How can gaming reclaim lost ground in the culture war?

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

EDIT:
I am not the OP of this thread, there was a bug and a response of mine to a completely different thread was glitched into the OP slot.

@CaptJohnSheridan If you PM me what the original post was about I'll post it to keep the thread going.

 

[CaptJohnSheridan]

They pledged to never play them again! How many of these children will still hold on to that pledge when they get older?

https://wsvn.com/news/local/cushman-school-students-throw-out-video-games-for-campaign-against-virtual-violence/

I think if the female students found out there were video games about female space marines they would be empowered!

How can the gaming community fight stuff like this?

 

[Xprimentyl]

It?s silly. Any mind impressed to action by fantasy of any stripe cannot fault the media it ingests; the issue is with the mind. For every rogue shooter they discover played videogames, I can give you a MILLION examples of those who played the same games without issue, least of all turning to violence or elsewise losing sight of that broad, bold line between fantasy and reality.

How do we regain ground? We don?t have to. The ?pundits? and talking heads that like to sensationalize, demonize, and draw unfounded parallels and conclusions about gaming every time they want try and rationalize heinous acts of MENTALLY UNSTABLE PEOPLE need to simply stop and/or be called out on their bullshit. I?m sorry, but their logic simply doesn?t follow the scientific method, falling apart quite soundly at right about the ?Research? phase, skipping everything between it and the ?Draw Conclusions? phase, and ignores the fact that their conclusion is an example, by far and away, of the exception and will not stand up to even the slightest, genuine scrutiny. If I created a medicine that cured cancer in 1 out of every 10,000,000 people, I have NOT cured cancer, but I have identified ONE person worth studying beyond the drug?s implications to identify what makes them exceptional, not what makes my drug ?so awesome.?

 

[CaitSeith]

Shouldn't this thread be in the Gaming Industry Discussion? That's the usual place for sensationalist threads.

OT:

Students at a South Florida school are giving up specific video games to show they?re against virtual violence in the wake of the recent Parkland school shooting.

How about something like a "Throwing out guns" campaign. At least getting rid of them from households would reduce the risk of them being fired at schools.

Another student said his parents forbid him from playing these kinds of games. "I'm not even allowed to play gun games," he said. "My parents won?t let me, so all I play are sports games."

Of course! Parkland school shooting was done with gun games, and no real guns, right?

Students said they want to do good and grow up to make an impact. "We can be the generation to bring about change like to stop violence, to not let this happen again," Palmer said.

Yeah. It isn't like anyone had the same revolutionary idea of getting rid of violent games (specially in the 90s). Hey! While we are at it, let's get rid of satanic games too!

"It?s unbelievable that the amount of violence we have nowadays in our schools," said parent Pia Petrelli, "and I don't think that prayers are going to solve none of this."

And neither throwing innocuous games away in a moral panic attack, genius!

 

[Avnger]

Shouldn't this thread be in the Gaming Industry Discussion? That's the usual place for sensationalist threads.

GID doesn't get enough attention nowadays. How can he spread the righteous outrage against the dreaded SJW menace if no one notices his post?

I'm confused. Did I miss something happening? I haven't noticed anything weird with the site recently. I never log out and am not in the fancy-pants club though. Maybe that makes a difference?

I think some people got a 502 bad gateway error or page not found or something and thought it was Y2K all over again. It was probably the new owners updating code or something.

I have now encountered the website's shenanigans. Your post is apparently the OP of this thread.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I have now encountered the website's shenanigans. Your post is apparently the OP of this thread.

What the hell?! Mods, I didn't make this thread, comments got copied over from a completely different thread.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

 

[Wintermute_v1legacy]

Jack Thompson was right all along. I knew it.

 

[Xprimentyl]

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

A genuinely interesting question. I'm going to sober up and respond with my thoughts tomorrow, but that is a very interesting question to ponder...

 

[Mcgeezaks]

Jack Thompson was right all along. I knew it.

Spoiler

Skip to 02:55

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

How can the gaming community fight stuff like this?

Honestly?

By not making it a huge battle.

We don't need to go full Buckley on everything, dudes, dudettes, and du's of other persuasions. Let them have their anxiety attack and these kids'll be back on GTA in a couple years.

 

[Spade Lead]

They pledged to never play them again! How many of these children will still hold on to that pledge when they get older?

https://wsvn.com/news/local/cushman-school-students-throw-out-video-games-for-campaign-against-virtual-violence/

I think if the female students found out there were video games about female space marines they would be empowered!

How can the gaming community fight stuff like this?

Literally all this means is that those kids consider themselves likely to be the next school shooter, so they are throwing away the expensive stuff someone else more than likely bought for them in protest of their own possible behavior, hoping to prevent that bad behavior, rather than just taking responsibility...

I just mocked them on Facebook and moved on

 

[EternallyBored]

How can the gaming community fight stuff like this?

Honestly?

By not making it a huge battle.

We don't need to go full Buckley on everything, dudes, dudettes, and du's of other persuasions. Let them have their anxiety attack and these kids'll be back on GTA in a couple years.

Pretty much this, I've been around this kind of thing in gaming for decades, and shit like this crops up all the time, parents groups, small school groups, etc. This story happened in March, it hasn't grown into some national movement, its a single school that seems to have pushed a bunch of kids into this stunt, it's not worth anyone outside the local community doing anything other than commenting and moving on.

I'd bet money the majority of the kids within the school don't give two shits this this long after it happened, the school hasn't pushed it on to the national stage or the government or anything like that.

There's nothing to fight back against right now, at this point it would just give their actions more attention, especially this long after the event with no seeming expansion or follow up. Hell, even the Presidential conference on games violence that took place after Parkland is much more effectively opposed through direct interaction by a small number of individuals that can engage and appeal to those in government directly.

Or like Spade Lead said, just call it stupid on Facebook and move on, that's really all the attention something like this deserves at this point.

 

[Zykon TheLich_v1legacy]

I'd bet money the majority of the kids within the school don't give two shits this this long after it happened, the school hasn't pushed it on to the national stage or the government or anything like that.

Pretty much this. You remember being told not to drink or smoke and do drugs when you were a kid? And how earnestly everyone in the class said they were never going to smoke etc and then as soon as puberty hits, bang, half the class is on speedballs (I exaggerate somewhat), and those are things that do have very provable downsides.

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

I think you might want to look at violence and it's place in society as a whole to answer that one. I'd say violent games are a small part of the overall picture. People doesn't like to discuss it, or at least don't like the answers they find when they think about it for minute, so jump for a convenient scapegoat.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

People want to wage a culture war on violent games?

That seems ill-advised, considering how gaming has trained every last one of us has into perfect killing machines who might just go on a massive murderspree at the drop of a hat.

Suppose we get to so pissed we rise up and stage a coup? We'd be basically unstoppable.

 

[McElroy]

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

The age old question. Some of it is definitely in the primeval predisposition in the hunter parts of the human (and especially male) genome. Maybe the rest is just marketing. Violence is an attractive form of fantasy competition as in the virtual world you can make it nice and clean to look at, by and large inconsequential, and program rules that are fair to everyone. Thus the playing field is leveled neatly, and the game is effectively detached from real world violence.

 

[Kerg3927]

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

The age old question. Some of it is definitely in the primeval predisposition in the hunter parts of the human (an especially male) genome. Maybe the rest is just marketing. Violence is an attractive form of fantasy competition as in the virtual world you can make it nice and clean to look at, by and large inconsequential, and program rules that are fair to everyone. Thus the playing field is leveled neatly, and the game is effectively detached from real world violence.

I think we're intrinsically violent, particularly males. We're designed to hunt and kill, and fight off people from other tribes trying to steal our women and food, and to invade other tribes and try to steal their women and food. Our culture has become more refined and civilized, but our hardware and wiring has not changed much if at all. Just like the gladiator games in Rome, I think violent video games and watching violent sports like American football and MMA provide a benign outlet for our violent nature, and if so, that's probably a good thing. It's better than people acting out real violence.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Is this really about "gaming" or is it about violent gaming? Violence does not only occur when someone shoots up a school - there is violence in words, actions and thoughts. So you can't dismiss violent games as inert by saying that only 1 in a million GTA players shoots up a school.

Gamers do not like to discuss it, but why are violent games so popular, especially to kids? No, really - I'm asking. Because it's clear to me that they're far more popular than non-violent games. We need an answer if we're going to discuss the matter seriously.

Well, your 2nd question seems to imply already that violent games are the effect, rather than a cause.

And i don't really know about violent games being far more popular now. The average age of "a gamer" have risen in the span of last decades. Aren't games like Nintendo titles, Minecraft and whole lot of mobile game crap the hot stuff that kids play nowadays?(Excuse me if i sound like an old fart here)

And yes, while Minecraft does contain violence, its not really comparable to, say, Doom, or GTA, which are go-to examples, whenever a discussion about violence in games pops up.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Please.... I remember when Protestants called us Satanists for playing D&D.

"Culture War" this is not. It's a reaction to violence by looking at consumption of violent products. And it's an old debate that goes back before videogames.

 

[Majestic Manatee_v1legacy]

You could always stop trying to present insignificant trivial shit as a call for "war" and see how quickly the "war" dissipates into "teenage melodrama."