are computer games to blame?

[new_novice]

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/fun.games/03/16/boy.videogame.reut/index.html

how sad can that be? Do games teach kids to be more bold? brave? or is it like drugs, they just gotta have it. I know it's only one "known" incident, could there be others? will there be others?

[Sophisticated]

well you can prevent that from not letting ya kid play video games that damn long..i bet he was on from mornin to midnight..krazy...well i kant say nothing im on this thing basically from mornin till night unless i have to work out go out wit my gurl or something

[FireMogle]

Its not the game, its the kid. What kind of kids pull knifes when they are punished, ones with social problems.

[Agent_Mull]

And which ones have social problems? the ones who play videogames from dawn till dusk.

[XunknownX]

Yes games are to blame. I used to be a good guy. But I've played too much Vice City. I see people on the street and I just want to beat the crap out of them. Oh God, I can feel it coming on....must....go.....act....out......RAGE!!!!! *cue 80's music*

[Lord_Zoltan]

I dont know - I have played games from dusk till dawn before and no social problems.

Note* Im currently 17 and i have been playing video games since i was really young. Infact, the original nintendo was my first machine, i played sega alot, then eventaully when i hit my early teens i went into computers. At the younger ages, when i played consoles, i would spend all day playing them for days on end, then go to legos when i got angry and couldnt win lol.

Now, I have always had a hard time just killing people in games. Take postal for example - very graphic . Sure its fun when my friend was over and we just wanted to mess around, but this game is seriously disgusting - we both agreed on this after a while. I would never let a kid under the age of 13 maybe 14 play this game.

I believe that it is the kid not the game, although some games are getting pretty bad, but i would still play them. I would like to point out that i have read novels that are worse than some of these games and I am pretty sure that books have been around for a while. No one seems to blame them. I guess it cant be books, if its printed its ok, well lets go look at the Satanic Bible or hell there is alot of books and novel stories that i could mention which are worse than any video game. They let you imagination play and if anything that has to affect you more than anything.

All in all, i think a parent , and i know this is always stated, but the parent should decide what is suitable for his child and what is not and how long each should be allowed. As i was growing up no one ever really checked those "Rated" legends which help parents decide. But my dad did every once in a while take a peak on the game i was playing. I remember once when i was playing Mortal combat on the sega genesis and the now corny blood splatter made my dad ask " Does this make you feel good? "
And i stated in my most youthful unexperienced slightly intelligent mind, " Winning feels good, but the hurting doesnt."

OH well, i turned out fine. Thats probably because of my dad and my parents and how i was raised.

~ Zoltan {Lz}

[tom10167]

Wow, this thread again, great.

Video games are just as much to blame as the parents.

[jonwessel]

i used to be really obessed with computers/comp games/ vid games like. started when i moved into our new big house and i got cable connection. literally i played CS on my new never had b4 cable connection from the time i woke up until usually around 5am. so i guess 18-20 hours a day. that lasted into the school year inwhich i failed the first half of 8th grade. then my cuz from duke university came and tutored me and i somehow passed 8th grade. then i was obessed again with comps in the 8>9 school year summer. that lasted from this summer up until about the end of 03. all of sudden i dont want to play vid games anymore. i haven't touched my ps2 in awhile, and i juss got socoms 2 nba live 04 and i have the HS and online adapter. i haven't played counter-strike in a while!!! and i dont even want to even as i;m sitting here now and talking about it. i think ppl my age (15), 10-20 yr olds, and immature 21-25 yr olds, well i think we go on kicks were we are obessed with one thing and do it 24/7 none stop. then one day we either grow outta kicks or move onto something else. my kick with until i got my CABle net and CS 2gether in summer of 02 till like november 03. i really wish CS would have never been made. from that time period i had no social interaction, infact this my sound sickening buts its the truth, when in my deepest obbession with CS i would rather sit home alone on a friday nite and play with strangers on a stupid internet video game CS than go and hang out with ppl (i didn;'t say friends b/c i had none at the time). i've never tried crack, but i think i might know what ppl talk about when they are addicted to it (sadly my dad is one of those ppl, actually he had a court hearing 2day for probation violation and i haven't heard back what happend, i think either his sister (my aunt who i live with) will pay his 800 dollar fines and he gets to walk, or they might not care about the $$$ and throw him in ohio prison for 1 year, he had that time on the shelf, plz pray for him if yer readin this) anyways i think i can relate to very strong addictions. and i think i'm over it b/c i've played CS sooooooo mucch i'm actually SICK of it. i wouldn't advise the same strategy to get over crack, lol. my 2 cents.

[JigPu]

Originally posted by new_novice
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/fun.games/03/16/boy.videogame.reut/index.html

how sad can that be? Do games teach kids to be more bold? brave? or is it like drugs, they just gotta have it. I know it's only one "known" incident, could there be others? will there be others?
Answer: If UT2K3/UT2K4/Sonic The Hedgehog/Tyrian/Half-Life/etc taught me to be more bold, why did it take me 3 minutes to work up the confidance today to ask a fellow classmate if I was late for my final? :D


I really think that games are just triggering mechanism. Put them in the hands of the wrong people, and they will do bad stuff. Put them in the hands of other people, and nothing at all happens. Games have not taught me how to shoot a gun (...or I'd be better at paintball... :D), they have not taught me the "correct" way to vent my anger (...or I would be beating people up instead of sluffing off the things people do to constantly annoy me... :D), etc.

JigPu

[Tebore]

Originally posted by JigPu

Answer: If UT2K3/UT2K4/Sonic The Hedgehog/Tyrian/Half-Life/etc taught me to be more bold, why did it take me 3 minutes to work up the confidance today to ask a fellow classmate if I was late for my final? :D


I really think that games are just triggering mechanism. Put them in the hands of the wrong people, and they will do bad stuff. Put them in the hands of other people, and nothing at all happens. Games have not taught me how to shoot a gun (...or I'd be better at paintball... :D), they have not taught me the "correct" way to vent my anger (...or I would be beating people up instead of sluffing off the things people do to constantly annoy me... :D), etc.

JigPu

I have to agree with you on this, games actually mass media are acting as triggers to violent incidents. In fact for kids this age they should be looking in to stress factors. I'm 17 and I know how stressful life can be, especially when mixed with teen hormones. I think why these incidents are happening more often now is because at school you can't just fight(nothing big just 2 guys slugging it out), but cause of zero tolerance and easy access to guns. People just can't vent anymore. So those ppl turn to games and when they do went the doctors will say he has been playing too many games. Instead they should look at it like this: If he didn't play video games he would have done it earlier.

[Malpine Walis]

Yah, I agree with most of what has been said already. It takes a person who has that violent streak in them to go over the edge. Most of us will not go that route. I used to work with someone who had previously been a postal worker and he pretty much confirmed that the USPS is hell to work for. Yet “going postal” is not an every day occurrence. If you are up for an interesting read, get Mind Hunter, the autobiography of John E. Douglas (the inventor of criminal profiling).

However, there is another dynamic at work in this type of case. The parents were complicit in allowing their son to get that hooked on video games in the first place. But when the bad consequences manifest, they turn to everyone around them to find who to blame.

In the 80's it was heavy metal music that was to blame. After all, everyone somehow knew that they were a virtual minefield of backwards messages. Of course that did not pan out so the focus shifted to the international Satanic conspiracy. The only problem being that there is no international Satanic conspiracy. More recently, we saw violent movies as the cause of the moment. Pick a movie and actually connect it to anything more than one or two guys going over the deep end and you might have the beginning of a persuasive case.

Today, everyone somehow knows that video games are the real reason why there are people who sometimes go over the edge. Well it is probably true that the two nut jobs who went on a shooting spree last summer after playing GTA probably should not have had access to that particular game. But the fact is that they were nut jobs long before they ever played the game. Who do you suppose made them that way?

[Yuriman]

What most people dont like to admit is that a large sum of the population is just crazy. If you dont play violent games, your sword fighting with friends, driving recklessly fast, or doing something else thats stupid(games arent). Violence is human nature, and video games have just changed the type of violence, not the amount of it. I mean, heck, count how many video game killings compared to the amount of reckless driving and street fighting killings, and it makes games seem like a godsend.

[Malpine Walis]

Good point Yuriman. One of my favorite authours has a great quote:

Robert Anson Heinlien:

Man is a wild animal.



Rembering that simplifies quite a bit of everyday life.

[gulp35]

Games are part of the reason why, But who governs how much the games are played?

The Parents.

It seems nowadays that less and less parents want to actually have to take care of thier kid. (See ESRB Ratings, if parents payed attention they wouldn't need these) and they don't want to take responciibility for their stupidity/actions (see "I got fat because of McD"lawsuits and "I got burned by HOT COFFEE, pay me money" lawsuits)

[ThePerfectCore]

It's a four paragraph (two sentences per paragraph) article. The only reason it's in print is because it involves OMG video games and OMG violent kids.

[DarkJediSleikas]

Correlation does not prove causation.

We see violent kids playing violent video games and assume that the video games must have caused the kid to be violent. But why can't it be the other way around? Isn't it possible that violent kids like to play violent video games? I'm not saying that ALL kids who play violent video games are violent kids. But, I do think that its realistic to say that violent kids tend to play more violent games.

[fletch]

It's all up to the kid. Games cause kids to be violent/stupid just as much as candy causes them to be fat. Yeah, if you are moronic enough to not tell the difference between games and reality, it can mess you up, but that is the person's fault for being an idiot, not the game manufacturer's.