Violence in Video Games Pt. 2

TUESDAY, JANUARY 8 2008

In another study, this time by a respected USC Sociologist, explains how video games are an easy target when it comes to youth violence, when issues such as, poverty, quality of life, and domestic violence seem slightly more realistic.

Video games are an easy target, mainly because they are out in the open. It is easier to try and fight something that is in plain site. People buy video games from stores and walk with them down the street in broad day light. When a child is harmed at home, no one sees it, when a child shoots a bully with his fathers gun, no one sees the emotional torment, only that he or she played Grand Theft Auto or some other violent video game. Have politicians, scum bag lawyers, and modern day Christian Crusaders, ever tried to reach out to the parents or primary guardians of these kids instead of immediately chastising the industry? Instill moral values in our nations youth, who have no concept of right, wrong, good and evil.

What some people don't understand, is that it isn't the killing in video games that makes them so appealing, at least to me. Maybe some people only play for the killing. Games that are considered good are that way because of other elements. The story-line is engrossing, the control scheme is easy to understand, the visuals are crisp and clean. The game as a whole is a pleasurable experience. Games that focus singularly on violence are usually not fun to play over an extended period of time, thus easily forgotten. In the game Carmageddon, your goal was to run over as many people as possible while trying to win a race. The game was fun because you were able to do things that you can't do in real life. Running over a person in a video game is fun and involves no consequence. Running over a person in real life can send you to jail for life. If you don't know that, please admit yourself to a mental institution. When all was said and done, Carmageddon was not that good of a game. The game was shallow thus I don't usually think about the game at all until some dummy brings up the fact that it was violent. I usually respond by saying, "Yeah, it was. Who wants to go run down some old ladies?"

All in all, the debate about violence in video games and how it relates to violence in the real world is just a microcosm for the world we live in. Lawyers and shallow politicians have ruined everything for everyone. The scum bag politician sees an easy moral victory by claiming they care about America's youth while their physical children are snorting lines of coke off the imported, living room coffee table with a rolled-up hundred dollar bill. The scum bag lawyer sees this as an easy pay off, jumps on the bandwagon and represents the parents of little Johnny who claims to have killed a friend because a video game made killing look glamorous. You mean to tell me that little Johnny wasn't aware that if he shot and killed little Billy he wouldn't jump right back up and say, "good shot".

Hey, all you activists, sociologists and psychiatrists out there! Put all that grant money to good use and do a study about how western civilization will fall because of the self-centeredness and greed of humanity.

ESRB ratings guide:
http://www.esrb.org/ratings/ratings_guide.jsp

USC Sociologist video game study:
http://gamepolitics.com/2007/02/28/violent-games-dont-cause-youth-violence-says-usc-sociologist

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