Just a speech I wrote for school, kinda good.
Violence in games does not make people aggressive
By John Scheser
What is real to you? What are the things you think are real? There is nearly an infinite number of ways you can answer this question, but out of that untold number you would hopefully not respond by saying video games. Video games are, of course, a form of entertainment, an outlet into an imaginary world, and nothing more. But nowadays everyone from United States politicians to angry parents is trying to blame the violence and aggression that children exhibit on this simple form of entertainment, turning them into a very reliable scapegoat.
According to the Interactive Digital Software Association, 60% of all Americans play video games, which is roughly 145 million people. And out of these 145 million people that play video games, 72% are male. We guys, for whatever reason, tend to lean towards the more violent side of things. We are the ones who go see the ultra gory movies, and we are the ones who don’t turn are head away in disgust from dissecting an animal. Stereotype or not, that’s the way the world views it. So it’s not much of a surprise that we are the ones that play the most games.
This leads to a question that comes up often when discussing video game violence. Why is there so much violence in video games in the first place? Well, why is there so much violence in movies or on television? Because violence and action sells, it's as simple as that. Now, I'll admit that some video games do take violence a little too far, but bad or not, what people need to understand is that it is not real. America's youth are not maliciously destroying actual people, or getting the urge to. They are destroying pixels and polygons. Experts on video game violence need to distinguish between these two things, instead of automatically pointing fingers at things that just “seem” to be.
But, that's what usually happens. I can only assume that they don’t even think about it. Instead of trying to understand why people like to play video games and how they really affect them, so-called experts automatically write games off as bad. They say that video games are a plague to society and that they're beginning to change how America's youth act. They also say the have proof of this.
This proof is nothing more than observations and opinions; it has nothing to do with how it truly affects kids. They may split small children into two groups. One group plays an action filled game, while the other plays simple puzzle games. After this, the psychologist observes the children. What they usually find is that the kids will act out and pretend to be the characters in the game. The researcher automatically says, "That's aggression. We can't allow our children to play these games," but what they fail to realize is that the kids are just playing. There is no intention to hurt any real person and there never was. This is something researchers need to take into consideration, they never do.
In Steven Poole's book, Trigger Happy, he points out another important factor in video games. Almost always, the player is cast not as a violent maniac bent on destroying everything in sight, but as a law-enforcing hero that actually wants to save lives. This is true to the fact that video games are not trying to brainwash people and turn them into aggressive psychos, they are trying to entertain us and to give us something fun to do.
Another thing that people tend to believe is that violent video games are all that teens and children want to play. This is completely false. Mature rated games make up only about 34% of the market. Around 53% is spent on games suitable for everyone. The largest selling PC game ever is The Sims, which contains little to no violence. It’s more like a virtual dollhouse. In fact, the most popular genre of games today is simulations, which promote gamers to use problem solving, not violence, to further themselves in the game.
John Sherry, Purdue University assistant professor of communication, agrees completely with this. "All video games teach logic, hypothesis testing and problem solving in some way," he said. He has been doing a study on the effects video games have on children and felt that the overall affect of games on aggressiveness doesn't appear great. In fact, he feels that many children are attracted to games because of the puzzles they present for children to solve, and not the violence.
Entertainment is what games are for. Just like shows and movies, they aren’t real, we know this, so all we do is sit down and enjoy the ride. The only difference is that games are being used as a scapegoat for the deterioration of our society and these other forms of entertainment, which are often just as violent, are not.
We, as a society, need to try to understand why people are attracted to games and stop pointing fingers. I seriously doubt if any of the people that are so quick to blame the aggressiveness that America's youth exhibits on video games have actually even tried to play the games they ridicule. One needs to experience something for himself before placing blame. And researchers must start realizing what games are meant for, not to teach us how to become effective killers or how to properly use a hand grenade, but just to have fun.
Violence in games does not make people aggressive
By John Scheser
What is real to you? What are the things you think are real? There is nearly an infinite number of ways you can answer this question, but out of that untold number you would hopefully not respond by saying video games. Video games are, of course, a form of entertainment, an outlet into an imaginary world, and nothing more. But nowadays everyone from United States politicians to angry parents is trying to blame the violence and aggression that children exhibit on this simple form of entertainment, turning them into a very reliable scapegoat.
According to the Interactive Digital Software Association, 60% of all Americans play video games, which is roughly 145 million people. And out of these 145 million people that play video games, 72% are male. We guys, for whatever reason, tend to lean towards the more violent side of things. We are the ones who go see the ultra gory movies, and we are the ones who don’t turn are head away in disgust from dissecting an animal. Stereotype or not, that’s the way the world views it. So it’s not much of a surprise that we are the ones that play the most games.
This leads to a question that comes up often when discussing video game violence. Why is there so much violence in video games in the first place? Well, why is there so much violence in movies or on television? Because violence and action sells, it's as simple as that. Now, I'll admit that some video games do take violence a little too far, but bad or not, what people need to understand is that it is not real. America's youth are not maliciously destroying actual people, or getting the urge to. They are destroying pixels and polygons. Experts on video game violence need to distinguish between these two things, instead of automatically pointing fingers at things that just “seem” to be.
But, that's what usually happens. I can only assume that they don’t even think about it. Instead of trying to understand why people like to play video games and how they really affect them, so-called experts automatically write games off as bad. They say that video games are a plague to society and that they're beginning to change how America's youth act. They also say the have proof of this.
This proof is nothing more than observations and opinions; it has nothing to do with how it truly affects kids. They may split small children into two groups. One group plays an action filled game, while the other plays simple puzzle games. After this, the psychologist observes the children. What they usually find is that the kids will act out and pretend to be the characters in the game. The researcher automatically says, "That's aggression. We can't allow our children to play these games," but what they fail to realize is that the kids are just playing. There is no intention to hurt any real person and there never was. This is something researchers need to take into consideration, they never do.
In Steven Poole's book, Trigger Happy, he points out another important factor in video games. Almost always, the player is cast not as a violent maniac bent on destroying everything in sight, but as a law-enforcing hero that actually wants to save lives. This is true to the fact that video games are not trying to brainwash people and turn them into aggressive psychos, they are trying to entertain us and to give us something fun to do.
Another thing that people tend to believe is that violent video games are all that teens and children want to play. This is completely false. Mature rated games make up only about 34% of the market. Around 53% is spent on games suitable for everyone. The largest selling PC game ever is The Sims, which contains little to no violence. It’s more like a virtual dollhouse. In fact, the most popular genre of games today is simulations, which promote gamers to use problem solving, not violence, to further themselves in the game.
John Sherry, Purdue University assistant professor of communication, agrees completely with this. "All video games teach logic, hypothesis testing and problem solving in some way," he said. He has been doing a study on the effects video games have on children and felt that the overall affect of games on aggressiveness doesn't appear great. In fact, he feels that many children are attracted to games because of the puzzles they present for children to solve, and not the violence.
Entertainment is what games are for. Just like shows and movies, they aren’t real, we know this, so all we do is sit down and enjoy the ride. The only difference is that games are being used as a scapegoat for the deterioration of our society and these other forms of entertainment, which are often just as violent, are not.
We, as a society, need to try to understand why people are attracted to games and stop pointing fingers. I seriously doubt if any of the people that are so quick to blame the aggressiveness that America's youth exhibits on video games have actually even tried to play the games they ridicule. One needs to experience something for himself before placing blame. And researchers must start realizing what games are meant for, not to teach us how to become effective killers or how to properly use a hand grenade, but just to have fun.
