U.S. Senator Seeks New Study of Violent Videogames

[Scars Unseen]

Sweet, I'd apply for that money! We already know the answer is "no", so free money!

No, we already know the answer is yes.
There are hundreds of studies that show that violent media of all kinds has significant effect on developing minds and not a single one that shows no effect.

Quite frankly, any good parent knows it too, as that's the whole point of childhood, taking in things you experiences and being affected by them. What the hell would the point of being a child be if you weren't affected by things?

A lot of gamers are very quick to dismiss this studies out of hand (and, for some reason, the simple concept of being a child) but, last time I checked, that doesn't make the studies untrue.

Nor does it make this any of the government's business. I believe the phrase is "it takes a village," not "it takes an uncaring pack of federally funded, pandering idiots." Federal government should stick to the federal level of governing and stay the fuck out of people's homes.

 

[Smolderin]

Stuff like this really gets me angry, I am very passionate about my hobby and I automatically become defensive against anything that looks to somehow interfere with what I love. But then I take a deep breath, slowly and rationally realize that something like this will have no effect on what I enjoy doing, and even if someone tries to put limitations or something like that on video games themselves, then the game industries billions of dollars will most likely have something to say about that.

So ya, nothing to see here people, move along....just another ignorant old fool who doesn't know what he is talking about it.

 

[Maze1125]

Federal government should stick to the federal level of governing and stay the fuck out of people's homes.

But how far are you willing to take that principle?

If a father is raping his daughter every night, should legislation stay out of that?
If parents are too self absorbed to feed their children, should legislation stay out of that?
If parents are too self absorbed to notice that their children are playing games harmful to their mental health, should legislation stay out of that?

Well, you've already answered the last one, and I'm going to assume you're fine with the government intervening in the case of the first two.
So what makes the difference? Is it that you like games and so are automatically more lenient to their effects? Or is because you consider mental health to be less important than physical health?

 

[Entitled]

Nor does it make this any of the government's business. I believe the phrase is "it takes a village," not "it takes an uncaring pack of federally funded, pandering idiots." Federal government should stick to the federal level of governing and stay the fuck out of people's homes.

If we know that smoking is unhealthy, then government might "stay the fuck out of people's homes", but at least they are expected to control advertisements that would glorify smoking, or selling cigarettes to children in shops.

It's the same with video games. IF there is reasonable proof that violent video games increase agression in children, that can be a pretty good reason to stop advertising violent games on mainstream TV, or limiting where they can be sold.

 

[senobit]

Talk about ignoring the elephant in the room, mental health issues, violet games, assault weapons - all of it is just incidental as long as any guns are easy to obtain. Take the guns away and these nutters will not have the ability go on these shooting sprees.

But it will never happen, politicians will spew rhetoric and look for scapegoats, the idiotic question of "how could this happen?" will be asked and in few months or years it will happen again and another group of parents get to bury their children.

 

[Entitled]

Talk about ignoring the elephant in the room, mental health issues, violet games, assault weapons - all of it is just incidental as long as any guns are easy to obtain. Take the guns away and these nutters will not have the ability go on these shooting sprees.

Reacting to this with gun legislation is no different than what he really wants to do.

Gun bans work. Scapegoating videogames doesn't.

A gunman without videogames still shoots people.
A gamer without guns doesn't.
A deranged lunatic without guns doesn't either.

Gun bans can only happen when the people see that they are necessary. There is a reason why the US has 10.000 gun-related deaths EVERY YEAR, as much as a third world country has during a civil war.

And it's not that some occasional "deranged lunatic" got a gun and shot two dozen kids, but that HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF AVERAGE AMERICANS, are perfectly fine with the idea of everyone owning guns, so every year, several thousands of petty thieves, jealous lovers, angsty teenagers, and overexcited neighbours end up shooting each other, where in a sane country, they wouldn't.

America as a country is OBSESSED with guns. They are actively looking for excuses so they don't have to give up their wonderful murder-tools. And that's a problem that can only be solved with direct cultural redoctrination of a next generation, by stopping the glorification of gun violance, and by not giving the next generation of children action movies and shooter games.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Federal government should stick to the federal level of governing and stay the fuck out of people's homes.

But how far are you willing to take that principle?
If a father is raping his daughter every night, should legislation stay out of that?
If parents are too self absorbed to feed their children, should legislation stay out of that?
If parents are too self absorbed to notice that their children are playing games harmful to their mental health, should legislation stay out of that?

Well, you've already answered the last one, and I'm going to assume you're fine with the government intervening in the case of the first two.
So what makes the difference? Is it that you like games and so are automatically more lenient to their effects? Or is because you consider mental health to be less important than physical health?

Yes to all on the federal level. In the first two cases you mentioned, it would be the state that prosecutes, not the federal justice system. Not to mention that first one you listed is irrelevant because rape is already a crime without adding "in your own home" to the sentence. The last one is also bullshit because that isn't a crime any more than letting your kid watch a scary movie or read a book about Apartheid is.

There is a difference between bad parenting and mental abuse. If bad parenting was a crime we would need to triple the number of prisons and orphanages in the US(and that's a conservative estimate).

 

[Maze1125]

Talk about ignoring the elephant in the room, mental health issues, violet games, assault weapons - all of it is just incidental as long as any guns are easy to obtain. Take the guns away and these nutters will not have the ability go on these shooting sprees.

The mental health issues aren't incidental. It's tragic how little compassion much of the American system has for such cases.

What I find odd is how many people are trying to make out that's is a dichotomy "It's not guns, it the mental health problems!" "It's not the mental health problems, it's the guns!"

No, it's both, America has fucked up completely on both issues for far too long, and if you want to make any real headway you have to fix both of them.

 

[Aeonknight]

Sweet, I'd apply for that money! We already know the answer is "no", so free money!

No, we already know the answer is yes.
There are hundreds of studies that show that violent media of all kinds has significant effect on developing minds and not a single one that shows no effect.

Quite frankly, any good parent knows it too, as that's the whole point of childhood, taking in things you experiences and being affected by them. What the hell would the point of being a child be if you weren't affected by things?

A lot of gamers are very quick to dismiss this studies out of hand (and, for some reason, the simple concept of being a child) but, last time I checked, that doesn't make the studies untrue.

Any parent who is willing to let their 360 babysit/raise their child has bigger problems than violent video games. You can put them in front of Hello Kitty Island Adventure and it still won't make up for the lack of attention/guidance from the parent's absence that causes them to lash out like this.

Or the bigger issue here: You can STOP trying to find a scapegoat everytime there's a shooting/bombing/whatever, and just blame the individual for once.

This man was not a child. the evil Mass Effect 3 vidja games didn't warp his mind from childhood, so any findings from any study are moot in the context of the reason behind conducting the study in the first place.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Nor does it make this any of the government's business. I believe the phrase is "it takes a village," not "it takes an uncaring pack of federally funded, pandering idiots." Federal government should stick to the federal level of governing and stay the fuck out of people's homes.

If we know that smoking is unhealthy, then government might "stay the fuck out of people's homes", but at least they are expected to control advertisements that would glorify smoking, or selling cigarettes to children in shops.

It's the same with video games. IF there is reasonable proof that violent video games increase agression in children, that can be a pretty good reason to stop advertising violent games on mainstream TV, or limiting where they can be sold.

Point of contention: there is no amendment of the US constitution guaranteeing your right to use drugs. There is an amendment guaranteeing your right to free speech(it's pretty early in the list). The federal government's own framework forbids it to create any restricting legislation in this matter(and as we saw earlier in the year, prevents the states from doing anything about it as well).

 

[Maze1125]

Or the bigger issue here: You can STOP trying to find a scapegoat everytime there's a shooting/bombing/whatever, and just blame the individual for once.

That's rather a narrow view.
Yes, blame the individual, but that doesn't mean that people shouldn't also be trying to find the events that occurred in his life that caused him to become that individual and so help prevent other people from becoming individuals like him in the first place.

 

[iblis666]

maybe instead of wasting money and time on scape goats they could maybe study the effects of a crappy almost non existent healthcare system with a focus on mental health and how that effects children

 

[the doom cannon]

I like how the 1 sentence at the end turned this into a firearms debate. All you anti gun people are just afraid of them. Anyway, I'm not sure why yet ANOTHER piece of legislation is going forward about videogames causing violence...

 

[littlewisp]

Or, you know, we could also criticize the media for sensationalizing massacres and bloodshed and giving crazy people a platform upon which to go out in a blaze of glory.

Yes, let's have studies done. But let's do it because we're being objective and are open to the results of effects of video games across the spectrum. Argghgh.

Knee jerk reactions are killing me.

 

[Entitled]

Point of contention: there is no amendment of the US constitution guaranteeing your right to use drugs. There is an amendment guaranteeing your right to free speech(it's pretty early in the list). The federal government's own framework forbids it to create any restricting legislation in this matter(and as we saw earlier in the year, prevents the states from doing anything about it as well).

Rights are contradicting each other all the time, neither of them are absolute. Your right to life and freedom can be limited if you violate laws, your right to bear arms can be limited from certain types of arms, Your right to free seech can be limited by copyright laws, slander laws, hate speech laws, etc.

To look at only one Right as if it would be absolute, always leads to extremism. If you want to say that a publisher's right to sell copies of a game to children under any condition, originates from "free speech", that's so indirect, that you could as well explain that you have an inherent right to own any drugs as your property, or otherwise your "right to property" is violated.

 

[Entitled]

Or, you know, we could also criticize the media for sensationalizing massacres and bloodshed

I'm pretty sure that's what he just did.

Oh, wait, no, he criticized the wrong kind of media, that we like!

 

[littlewisp]

Or, you know, we could also criticize the media for sensationalizing massacres and bloodshed

I'm pretty sure that's what he just did.

Oh, wait, no, he criticized the wrong kind of media, that we like!

I did like the line about if the effect of violent games is similar to that of violent media. I even like the idea of having studies done, so long as they are properly controlled and don't try to skew their findings one way or another (and yeah, I question more studies than just ones done on violent video games. There's a lot of bad research out there). What I don't like is playing ball solely because you're trying to garner more support. What he's doing now? Yeah, that's a pop political move.

I didn't go to the actual source, so if he did go into how news programs go out of their way to turn shooters into tragic heroes, then I do owe the man an apology. My original post was vague though. . .I did mean news programs.

To me the order goes like this:

parenting > advertising > news > fictional violent media that encourages children to act like little punks > fictional violent media with a greater purpose in mind

So cherry picking one thing over the other thing (my mom is a sixth grade teacher and tv shows her kids are allowed to watch frustrate her as much as the games they're allowed to play), attacking something just because it's in a spot of convenience to make you look good. . .yeah, it pisses me off. And yeah, from the very specific quotes I'm not giving the guy a chance, but I'm not objective right now so I'm not going to try.

 

[Gilhelmi]

First legislation to be proposed. This man gets zero points from me. ZERO. YOU FAIL. No matter how eloquently he managed to put it, he still proposed THIS first instead of anything related to guns.

Reacting to this with gun legislation is no different than what he really wants to do. Limit liberty by putting up unneeded safeguards. Just like after 9-11 with airport security. We learn to live with less liberty for an illusion of more security. Reactionary politics are wrong no matter your political beliefs.

Amen

Also, who is talking about limiting video game YET. He is just proposing a study, The study will be denounce by the Pro-Game side if it shows a link. It will also be denounced by the "anti-game" side if it does not show a link. I feel bad for those researchers.

I don't. They'll be getting paid good money to rehash the same tired arguments that have been made time and again, ultimately taking the side of whoever is holding the purse strings. I guess it might suck if they wanted to do anything significant with their education, but I'm guessing most of these guys already have PRO and ANTI templates ready to go so that they can have more time to play Minecraft or beer pong or whatever it is that researchers do when the government asks them to research bullshit and spit out politically convenient responses.

It is not complete BS, There is some evidence from real world events. Sadly, I cannot link books (also, I doubt that you want to read the whole book).

All research needs to be funded (scientist got to eat). So there really is no way to get an "unbiased" study done, ever. I use quotes because I honestly believe that a lot of evidence is dismissed without actually getting into "How" the research.

Power went out. I will try to be on later to finish the discussion.

 

[McMullen]

What does he think this one will find? Those court decisions are based partly on the fact that no conclusive links have been found by previous studies.

But of course, parents know best I suppose.

 

[Lawyer105]

First legislation to be proposed. This man gets zero points from me. ZERO. YOU FAIL. No matter how eloquently he managed to put it, he still proposed THIS first instead of anything related to guns.

Or anything related to mental health. When you come down to it, guns make it easier, and make the carnage worst, but gun control wouldn't really prevent attacks. They need to work on mental health system and on giving the sensationalist media a sharp kick in the balls.