Effect of Violent Videogames

[thedarkshade]

I tend to think of violent video games as the modern version of "Cowboys and Indians", or "Cops and Robbers",

Huh? Those are boring. I'd say COD 4, Crysis, Halo 3, Assassins Creed, Bioshock all of these are too violent. And taking into consideration the high graphical appearance it looks like you really shooting someone, and that is BAD!

[noz92]

That's true, but I wonder if the idea of shooting someone is the same as actually seeing someone shot.

 

I also wonder if controlling the character in a video game has the same effect as watching it happen (such as in a movie)?

[halogirl]

Huh? Those are boring. I'd say COD 4, Crysis, Halo 3, Assassins Creed, Bioshock all of these are too violent. And taking into consideration the high graphical appearance it looks like you really shooting someone, and that is BAD!

 

 

heres the thing, video games may be violent, but i know way too many people who play regular games and are still amazingly violent and rude.

seriously, video games are absolutely different from real life. and the majority of people know this. and if you have ever seen anybody get hurt by other people, you know video games are nothing like it.

even movies are different. not only that the only physical thing you are doing is moving your thumb and finger.

think about it, there are way too many other factors that cause violence to simply blame video games, people are just looking for a reason for the seemingly pointless violence that occurs.

[Donut.Hole]

heres the thing, video games may be violent, but i know way too many people who play regular games and are still amazingly violent and rude.

seriously, video games are absolutely different from real life. and the majority of people know this. and if you have ever seen anybody get hurt by other people, you know video games are nothing like it.

even movies are different. not only that the only physical thing you are doing is moving your thumb and finger.

think about it, there are way too many other factors that cause violence to simply blame video games, people are just looking for a reason for the seemingly pointless violence that occurs.

 

Exactly! Those activists who think that videogames are bad - they may not have really played them. They judge them too quickly the moment they see them.

 

This really famous lawyer who's practically spent the last decade fighting videogames, even claims that videogames influenced the Viriginia Tech Massacre and other shootings. He goes so far as to call it "mental masturbation." But you can see that the guy doesn't know what he's talk about. He call Counter-Strike "Counter-Strike Half Life," and it's "Half Life: Counter-Strike."

 

He also claims that videogames are a way of rehearsing school shootings and points out the fact that weapons often used are those found in popular shooters like COD and Counter-Strike. Did it ever occur to him that that's because only the most common, readily available weapons would be famous enough to be put in a game? He never realized that these weapons are common, and that's why school shooters often used them.

 

Well, voice your thoughts on my rantings.

[Mr Skeptic]

heres the thing, video games may be violent, but i know way too many people who play regular games and are still amazingly violent and rude.

 

Ohhh, good point. I'd like to see a comparison of violence between, say, video game players, and American football players.

[antimatter]

I wouldn't...

[halogirl]

Exactly! Those activists who think that videogames are bad - they may not have really played them. They judge them too quickly the moment they see them.

 

This really famous lawyer who's practically spent the last decade fighting videogames, even claims that videogames influenced the Viriginia Tech Massacre and other shootings. He goes so far as to call it "mental masturbation." But you can see that the guy doesn't know what he's talk about. He call Counter-Strike "Counter-Strike Half Life," and it's "Half Life: Counter-Strike."

 

He also claims that videogames are a way of rehearsing school shootings and points out the fact that weapons often used are those found in popular shooters like COD and Counter-Strike. Did it ever occur to him that that's because only the most common, readily available weapons would be famous enough to be put in a game? He never realized that these weapons are common, and that's why school shooters often used them.

 

Well, voice your thoughts on my rantings.

 

 

 

 

he would seriously argue that? yeesh, i think i've mentioned that i play games all the time and i'm not violent so far as i know. what a weirdo

[noz92]

If you are going to rehearse something like that, why not simply go to a shooting range, or something? That would certainly seem more useful to the shooter than a video game.

[antimatter]

Shooting range? ha!

As Shakespeare once didn't say:

"The Whole word's a shooting range, and all men merely targets"

 

But irony aside, I don't think there's a way we can ever prove a correlation, not to mention have a reasonable argument against it.

[iNow]

But irony aside, I don't think there's a way we can ever prove a correlation, not to mention have a reasonable argument against it.

 

Humans are the product of genes and experience.

Experience shapes who the person becomes after the genes lay the foundation. Experience fills in the details of the outline.

 

If one has experience fantasizing about killing and disassociating from the act itself, detaching themselves emotionally from these acts which are counter to social codes, they will be more likely to engage in the act of killing beyond the confinements of the video game.

 

I am, by no means, against video games. I quite enjoy them. I'm simply showing that it's not hard to show that practice in fantasy doesn't take much to evolve toward execution in reality.

 

 

Disclaimer: The above blatantly ignores the "pressure valve" effect, whereby expression in fantasy provides relief of urges so they don't ruminate and explode beyond control, ultimately getting expressed in reality.

[antimatter]

I suppose it's also about strength of personality and character, who can control their urges, right?

 

I mean, I'm not a very angry (anymore) or violent person, though I do enjoy the occasional bout of Half-Life 2, in which I blast the heads of zombies with a .357 magnum.

I do however have a friend, who's sort of a pushover, who plays F.E.A.R. and Crysis obsessively, and just two weeks ago he told me that he was going to knife me in the stomach. It's pretty consistent actually.

 

So that's my evidence I guess,

am I wrong?

[Donut.Hole]

Trust me, your friend, who we both know, is probably just violent at heart. That's why he's attracted to violent videogames, not the other way around.

[iNow]

The idea for people to remember is that video games DO have an impact, but there are a multitude of other factors at play which can either supplement or negate that impact.

[antimatter]

Nice way to wrap it up, iNow.

I think that's the end of the discussion...unless someone wants to talk about any video games specifically.

[noz92]

Something I've noticed is that most video game characters, having no personality and no intelligence other than a basic programed survival instinct, are very easy to kill from an emotional standpoint. I'm a pacifist who is opposed to any form of violence, recognizing that the person on the other end of the gun is a human too, and as such, that person has a life away from your gun, and has a personality just as I do, and so I have a problem with hurting, much less killing, him in any way. Realizing that a video game character does not die (if you restart the game, there he is with not even a scar from the last time you blew his brains out), and doesn't even have a personality or a life, he is much easier to kill. I have no problem killing a video game character, but even thinking about killing another human being sickens me. Unless that character is a major character in the game, and therefor has a personality, and clearly expresses a desire to live, I have no problem killing him (I actually do sometimes have a problem killing characters in role playing games, but I ultimately am able to when I realize that that character is not in any way sentient, nor will he disappear).

 

Blaming video game violence on real world violence is somewhat naive, as I, and so I assume most others as well, do not see them as the same thing at all.

[antimatter]

I agree with you, but honestly, I feel like with this topic, we're just hitting a dead horse with a bowling pin.

[noz92]

Could you clarify that idiom.

[antimatter]

Sorry, my idioms/sayings tend to be...peculiar.

 

I'm saying that we've already discussed and discussed this topic for almost four pages, and I think we've gone over all off the points possible.

Once again, it's not that I don't agree with you, I just feel like there's nothing left to talk about.

[foodchain]

I have played and continue to play the most violent video games that exist. I can also say I don’t step on ants, or hurt anything living, or have any confusion at all that I am playing a video game. Do some people have problems with it, sure, but anything that exists there exists some people that have problems with it, so what is the point? I think a more prudent response to video gaming would be the massive waste of resources for mere entertainment, but if we did away with that I am sure a large percent of the world economy would collapse overnight and maybe gas prices would go down.

 

I mean if you are looking for some absolute to this I think neurobiology combined with learning and the environment overall is what you are looking for, and well maybe I made the cut from people that play GTA and then go and run people over in real life.

[antimatter]

Right, a lot of it has to do with the person who is playing.

I for example, enjoy the occasional smashing of zombie heads with a crowbar, though I don't consider myself to be a remotely violent person.

 

What games exactly? Manhunt?

[foodchain]

Right, a lot of it has to do with the person who is playing.

I for example, enjoy the occasional smashing of zombie heads with a crowbar, though I don't consider myself to be a remotely violent person.

 

What games exactly? Manhunt?

 

I mostly play online fps games really. I found the concept of manhunt to be a bit over the top in a trendy type of fashion, but really a lot of it is perception on an individual level. Say you play a game where you have to kill humanoid like creatures, or say an alien, when you shot them in the head with your gun why is it any different if the graphical representation was that of a human? I mean I like video games that have a flamethrower, not so much because I like to pour out flame into some packed hallway full of noobs along with some grenades(), just that I like how it looks graphically. So its somewhat case by case I would think?

 

If the idea is that playing violent video games makes you violent, I have to disagree, if its the idea that playing violent video games means you are violent I would also have to disagree, simply because I am not a violent person. Case in point I would actually have to say I am almost a pacifist when it comes to violence or use of force in real life. So I don’t see how you can draw the connection really past just saying its that way really, which is hardly any kind of a truth, or fact, or what not. Lets look at religion, its buried so many people in all the most horrible ways, it like video games is human made, so could I say simply because a person is religious they are violent killers? I mean lots of people drink, not everyone who drinks becomes some deranged violent person, but it does happen, so what baseless blanket stereotype based on some occurrences do you wish to use really? There is no absolute mechanism or single variable correlation to be made there.

[antimatter]

You're really just rephrasing what I said...a.k.a. you're uh...sorta strawmanning.

Anyway, that's exactly what I just said, it depends on whether the person who either plays the game, joins the religion, drinks, etc, etc, is easily impressible.

At one point I played Half-Life and Halo a lot. A LOT. Both are very violent games, and they haven't really made an impression on me, I have gotten a little more insane, but I think that's just my slow descent into madness that started way back in the third grade.

[halogirl]

hehe me too. but really video games might desensitize you to blood and gore, but skinning an elk does the same thing(Yuck! and Yuck!) and if you've ever been hunting, it's disturbing to see something die, but that is way more likely to cause a killing spree then video games. eh, if someone's gonna kill people they've probably been hunting.

(Elk guts are not fun)

[foodchain]

You're really just rephrasing what I said...a.k.a. you're uh...sorta strawmanning.

Anyway, that's exactly what I just said, it depends on whether the person who either plays the game, joins the religion, drinks, etc, etc, is easily impressible.

At one point I played Half-Life and Halo a lot. A LOT. Both are very violent games, and they haven't really made an impression on me, I have gotten a little more insane, but I think that's just my slow descent into madness that started way back in the third grade.

 

 

On the strawman maybe, maybe not I think the point holds some water though.

 

I think games could play a participatory role in learning something, or even violent behavior. I think a great many things can do this though, I think reality backs me up on that. I also think a lot of it is a matter of opinion, I mean I could say all human cultures are temporary and flawed entities that lead to war and global ruin via issues like global warming, there is no real absolute answer to this question though, or its not as black and white as 1+1=2 really. I mean if you had a person, and all that person was allowed to do was play a violent video game or two, I don’t really think you could say its all the games fault, I mean that situation is for lack of better words unnatrual in the first place. I learned about violence from human history, such as learning about world war 2, or 1, or pick a conflict, not so much from a video game. Some people probably learn it from playing football, I just don’t see how it can be so easily constructed as playing such games means or makes you violent though.

 

On a flip side though maybe the reality that we evolved from territorial species kind of includes the same in our makeup as a specie, I don’t find such an idea so far fetched. Could it still be us just carrying out learned behavior, but how would you answer such a question really? Cut out some genes, isolate some people? The cultural primitive does not exist past a newborn really, and even then how do you perfectly segregate various items really? The nurture vs. nature debate is hardly solved, if not for the fact its probably mutable in some open ended sense itself.

[antimatter]

I know it 'holds water', I did say it!