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| Friday, March 18, 2005 11:19 AM |
| Violent Media Attack! |
 by Fëanor |
- First, let's recycle some links from Sarcasmo's Corner: I liked in particular this list of fictional curse words. I'm very suspicious of the wikipedia in general, even though I'm reading an intriguing article about it in Wired currently. I like my encyclopedia to be a place I can go for trustworthy information, sanctified by folks with degrees who do that kind of thing for a living. But whatever. It's a cool list, and "frak" is on it. I'm thinking about trying to use frak more in regular conversation. I've also been trying to refer to "Gods" instead of "God" when I use phrases that usually include said word. Yes, I know, I'm a geek.
- Speaking of "BG," the last episode was pretty awesome, eh? Always something unexpected from the folks on that show, Gods bless them.
- But anyway, back to the links. I took this zombie quiz, and I enjoyed it:
Official Survivor
Congratulations! You scored 73%! | | Whether through ferocity or quickness, you made it out. You made the right choice most of the time, but you probably screwed up somewhere. Nobody's perfect, at least you're alive. |  |
My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender: | You scored higher than 59% on survivalpoints |
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- I thought defective yeti's post today was pretty enjoyable, too. They were trying to be funny when they listed "I'll go make you a burrito" as one of the hottest things you could say to a naked woman, right?
- Okay, now here's that article I mentioned in yesterday's post. It's on a book about the supposed link between violence in the media and actual violence. This is a topic I've been disgruntled about for many a year. A lot of folks would like us to believe that if you play a violent video game, or watch a violent movie, you will then go out and do violence. I like to think of myself as a walking contradiction of this theory. I'm a man who tends to like my media violent and indecent, but I completely despise real violence. For me, violent games are a way of getting out aggression--if anything, they contribute to me continuing to not do violence. The article mentions some psychologists who agree with me: "violent entertainment provides a valuable fantasy outlet for the inevitable rage of childhood and adolescence, and probably helps more children than it hurts."
Now the argument that a normal, mentally well-adjusted adult person could be influenced into doing something illegal or violent or completely against his principles simply by reading a book or playing a game is utterly laughable. You can say that studies show this, and studies show that, but the article debunks at least one key study, and points out that for every study that seems to show that violent media causes violence, there's another one that shows the opposite. So let's just use common sense here. Yes, it seems probably true that young children (who are, as we all know well, extremely impressionable) shouldn't be watching a lot of extremely violent shows or playing violent video games. But it also seems obvious that there is no simple, one-to-one cause and effect in action, even in the case of young children. Nobody sane really thinks that a previously completely normal, well-adjusted kid is going to watch Predator, play a game of GTA, and then go out and shoot some people. If a kid does something like that, there's obviously a lot of other more important stuff going wrong in his life, and that's the kind of stuff we should focus on. Were his parents paying attention to him, and how did they let him get access to the gun, etc.
I like that the article (and the book) also debunks the old "things didn't used to be like this" argument. I hate that argument. There was no golden age when you were a kid, old-timer. There was plenty of violence in the media then, too, and plenty of violence in real life--even more, in fact, as the article points out. You just didn't have constant contact with many forms of media back then and didn't hear the details about every single killing multiple times, on the internet, in the paper, on the radio, and on TV.
But anyway, let's accept that maybe really young kids shouldn't play violent games or watch violent movies. Does that mean that such things should be banned entirely, and no one should have access to them? Obviously, my answer is no. I want my slasher movies and my shooting games. They entertain me, they offer me an outlet, and they are part of the free expression that we are allowed both by law and the inherent rights of humanity.
There's a line between reality and fantasy. Maybe it gets blurred sometimes, but it's there and it's important and the great majority of normal adult humans know where it lies. People who are messed up and looking for a reason to do violence are going to find that reason, whether you let them see Reservoir Dogs or not.
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Jim Genzano's books on Goodreads
