Video_Game_Censorship

Video Game Censorship I’m going to give you a few reasons why people believe censoring video games is a good thing, and why, for the most part they are wrong. But, the key to understanding the viewpoint of an anti-gaming activist is to admit, to an extent however, is that he’s right about some things. 1. Yes, entertainment can change your personality A common dismissal to every debate involving censorship is, "it's just harmless entertainment! It has no effect whatsoever!" Have you ever heard a song that made you sad' Never cried at the end of a movie' Ever' Not even at the end of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King when the King says, "my friends, you bow to no one'" And all the king's men bowed to the little hobbits' You've never had your emotions moved by something you watched or read or heard' Ever' Have you never heard an activist actor or actress say they hope their movie "raises awareness" on an issue or "has a positive impact"' Schindler's List didn't change the way you thought about the Holocaust' You don't think Uncle Tom's Cabin changed the way people thought about slavery' So can we admit that what we read and watch and hear can change our mind and emotions' And that it's at least possible someone could make a game that influences the people who play it, for better or worse' Can we admit that playing Doom III filled some gamers with horror and dread or at least raised the amount of adrenaline in their bloodstream' The truth is you play these games because you like to feel this way, you like the feel of adrenaline pumping through you. This is the same reason you watch horror movies or action flicks or visit a haunted house at Halloween time. In fact, the whole point of any entertainment medium is to change the audience, to manipulate their senses. Why it’s wrong… It’s wrong for the same reason it’s right. Video games are no different. You're not playing yourself in Grand Theft Auto; you're living a story through a character. Just like in a film or a comic book or a novel. If you can successfully hold Rock Star Games (the creators of Grand Theft Auto) responsible when some kid shoots a policeman, you have to hold thousands of authors responsible when a serial killer turns up. People like to say the games are "training" kids to kill, but no video game gets as instructive and detailed about how to commit the crime as the paperbacks at your local bookstore do. This is the fatal flaw of censorship. There is no logical stopping point. Every good story contains conflict and much of that conflict is expressed as violence. Ask any Shakespeare fan. Besides, will any game "train" me on how to get away with a crime as well as the average episode of CSI' So where do you stop' 2. Real People Are Portrayed and Killed in Games and it’s wrong… For example, to a kid working at McDonald’s it wouldn't seem so cute to see a game where other kids can walk into the restaurant and blow the visor off an employees head as part of the "fun." The main target of this is police officers. A police officer isn’t going to see the joy in a game where the objective is to kill police officers. To make a game where real dads and brothers and husbands who work as police officers are turned into faceless targets, all for the point of making a profit is, on a human level, is a horrible thing to do. Why it’s wrong… If there is such a game out there, I haven't played it. The entire attraction of games like Grand Theft Auto is that you make choices and you suffer the consequences. The moral lessons of the game are, in fact, infinitely more true-to-life than a game where you can only do the good deed, where the A Button makes you kill the bad guy and rescue the princess. Your only choice is to rescue her or stand there doing nothing. You can't rape the princess. So how can you say the gamer in Mario did a "good" deed when he didn't have a choice in the matter' For a game to teach kids about consequences wouldn't there have to be a button on the controller that lets you do something terrible' So you can choose not to push it' 3. Most Games Appeal to the Worst in us… Or, more specifically, the worst in teenage boys. Can any of us deny that game makers profit from the hormone-driven urge to define manhood through violence' Do you think the makers of the Dead or Alive series know a thing or two about how to tap into sexual frustration in young males' So in the course of defending the right of game makers to express themselves through their art, let's not pretend there's anything redeeming about a whole lot of the games they make. And let's leave room for people to express their freedom of speech by calling such games worthless. Why it’s wrong… This is my favorite graph. It shows how violent crime has plummeted starting in the early 90's, exactly at the dawn of the First Person Shooting game; Doom: You’re probably wondering what video game addict posted this on the internet. It actually comes from the U.S. Department of Justice. I can't prove that violent video games caused crime to go down. That would be using the same false before-and-after presumption used in headlines, for example, Teen Kills Two After Playing 'Grand Theft Auto.' But how can you make the argument that violent games cause violent crime in light of the data' Games are violent but so were comic books, so were the old westerns that used to populate television in the 50's, so are our movies. If B-grade, grindhouse entertainment has the ability to cause crime then the crusade should have started long before the first red pixels of blood spewed from our game consoles. 4. The future is scary… The reason, of course, that many people fear Grand Theft Auto but didn't fear watching deadly gunfights on Bonanza is because they grew up with the latter one, thus it's familiar to them. Grand Theft Auto is new and unfamiliar. The unfamiliar is scary. It's a human trait, as basic as hunger. Let’s look at it this way. At one time in video games we could kill a girl that looked like this: On Xbox 360, you’ll be able to kill a girl that looks like this: And by the time you have kids, they’ll probably be killing a girl that looks like this: That is, they'll be able to simulate the exact sense experience that comes with killing a real human being. You just need the right amount of processing power and memory to do so. I assure you, by the time this happens, the future will be scary to you, too. Though I admit, shooting Mr. Goatee up there might not be all that disturbing. Why it’s wrong… There's a book called “Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill” that is commonly quoted by anti-gaming activist. It's by a military expert who claims that First Person Shooter games use the same techniques to desensitize kids to murder that the U.S. military uses. That is, the military found they could get soldiers to fire their weapons faster in battle by training them on human-shaped targets instead of bull’s eyes. There are two problems with that, though. One, even a First Person Shooter game doesn't teach you to handle a real weapon (shooting someone with a pistol and shooting someone with a game pad are two completely different experiences) and two; Grand Theft Auto isn't an FPS game. And if merely watching two little characters on your TV screen shoot each other trains us to kill, then prime time TV has already made us a nation of killers. And let’s not forget: 5. We do have real murders linked to games An article on gamespot.com would give us a specific example; a kid killed three police officers and said Grand Theft Auto III made him do it. The evidence in the case leaves no question that the release of Grand Theft Auto III has dramatically increased the number of murderers who now claim Grand Theft Auto III made them commit the crime. In fact, as recently as 1980, there were zero recorded cases of criminals who claimed Grand Theft Auto III made them commit a murder. Why it’s wrong… When a convicted murderer says his crime was caused by something that, if true, would absolve him of responsibility, you must hold out the possibility that he might not be telling the truth. Or, just run the numbers. GTA III sold ten million copies worldwide, according to IGN entertainment. So we have this case and then I know of another in Japan where the game was cited as the cause. That means one in five million users suffered from murderous impulses after playing it. That's 0.00000002%. Can any manufacturer be held liable with those kinds of numbers, even if it could somehow be pinpointed as the exclusive reason for the crime' The gaming industry does deserve criticism. Stores that sell M-Rated games to minors deserve criticism. But I'm looking forward to a day when someone can do it with enough evidence to show why and how to change it. I mentioned Schindler's List earlier as an example of how film can change the way you think about things for the better. Ask yourself: has any game ever done that' Works Cited "Bureau of Justice Statistics Violent Crime Rate Trends." U.S. Department of Justice-Office of Justice Programs. . "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas Announced." IGN Entertainment. . Grossman, Dave, and Gloria Degaetano. Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill. Crown, 1999.