'Video games causing violence' has been a common trend in the media lately, however, they are mostly incorrect.
Recently, as more video games are flooding the market, the media seems adamantly focused on pointing out that they believe there is a direct correlation between violence and video games.
On August 26th, 2013, "An 8-year-old Lousiana boy intentionally shot and killed his elderly caregiver after player a violent video game" according to CNN. The game in question is Grand Theft Auto IV, (From now, known as GTA IV) which is an R18 game. The argument that should be posed by the media is 'Why did an 8 year old have full access to a loaded fire-arm?' as well as 'Why did the child have access to a game he is 10 years too young to legally purchase?' instead of 'Are video games causing violent actions?'
CNN goes on to say 'Grand Theft Auto IV,' a realistic game that has been associated with encouraging violence and awards points to players for killing people, just minutes before the homicide occurred." However, GTA does not award points for killing people, infact it leaves you in a bad position in the game. Take Two interactive, the publisher of the game, has denied this by saying "Ascribing a connection to entertainment -- a theory that has been disproven repeatedly by multiple independent studies -- both minimizes this moment and sidesteps the real issues at hand." Arguably, this might just be a defensive from Take Two to remove themselves from the claims that their games are causing violence so people will continue to buy their products.
It is entirely possible that people simply don't understand video games. In this article, a father blames the video game 'Minecraft' for his child taking a gun to school. "They use hammers to dig and knives and guns to protect themselves from zombies," Which is incorrect, shovels are used to dig in minecraft, swords exist, but knives do not and guns are unheard of in the minecraft world.
It is entirely possible that people simply don't understand video games. In this article, a father blames the video game 'Minecraft' for his child taking a gun to school. "They use hammers to dig and knives and guns to protect themselves from zombies," Which is incorrect, shovels are used to dig in minecraft, swords exist, but knives do not and guns are unheard of in the minecraft world.
In an article by PBS, a psychiatrist says “I don’t think we have enough science to suggest that playing video games causes violence in children any more than watching violence on TV,”
So why are the media and people in power targetting Video games as a cause of Violence?
Lt Col Dave Grossman says that video games are "murder simulators." However, by definition, Murder is killing with malicious aforethought. However, in most video games, the player is usually the one who is under attack and enemies will attack on sight regardless of the players disposition. It's what the Artificial intelligence has been programmed to do. I'm going to look at a popular game called Call Of Duty, often blamed for 'training' of killers and causing violence in it's players. The game at it's core, is not a simulator of any kind. It is not a gun simulator, as the only action of the gun the player controls is the aiming and shooting, and on some platforms the aiming is done for you. "Press R to reload" does not accurately represent ejecting the magazine, sliding a new one in and if no rounds are present in the chamber; pulling the action to chamber a new bullet. Players are not murdering other players because there is no premeditation or planning to kill a specific player, if anything it's self-defence. Physically speaking, it's a broken game and when you can fly through the air with a knife, it should remove any suspension of disbelief and remove any connection to the 'real life,' if not, there are other issues in the mind which should be looked at instead of fantasy violence.
In an article written by The Guardian; A doctor had been interviewed about the correlation between video games and violence. It was an assessment of reports that were willingly submitted by video gamers in relation to their aggression and violence. "Over 90% of subjects reported dramatic increase in anger and violent inclinations whenever they viewed a news story that associated video games and violent behaviour." And not that video games themselves cause violence.
Dr Vance, the doctor in question, goes on to say "The Media's main concern appears to be that enthusiastic gamers can't differentiate between games and the real world." However, he continues by saying; "People taking part in the experiment knew they were taking part in and experiment, so behaved differently. Basically, people's ability to differentiate between fact and fiction disrupted our experiment into whether they could differentiate between fact and fiction."
Dr Mario Vance says "A bias is one thing, but turning a brutal and deadly shooting into an excuse to attack a tenuously linked entertainment medium? That borders on pathological." Dr Vance is a psychological researcher at the Rapture institute for head-line inspired science.
Now, I'm not saying that there is no violence is video games. I would be blatantly lying. However, to say that is causes real life violence, or trains people to be killers is absurd. Sure, some people will get homicidal ideas from it, just as people will get violent ideas from what happens in the real world (such as copy cat killers), or from movies and TV. People may even get homicidal ideas or violent tendencies from voices inside their head. However, former FBI profiler says that "video games do not cause violence." If the warnings on video games were heeded, and the mental stability of criminals with 'video game related crimes' was taken into consideration, I do not believe that video games would be the main blame of the media.
Just because I'm a fan of the Fallout series doesn't mean I'm going to go around shooting people until they blow up.
Just like someone who watches Breaking Bad doesn't start cooking meth because they like the show.
Retrospectively, people hated Cinema when it was 'the medium' of the day. People said rock music was 'the devil' back when Elvis was popular. Perhaps, people fearmongering with video games is just the next on the list.
I will leave this image to end this blog post. Here's a link to the original size.
This image is an example of Poe's Law, in which it is almost impossible to decipher whether the writer, Jack Thompson's (An anti-video game activist) extremism is sincere, or a parody.
Video games aren't the cause of real world violence. It's the effect of it.
Images;
Lepetit, J. Bridgman, A. (2013). Culture of Violence. Retrieved from http://www.dorkly.com/comic/54084/culture-of-violence
Call of Duty Wiki. (N.D). Call of Duty; Modern Warfare 2. Retrieved from http://images.wikia.com/callofduty/images/4/47/MW2_Favela_Extreme_Knife_Lunge.gif
Text references.
Burnett, D. (2013). Claims that 'video games lead to violence' lead to violence. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2013/sep/20/video-games-cause-violence-claims-cause-violence
Cushing, T. (2013). Video games do not cause violence, according to former FBI profiler. Retrieved from http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130228/09391122151/video-games-do-not-cause-violence-according-to-former-fbi-profiler.shtml
Grossman, D. (1999). Statement of Lt Col Dave Grossman. Retrieved from http://www.thefreeradical.ca/research/statementOfDaveGrossman.html
Keim, B. (2013). What science knows about video games and violence. Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/body/what-science-knows-about-video-games-and-violence/
Russell, L. (2013). Police: 8-year-old shoots, kills elderly caregiver after playing video game. Retrieved from http://edition.cnn.com/2013/08/25/us/louisiana-boy-kills-grandmother
