Columnist Calls Videogames "Close To Evil"

[ErinHoffman]

Geoff, I appreciate the compliments (truly), but any letter with the ideas is better than none. It's time to get eloquent! FOR THE CHILDREN!! You have muckraker as your rank -- rake some muck!

We'll see what comes of the letter and what kind of response I get, if any. I can always escalate the situation. Never been any good at keeping my mouth shut.

 

[Dectilon]

A priest speaking in absolutes? Surely not! This debate is the same as the piracy debate: there are only two sides offered, and neither side is right. The situation COULD be resolved and there could be mutual understanding (with the knowledgable gamers/makers doing most of the explaining), but I think we all know that won't happen.

Just as television destroyed the previous generation (apparently) so gaming is destroying the current. Before that it was music, or perhaps light novels. There's no way to win but to tough it out.

 

[oneplus999]

So what about the opposite approach?

Many people have an inclination to become addicted to various things. Its nothing special about videogames. So why not let our children learn to conquer addiction at an early age (thank you Starcraft) so that it is easier to beat later in life (take that WoW!)? Otherwise you end up with a bunch of college students who grew up in a bubble and now go nuts with videogames and maybe other addictions? If he had played pong as a youth, he maybe would have suffered in middle school and then had no problems at the college level. Its like how people who grew up with pets won't be as likely to have allergies. Get them vaccinated!

 

[Ian Dorsch]

That's an excellent letter Erin, good for you.

Since I like to play devil's advocate, though, let me just throw this one out there: like many of you, games are probably my number one hobby. I work part-time in the industry and I am as passionate a defender of the medium as anyone out there. However, while I may not agree with the black-and-white rhetoric of Fr. de Souza's article, the padre has a point.

My freshman year of college was very nearly sucked whole into the vortex that was Doom and text-based MUDs. Those are somewhat more sophisticated games than Tetris, but my overall experience was similar to that of Fr. de Souza. Naturally, I don't blame games for my terrible academic performance that year, I blame myself for my lack of maturity and poor impulse control. Still, the fact remains: over the years, I've lost more productivity to games than any other single factor.

As has been suggested in this thread, if not games, would it have been some other obsession? Possibly. Any hobby can take that left turn into obsession under the proper circumstances, but I think most of us would agree that gaming is more prone to that sort of derailment than most other "respectable" pastimes. I think that if we can avoid couching it in the sort of good-vs-evil loaded language that is used in the article, this could be a useful topic of discussion to have with parents who may be non-gamers.

 

[Ros Lai]

Ye a world without video games would be a world without fun or anything fun. That is like telling microsoft to stop selling 360 and sell barbie dolls.
i mean comeon if they just tried to play a game once maybe they would enjoy it.

Barbies boarderline closer to pornography then video games do. The most pornographic I've seen a game was Mass Effect (I haven't seen those hot coffee GTA ones) and it was more artistic like a movie sex scene then porn.

Regardless of all the crap that journalist was spewing, I'm pretty sure we can agree that pornographic tetris would be the greatest contribution to society since the Commodore 64.

 

[Dectilon]

Ye a world without video games would be a world without fun or anything fun. That is like telling microsoft to stop selling 360 and sell barbie dolls.
i mean comeon if they just tried to play a game once maybe they would enjoy it.

Barbies boarderline closer to pornography then video games do. The most pornographic I've seen a game was Mass Effect (I haven't seen those hot coffee GTA ones) and it was more artistic like a movie sex scene then porn.

Regardless of all the crap that journalist was spewing, I'm pretty sure we can agree that pornographic tetris would be the greatest contribution to society since the Commodore 64.

I'd be surprised if the internet hasn't spawned half a million of those yet ^^

 

[PurpleRain]

Ye a world without video games would be a world without fun or anything fun. That is like telling microsoft to stop selling 360 and sell barbie dolls.
i mean comeon if they just tried to play a game once maybe they would enjoy it.

Barbies boarderline closer to pornography then video games do. The most pornographic I've seen a game was Mass Effect (I haven't seen those hot coffee GTA ones) and it was more artistic like a movie sex scene then porn.

Regardless of all the crap that journalist was spewing, I'm pretty sure we can agree that pornographic tetris would be the greatest contribution to society since the Commodore 64.

I'd be surprised if the internet hasn't spawned half a million of those yet ^^

Meh, tetris bores me. How about Strip-Bioshock or Strip-HalfLife instead. Now that I could enjoy.

 

[Nordstrom]

My daughter is addicted to reading books and I'm starting to get concerned. When she's reading, she completely zones out and I can barely get her attention. It's like she's in another world. It's not until I put my hand in the way of the book that I can get her attention. It's a compulsion that lasts all day. She gets upset when she has to stop. If I leave her alone for even a minute, the next thing I know she's reading again. I'm concerned that she's losing touch with reality because she spends so little time in the real world.

 

[lophat]

Where to start? Well, how about the fact that organized religion is responsible for more nasty stuff in the world than I care to list here. Let's just say from the Inquisition to the Boston Archdiocese, these guys credibility to call other folks evil is pretty much zero. Then there is the other fact that this fellow's whole article is based on his own addictive personality - ie. he couldn't trust himself not to play Tetris. Love it when somebody with that kind of credibility wants to give me advice.

 

[twilight_dweller]

Hey, hey hey! You are all jumping the gun here! This is all obviously some form of creative satire. Like Jack Thompson's comedy act! Or Fred Phelps. Well done! Very, very well done indeed!

 

[PurpleRain]

My daughter is addicted to reading books and I'm starting to get concerned. When she's reading, she completely zones out and I can barely get her attention. It's like she's in another world. It's not until I put my hand in the way of the book that I can get her attention. It's a compulsion that lasts all day. She gets upset when she has to stop. If I leave her alone for even a minute, the next thing I know she's reading again. I'm concerned that she's losing touch with reality because she spends so little time in the real world.

So. She's reading, she learning. There's nothing wrong with her escaping into a book.

 

[Arbre]

@Arbre: S.A.P.S? Qu'est-ce que c'est? Vas ist das?

Society Against Playstation [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIyEqpYnEaU]

^_^

Makes the content just all the more sweet.

 

[Nordstrom]

My daughter is addicted to reading books and I'm starting to get concerned. When she's reading, she completely zones out and I can barely get her attention. It's like she's in another world. It's not until I put my hand in the way of the book that I can get her attention. It's a compulsion that lasts all day. She gets upset when she has to stop. If I leave her alone for even a minute, the next thing I know she's reading again. I'm concerned that she's losing touch with reality because she spends so little time in the real world.

So. She's reading, she learning. There's nothing wrong with her escaping into a book.

All I'm saying is that video games aren't the only "addicting" activity out there. There are well accepted activities, such as reading books, that aren't frowned upon. How many hours are wasted reading books that could be used for something productive?

EDIT:
Now that I've read the article, I see that it's an opinion piece, so no one is obligated to take him seriously. His biggest complaint is that video games are a waste of time. He doesn't say that video games rot the brain or turn people into criminals. He even distributed a donated Xbox to family in need. He was reluctant about it but he did it. While his language is hyperbolic, the actual content of his complaint is mundane.

 

[hickwarrior]

Well, maybe it's an opinion piece, but i do see something that he stated more as fact in this article.

"This Christmas, do the poor kids of all economic levels a favor: Don't buy them videogames."

Hmm, i might be wrong then.

Anyway, he's on of those misinformed idiots that want free votes(or something). So, nothing new i guess.

 

[Dectilon]

Sure, but there are tons of people who cannot really distinguish (or rather not distinguish) between opinion and truth. If there wasn't there'd be no need for the Colbert Report : )

 

[Nordstrom]

I think that the content in Erin's letter would make a good opinion piece for a mainstream paper like the National Post. I don't know how someone would go about it, but I bet that there is a decent shot at getting something like that published.

 

[Easykill]

My daughter is addicted to reading books and I'm starting to get concerned. When she's reading, she completely zones out and I can barely get her attention. It's like she's in another world. It's not until I put my hand in the way of the book that I can get her attention. It's a compulsion that lasts all day. She gets upset when she has to stop. If I leave her alone for even a minute, the next thing I know she's reading again. I'm concerned that she's losing touch with reality because she spends so little time in the real world.

So. She's reading, she learning. There's nothing wrong with her escaping into a book.

I disagree. Unless she's reading nonfiction she probably isn?t going to learn much from reading like that. I myself used to be obsessed with reading and I would say I only learned something every couple books, and then it would be something trivial, like what Ockham's razor is. Fiction isn?t really any better than videogames once you?re good at reading, its just habit from when we weren?t good at reading and our parents were encouraging us to read that tells us there is nothing wrong with it. Anything is excess is bad.

 

[broadband]

i think theuseof the word evil makes this more a opinion than... a notice or something like that, maybe if he would just have said adictive and that would be more... passable or somehing

 

[Nordstrom]

My daughter is addicted to reading books and I'm starting to get concerned. When she's reading, she completely zones out and I can barely get her attention. It's like she's in another world. It's not until I put my hand in the way of the book that I can get her attention. It's a compulsion that lasts all day. She gets upset when she has to stop. If I leave her alone for even a minute, the next thing I know she's reading again. I'm concerned that she's losing touch with reality because she spends so little time in the real world.

So. She's reading, she learning. There's nothing wrong with her escaping into a book.

I disagree. Unless she's reading nonfiction she probably isn?t going to learn much from reading like that.

For what it's worth, I'm not really concerned and I'm exaggerating a little. I just find it interesting to see some of the same behaviors between reading and gaming. It's not hard to imagine a kid so addicted to reading that it socially harms their development. Despite the similarities between the two activities, I've never heard of a parent being concerned about their child reading too much.