people goes out and tries to mimic their virtual
actions in real life they will find a very different experience. According to
the book On Killing: The Psychological
Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society by Dave Grossman during World
War II only 15 to 25 percent of combat infantry were willing to fire their
rifles. They were hardened soldiers that had seen some of the most horrific
things imaginable, yet they still couldn’t bring themselves to kill. Yet people
still want to say that video games influence people and make it easier to kill?
If the things those soldiers saw could not make them more prone to kill, it is
hard to believe that a simple video game could make it easier for a person to
kill. It is far more likely that that person has much deeper problems than video
games that would give them the urge to kill. Many people believe the opposite of
the popular theory that they make people more violent. Like Andy Mcnab they
think that video games actually help relieve stress and make people less violent
because it gives people a harmless outlet for their aggression, just like
wrestling or boxing.
Last but not least, in the majority of video games players are the
protagonist, the hero. Players fight to save people and in self-defense. That is
way different from walking into a school and shooting someones classmates who
are themselves defenseless. There is an obvious difference between these two
things. To kill someone in cold
blood in such a way as that, without being provoked requires a lot more than
just having played violent video games. Someone who commits an act such as that
has some serious personal and mental issues that can be blamed solely on the
fact that he plays violent video games. According to dosomething.org, revenge is
the greatest motivation for school shootings, and 77 percent of students are
bullied. This is a much more compelling idea of the cause of violence among
teens as compared to simply saying that they were acting out what they had seen
in a video game. If the games were honestly that dangerous of an influence then
we would see much higher numbers of violent acts due to the fact that the
majority of teenagers have played violent video games at some point in their
life.
People who agree with the theory that violent video games influence
people to act out violently often use the fact that violent video games are
found in the homes of the killers. While this is true, it is also a fact that
federal statistics show that 90 percent of boys and 40 percent of girls play
video games (PBS). According to those statistics one would be very likely to
find at least one violent video game in almost anyone’s home. They also claim
that video game playing is isolating. This cannot be less true, especially with
the increase in online gaming against other people. Nearly 60 percent of gamers
play with friends, 33 percent play with siblings, and 25 percent play with their
significant other and/or their parents (PBS). The evidence just does not support
these claims.
The argument that violent video games are the cause of violence among
today’s youth is simply not true. It isn’tfirst of all, just because someone
plays a video game where they kill, does not mean that those skills transfer
over into real life. It takes a life time of practice for someone to have those
skills. Secondly, there is an obvious difference between killing someone in real
life and killing an animated target on a game. I’ve also showed the obvious
differences between killing in self-defense on a video game and killing in cold
blood in real life. The arguments that critics of video games use such as they
found violent video games in the killers home are simply too vague and not
anything more than a scapegoat. Video games are not turning today’s youth into
killers.
Works Cited
Grossman, Dave. On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning
to Kill in War and Society. 1st. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1995. 25.
Print.< http://www.amazon.com/On-Killing-
Jenkins, Henry. "Reality Bytes: Eight Video Game Myths
Debunked." PBS.org. PBS. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
Reilly,
Luke. "Video Game Violence Debate "Load of Nonsense". IGN.com.
IGN, 27 2011. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
"11 Facts about School Violence." dosomething.org.
dosomething.org. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
Answers.yahoo.com
Marlene Lang
Eng. 101
10/20/12
Violence in Video Games
In recent years the argument has been made that school shootings and
other such violent acts by teenagers can be attributed to video game violence.
Critics say that video games teach kids how to kill, and make it easier for them
psychologically to do so. This just is not the case in any way. First of all in
video games the character’s people play automatically possess the skills
required to kill. Characters are programmed to know how to use various weapons
that can be picked up while playing the game. It is obvious that someone who
has never shot a gun or used any other type of weapon before is not going to
just pick up a gun and be a master marksman because they played a video game
that had guns in it. Secondly, there is a deep psychological difference between
killing a living breathing human being, and killing a bundle of pixels on a
screen which is pretty much just an animated punching bag. Lastly, in most
video games the players are killing for a reason, often in self-defense. It is
kill or be killed, unlike when a shooter walks into a school and just begin
massacring their classmates. Why is it that some people can play these video
games just as much as a shooter, or more, and they never go out and do anything
violent? There are much more plausible explanations for that sort of behavior,
such as a rough home life, traumatic events in the shooter’s life, bullying, or
mental illness. Violent video games only really significantly influence those
with an already disturbed mind.
One obvious reason that video games are not teaching kids how to kill is
that just because they play a video game with weapons in it does not mean they
have any idea how to use said weapons in real life. They would most likely learn
a lot more about how to kill someone by watching a show like CSI or Criminal
Minds, or an old Sylvester Stallone movie like Rambo. These shows go in depth a
lot more on the ways people are killed compared to a video game such as Call of
Duty or Grand Theft Auto. Just because a child is an excellent sniper on the
game Call of Duty does not mean he is going to be able to go out, pick up a
Barrett .50 caliber rifle, and drop somebody from 500 yards. I think that
anyone would agree that the idea is ludicrous. They aren’t going to know how to
reload the gun or even turn the safety on or off much less actually be an
accurate shot. Just because a player can throw for 600 yards and 5 touchdowns
on the football video game Madden, does not mean that they are able to throw
like Brett Favre in real life. There is a definite line between reality and
video games and they do not translate to one another. Some people with mental
illnesses can struggle to make that separation, and that is when violent video
games become a problem. In The
Guardian, a British newspaper, in an interview with a former Special Air
Service (S.A.S) officer named Andy McNab, when asked if he was ok with violent
video games, said yes. He says that the whole debate is nonsense. He
said that the violence has always been there, in movies and books, and games are
just a different expression of the same thing. He said that he believes video
games actually help reduce violence because they give people a way to live out
some of their war fantasies. Whose opinion on this matter could be more valid
than an actual Special Forces officer, with real combat
experience?
Another reason video games don’t make it easier for people to kill is
because there is a fundamental difference between killing a real living
breathing person, and killing someone who is not even real on a video game. A
player can kill someone in video games and not think twice about it for the rest
of their life, because there is really no reason to. It was not real, no one was
hurt. It was just good clean fun. Unlike a soldier who has seen combat, you are
not going to develop post-traumatic stress disorder over killing someone in a
video game. That is because it is not real. If a person who has played all these
games where they have killed people goes out and tries to mimic their virtual
actions in real life they will find a very different experience. According to
the book On Killing: The Psychological
Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society by Dave Grossman during World
War II only 15 to 25 percent of combat infantry were willing to fire their
rifles. They were hardened soldiers that had seen some of the most horrific
things imaginable, yet they still couldn’t bring themselves to kill. Yet people
still want to say that video games influence people and make it easier to kill?
If the things those soldiers saw could not make them more prone to kill, it is
hard to believe that a simple video game could make it easier for a person to
kill. It is far more likely that that person has much deeper problems than video
games that would give them the urge to kill. Many people believe the opposite of
the popular theory that they make people more violent. Like Andy Mcnab they
think that video games actually help relieve stress and make people less violent
because it gives people a harmless outlet for their aggression, just like
wrestling or boxing.
Last but not least, in the majority of video games players are the
protagonist, the hero. Players fight to save people and in self-defense. That is
way different from walking into a school and shooting someones classmates who
are themselves defenseless. There is an obvious difference between these two
things. To kill someone in cold
blood in such a way as that, without being provoked requires a lot more than
just having played violent video games. Someone who commits an act such as that
has some serious personal and mental issues that can be blamed solely on the
fact that he plays violent video games. According to dosomething.org, revenge is
the greatest motivation for school shootings, and 77 percent of students are
bullied. This is a much more compelling idea of the cause of violence among
teens as compared to simply saying that they were acting out what they had seen
in a video game. If the games were honestly that dangerous of an influence then
we would see much higher numbers of violent acts due to the fact that the
majority of teenagers have played violent video games at some point in their
life.
People who agree with the theory that violent video games influence
people to act out violently often use the fact that violent video games are
found in the homes of the killers. While this is true, it is also a fact that
federal statistics show that 90 percent of boys and 40 percent of girls play
video games (PBS). According to those statistics one would be very likely to
find at least one violent video game in almost anyone’s home. They also claim
that video game playing is isolating. This cannot be less true, especially with
the increase in online gaming against other people. Nearly 60 percent of gamers
play with friends, 33 percent play with siblings, and 25 percent play with their
significant other and/or their parents (PBS). The evidence just does not support
these claims.
The argument that violent video games are the cause of violence among
today’s youth is simply not true. It isn’tfirst of all, just because someone
plays a video game where they kill, does not mean that those skills transfer
over into real life. It takes a life time of practice for someone to have those
skills. Secondly, there is an obvious difference between killing someone in real
life and killing an animated target on a game. I’ve also showed the obvious
differences between killing in self-defense on a video game and killing in cold
blood in real life. The arguments that critics of video games use such as they
found violent video games in the killers home are simply too vague and not
anything more than a scapegoat. Video games are not turning today’s youth into
killers.
Works Cited
Grossman, Dave. On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning
to Kill in War and Society. 1st. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1995. 25.
Print.< http://www.amazon.com/On-Killing-
Jenkins, Henry. "Reality Bytes: Eight Video Game Myths
Debunked." PBS.org. PBS. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
Reilly,
Luke. "Video Game Violence Debate "Load of Nonsense". IGN.com.
IGN, 27 2011. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
"11 Facts about School Violence." dosomething.org.
dosomething.org. Web. 31 Oct 2012.
Answers.yahoo.com