video game violence

[fireplug]

How many of you buy into the argument of video game violence desenstizing kids to the point that they go out and kill with no remorse?
I dont' personally buy it. I think it all falls back to the parenting style or lack thereof. I think it's just another excuse to justify no personal
responsibility. I'm having this discussion with a cousin of mine that is a Colonel in the Air force and very intellegent. He's in the blame video
games camp. Says it's taking us back to the Roman gladiator type atmosphere. I don't buy it. What say you?

[landscaper]

How long have kids been playing cops and robbers or cowboys and indians? I was shooting my friends with my fingers guns way before anyone even knew what a video game was.

[Northbigmuddy]

I think it all falls back to the parenting style or lack thereof. I think it's just another excuse to justify no personal responsibility.

Your on the right track. Ill add that society at large takes zero responsibility for kids these days as well. Parenting is paramount but parents can't be present 100% of the time. I have been corrected by many people other than my parents back in the day. Those folks didnt look the other way. Not that wasn't already aware of my personal responsibility for behaving myself, but the knowledge that I would be held accountable pretty much all the time had an impact. The video game excuse is cover so as to not have to deal with societies greater failings. Folks like your cousin or whoever can't see the forest for all the trees.

[fireplug]

I think it all falls back to the parenting style or lack thereof. I think it's just another excuse to justify no personal responsibility.

Your on the right track. Ill add that society at large takes zero responsibility for kids these days as well. Parenting is paramount but parents can't be present 100% of the time. I have been corrected by many people other than my parents back in the day. Those folks didnt look the other way. Not that wasn't already aware of my personal responsibility for behaving myself, but the knowledge that I would be held accountable pretty much all the time had an impact. The video game excuse is cover so as to not have to deal with societies greater failings. Folks like your cousin or whoever can't see the forest for all the trees.

Yeah, normally if I was up to no good around town, my folks new about it before I got back home.

[woundedduck]

Whatever happened Crazy?

[adame]

Im cappin saggin i the newest grand theft auto and i have no desire to go out a kill someone in cold blood. FWIW

[SNOT]

I think it might play a small part but I do think it gets back to parenting and the fact that anyone that just randomly kills a bunch of people they don't know deserves the worst possible punishment there is...

Fact is, all the guys are as sorry as they come----right up there with the crazy Muslims cutting people's heads off-----the worst one was this piece of $#!+....killing a bunch of little kids just for the hell of it...



A couple more crazy fools----just look at these idiots, you can tell they're screwed up just by looking at their psychotic looking eyes..





I bet there are some common traits with these people----guarantee they like to torture animals (like throwin a puppy in a fire kind of torture)---I bet they had zero friends because they were so f'in weird----most of their interaction with other actual people was on the computer or playing video games - as in, they never developed normal social skills and I guarantee they were on some kind of anti-depressant or Ritalin type drug since they were a kid....but there's probably millions of people like that in this country that have all or some of those traits but only a tiny-tiny amount wanna go out and just kill folks----those are the sorry, sick, weirdo bastards that are just straight-up evil that shouldn't get so lucky to commit suicide after they kill a bunch of people---those bastards should be tortured then drop-shipped in the Afghan mountains.

[Wingman]

It's a God thing. They've taken Him out of everything. There is no other option but to behave like a heathen.

[duramax]

I agree Fireplug. It's a parent thing 99.99999%. Not a church thing, not a God in schools thing, not anything else other than being brought up with a positive structure being taught right from wrong and having that established in them from years of involvement (good parents taking their kids to church just shows they have an active role in their child's life). I don't play video games. But I know tons of folks who do. Violent games too. None of them are any more inclined to kill people than if they didn't play the games. However these are balanced minded people (for the most part at least). The violent video games are simply a symptom of the problem in those who carry out horrible acts. These unbalanced people had crappy parents that wanted little to nothing to do with their kids and let them have idle hands, and sit in front of tv 24/7 playing these games. You think all these gang punks that shoot each other play violent video games to become violent? No. They just grow up around violence and have no moral structure to tell them how to live like a functional human being.

It's the same with humans and any other animal. No structure in growing up leads to them becoming unpredictable individuals. Though I'm no fan of pitbulls, a well trained, loved from birth pitbull will almost certainly be a great dog the rest of it's life. Take a lab (generally thought of as the most soft hearted dog breed) and bring it up without rules, and throw in violence, and you have an unpredictable, potentially dangerous dog. A kid brought up with no discipline or boundaries, will almost always fall into the categories of becoming violent, a drug abuser/alcoholic, or all around "ne'er do well". The ones who have violent tenancies will automatically be drawn to violent video games if they are at their disposal. As I said, the violent video games are just a symptom of a larger problem.

The last 0.00001% variable as woundedduck pointed out, is sometimes folks are just crazy. And crazy folks playing nothing but Mario Bros may be just as likely to kill a bunch of folks, because there's no predicting crazy.

[cwink]

No doubt that there is something wrong with these people.. Mental issues, lack of parenting, lack of God in their lives all play a part.. I think more than anything the video games might be a catalyst more than a reason..

[Northbigmuddy]

He11 I call my PS2 my "Jap Killing Machine". Every winter I break Medal of Honor out and blast a couple of dozen, but I've never had the urge to go act it out in real life.

I would like to see the statistic of how many gamers commit firearm related crimes. Ill bet its next to nothing.

[JCA]

Don't know that video games cause the problem but I do believe they do train kids to be more proficient when they do snap. In my opinion they are nothing more than simulators that soldiers or law enforcement train and shoot in different scenarios on. They program themselves to start shooting and not stop till there are no more targets. Desensitized to the destruction they are causing.

[the tree]

kinda like weed being a gateway to heavy drugs, might not be true, but I bet most hard core drug users started off smoking weed.

[SNOT]

kinda like weed being a gateway to heavy drugs, might not be true, but I bet most hard core drug users started off smoking weed.

Yep---kind of like not all pot smokers do hard drugs but 99% of all meth/coke/heroin users started smoking weed first.

Not all Muslims are terrorists (I think) but 99% of terrorists are Muslim.

[stitch]

I always tell people around me......"don't go with your gut, do what the numbers tell you to do". I don't have time to dig up the numbers, but homicides with guns are at close to an all time low.....much lower than they were 20 years ago.

Numbers also show that gun crimes are much lower in areas where guns / concealed weapons are allowed. Look at all the mass murders......they occur in gun free zones.

I had this discussion with friends the other day as it relates to "protecting kids" these days......my argument was that statistically things are safer today then when we were all kids.........I just think it's the information age / media.....something happens in California and 30 seconds later the whole world knows about it. With the endless media outlets, of course there is nothing to do but talk about it for weeks at a time.