U.S. Senator Seeks New Study of Violent Videogames

[Xanex]

I think we all know what "findings" this study will produce.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cONmzaT4x10

 

[funnydude6556]

First off there's been tons of Studies into the effects of violent video games on people all by people biased against the gaming industries that still came back proving the link between Video games and violence is not greater or less then that of films and other media.

"Recent court decisions demonstrate that some people still do not get it. They believe that violent videogames are no more dangerous to young minds than classic literature or Saturday morning cartoons," If he referencing the decision to give Video Games the same First amendment rights as other media then actually I'd say he spits right in the face of everything the founders of America stood for by thinking he has the right to pick and choice what mediums deserve the right to freedom of speech and then there's this comment he made on Video Games

"Major corporations, including the video game industry, make billions on marketing and selling violent content to children. They have a responsibility to protect our children. If they do not, you can count on the Congress to take a more aggressive role"

1)What has me worried is what exactly Senator Rockefeller means when he says "A More Aggressive Role". So pulling out the government issued ban-hammer? A greater tax on American games designers? Good luck for the future America, I don't think a lot of games companies will want to do business in the US if Senator Rockefeller gets he's own way. Seriously I really can not wait for the next medium to come along so people will leave the games industry alone. I swear I really don't get what is so how for non-gamers to understand about adults playing video games.

2) Games companies don't have a responsibility to anyone's children.
No, those 18 rated games were made for kids because no adult in their right mind plays video games. This includes movie, music and TV Companies. Nobody but the parent is responsible for what their children do.

3) I noticed the good senator only made a point of mentioning games companies. Makes me think this is centered exclusively around Video Games with other mediums making cameos so Rockefeller doesn't look biased.

I am all for looking into the games industry and analyzing it but this isn't analysis, it's scapegoating and the American Government shouldn't allow it. Also are we forgetting the part where the US Government was about to look into Gun Control?! Maybe someone should check if Senator Rockefeller here has links to anyone suspicious. Say gun manufacturers and the NRA? I mean your right Rockefeller let's look into the effects violent video games have on people and not question the guys selling guns to people. I mean that's clearly the right move after someone guns down a bunch of schoolkids right? Games are to blame here not guns like the one the killer used to gun down the schoolkids!

 

[Gecko clown]

Do not blame games for attention seeking psychos, blame the media for giving them the attention they desperately want.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PezlFNTGWv4

 

[DioWallachia]

I woudnt trust a Rockefeller if i were all of you. He and Rupert Murdoch have interest against videogames and The Internet since those industries are taking away money from previously stablished ones.......and they wouldnt fucking have it.

 

[Erttheking]

I know I know, but this is really a debate meant for the R&R thread, that's kind of why it has its own section. This news is more about video games causing violence than anything else, so arguably, a gun control debate is derailing this.

Yeah, how dare a real, related issue be brought up to derail this topic!

Since we are on the topic, how do you feel about the fact that someone in government is demanding studies on video games, when they have effectively banned studies on firearms through defunding and no longer release the information that is still gathered? Do you feel that video games are such speshul snoflaykz that they deserve far more scrutiny (government funded) than do weapons?

And if a kid came to your school/your kid's school/whatever, which would you rather he be armed with? Mass Effect 3, or a Bushmaster?

Sorry 1 hurt is still 1 too many.

Yes, it is, but to say gun control is pointless simply because you can't stop all harm is ridiculous. Do you wear a seatbelt? Do you shower with a toaster? Do you eat healthy? Do you dress weather appropriate?

We take measures in this country, sometimes measures that protect fewer people, with less of a fuss.

To be honest, I have no idea. Is the National Acadamy of Sciences an impartial organization?

I don't know enough about them to judge, which is why I'm curious.

At the end of the day it doesn't matter. Even if it turns out to be the most in-depth, multi-disciplinary, scientifically rigorous study ever done, the crapsacks-in-chief will ignore it or 'interpret' it via Very Special Logic if it fails to conform to their preconceived biases.

It matters to me because I want to see a real study done. I know that "haters gonna hate," and that even if there's a negative correlation they will still bray on. But out of curiosity, I do want to see what merit there is to the claim, if any.

And really, that's one of the things that should drive science in the first place. Not the political dick-waving contests we see about so-called "controversial" issues.

Yeah...I think we're done here. Not much else to say. I really don't like talking with people when they don't even have the common courtesy to be polite while trying to make a point by replying to me.

Though if you REALLY want to know, while I am against banning guns all together because I think that there are just too many of them now in our system for it to do large amounts of good and it will be depriving more people of those that want to use it for self defense and not so much those that want to use them to cause harm because they won't be above acquiring guns illegally, I do believe that we need more strict gun control laws. What should they be? I don't know. I'm only a first year college student, I don't have the answers.

There.

 

[DrOswald]

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.

Limit liberty by putting up unneeded safeguards

30.000 people die every year in the US due to firearms, and its murder rate is comparable to that of the average third world warzone. Come again with that 'unneeded' bit?

30,000 people do not die due to firearms each year in the U.S. There are around 30,000 fire arm related deaths a year, but that is a very different thing. Most of those fire arm related deaths are suicide (about 17,000 of them) which would most likely have found some other way to get the job done. Only about 8,000-10,000 of those deaths are homicides. Plus, even if they were all homicides it is unlikely that simply removing guns would eliminate every gun related homicide. Around 1/2-2/3 of homicides are gun killings (depending on the year.) People can and do find other ways to kill one another. Zero access to fire arms would certainly reduce the number but it would not eliminate every incident.

You said that the murder rate of the united states is comparable to the average third world warzone. This is a ridiculous claim. The murder rate of the United States is 4.2. Much higher than China (1.0) the UK (1.2) or South Korea (2.6) But far lower than Russia (10.2) Mexico (16.9) or Brazil (21.0). The world wide homicide rate hovers somewhere between 6.9 and 7.6. The rate for the Americas is 15.6. Basically, The United States in the higher end for well developed countries, but well below third world status.

I do not disagree with you. More gun control is probably needed. But lying and misrepresenting the facts is foolish. If you lie intentionally it shows that your argument is so weak that you think the truth cannot support it. If you lie unintentionally it shows that the issue is unimportant because even the advocates of gun control don't bother knowing the facts.

When you misrepresent the problem you harm the cause you are trying to champion, especially when you make claims as ridiculous as this. Stop it.

 

[Lunar Templar]

well, nice to see this brought all the rm chair politicians out, again. yippy ....

@everyone bitching about guns in my country; Fix the people FIRST, then worry about the weapons. Just banning one type of weapon isn't going to stop some ass hole from STILL going out and hurting/killing large groups of people at a time, Or have none of you heard of Improvised Explosive Devices and other such home made murder tools one can make with bewildering ease.

Why cant you do both?

I whole hardily agree that removing the guns is a "Treating the symptom" kind of solution, but why cant we also treat the symptom.

Yeah the end goal to not have the crazies, but cant we also remove the crazies access to tools designed for killing (that is the difference between improvised weapons and designated weapons)?

See, I'm not 100% convinced there needs to be tighter gun laws, take this last shooting as example. The Terrorist stole the firearms that had been legal acquired by his mother. That's not really a failure on the laws part, it's more a failure on his mothers fault for providing access to the weapons. There's also the fact that a lot of these recent Terrorist attacks (yes, I'm calling these people Terrorists, that's what they are, they lost the right to complain about labels when they decided killing a large group of people was a good idea) wouldn't have popped any red flags anyway.

So while making it harder might stop one or two people, but if they never would have been barred from getting a gun to begin with whats the point? Your stil going to have high risk people out there who can get a gun.

Furthermore how come there is a "its the person who killed them not the gun!" but when someone used a gun to defend themselves it is "Its the gun that saved them!". I am sorry you cant have it both ways. If guns made the difference in the defense you cant deny they made a difference in the offense.

you know, I really have no idea on that one, but then, I don't really like guns so I rarely pay attention to stuff like that.

Hey, I live in the same country as you so don't get all high and mighty.

it's less me being 'high and mighty' and more 'it's not your county so you've really got no right to complain'.

As I've said before your purposefully ignoring the point that easy (keyword here: EASY) access to firearms makes the possibility of mass violence that much more likely. People who say 'oh well you can't stab someone' or 'oh well you can make a bomb' fail to realize that is actually very difficult to do and most of the psychotics who go on killing sprees lack the focus to do anything beyond shoot a bunch of people. Every attempted bombing in the US in the last few years has failed because the attempted bomber was apprehended or they screwed up the bomb and it didn't work. As for the other possible weapons it's a lot harder to kill someone with a knife than a high powered rifle or handgun - you actually have a more than 1% chance of succeeding in fighting back in that case. Also excuse the fuck out of us for discussing politics in the wake of bad shit happening, it's not like a democracy is supposed to be able to let the citizens get involved but maybe you're right: the people have about as much effect on legislation as someone using a teddy bear to stop a bulldozer.

for the 'easy access part, see the above.

on to the alternate weapons bit; If some one is set on hurting people, just taking weapons away isn't going to stop them, they will find away to hurt and kill people. "you can not disarm evil" as some one recently said. So yes, it may be easier to off some one with a high powered rifle then it was with a knife, but they will still try, just as they will likely still try to make that bomb to blow up a subway full of people

pretty sure a your anti-bulldozer teddy bear is more effective, but then i've completely lost faith in our government to actually DO anything to fix this country, they all seem pretty content to fuck over people like us while sucking off what ever special interest group/corporation that paid them off. There's a LOT of things that need fixing and gun control is not only one of many issues, most of which are more important in my mind, like the unemployment rates or health care.

 

[Wolf In A Bear Suit]

Baaaaaaa scapegoat. Well I don't see the harm in a study that will come up with nothing. I am of the opinion that ultra-violent games are bad for kids, but I fail to see the connection between that and the shootings. The fact is that this guy was not right in the head. No ammount of violent media will change that. But why am I posting this? you all know this.

 

[Negatempest]

Sports events SHOULD be banned since they HAVE caused fans to erupt in massive size mobs destroying neighborhoods....
Oh wait,..it makes money for the city...

 

[Jimmy T. Malice]

It's interesting how they never call out other forms of media. Many films and TV shows are even more violent than most video games, but nobody says "We must ban Saw XIV!".

 

[Gilhelmi]

Video Games will not make you into a murder, they take a person (predisposed to murder) and make them a MASS murder.

You do not deserve a civil response, but you'll get one because the forum rules dictate it must be so.

The treatment is simple. Stop raising your children in a dysfunctional society, which predisposes them towards committing murder, let alone MASS murder. But if you think banning violent video games is even remotely anywhere near the top of the long, long laundry list of changes that have to occur in order to make that happen, then I'm sorry to break this to you but in the grand scheme of things your personal problem with violent video games simply doesn't rate.

What saddens me most about this tragedy is that fact that while people are lining up round the block to exploit it in order to tell others what can and cannot be done, what is or what isn't permissible, if everyone, everyone for even second all together stopped pointing fingers at other people and instead asked themselves what they could do, what they could change about their own behavior, and if they applied and stuck with those changes, then perhaps we'd fill less coffins with kids.

NOT Ban, But Restrict. I do not want to lose some very good shooters, Heck even EVE online (a ship-to-ship shooter) could be considered violent. I am of the belief that we need to actually enforce the standards already in place, and tighten up some of the standards. I have seen two games, one rated M, one rated T. I could not tell you why one was worse (or better) then the other. We also need to allow legal enforcement of the M ratings.

I agree, this tragedy should not be exploited to create bad legislation. I do not want to see Mario rated T for violence against Goombas. But at the same time, we need to seriously consider the ramifications of how we play games, and what it says about us as people. I honestly have a hard time role-playing as an "evil" character because I feel empathy for the computer AI, it is strange, I know they are not real but I still feel bad for being a jerk to them.

A study might not be a bad thing.

I wish I could just link to the section of the book that talks about this. Sadly, it is not public domain.

 

[Gilhelmi]

snip

I can understand where your coming from, but your point doesn't hold up when you consider the fact that a controller cannot prepare you to handle an actual firearm. I've been playing shooters for years, but aside from the basics of gun safety, I wouldn't have a clue as to how to properly use a gun. Along with that, what your saying just seems like a generalization of human psychology. Yes, the military does train soldiers to form a mindset for combat, but it's never anything as simple as a "safety switch". Even a soldier who's seen combat will still hesitate. I agree with the notion that humans have a natural inclination to violence, but actual killing isn't something that comes easy to anyone.

In the same author's other book, "On Killing", He does talk more about the "Universal Human Phobia" or killing. In WW2 (and before) the firing rates were 15-20%, battlefield studies done later, show that the casualty rate was way to low for the weapons of the day. A study done on the (American) Civil War shows that, even with inaccurate powder rifles, the casualty rates were way to low. Soldier were aiming high or low. SMA Marshal actually estimated that only 2% of soldier during WW2 actively participated in the killing, while the other 13-18% were just "missing", most commanders of that era agreed. Have you ever read a Medal of Honor account and wondered "why was he the only one fighting where were his fellow soldiers?" It is because that MoH recipient was of the 2%. Another note, Dave Grossman (the author) suggested that this 2% is really 1% hero and 1% psychopath. He called them Sheepdogs (the Hero's who bring the other home), and the Wolfs (those who killed because they were having fun). An apt quote here,

"Out of every one hundred men, ten shouldn't even be there, eighty are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior, and he will bring the others back." - Heraclitus(?)

As for the book you linked to, I don't see the connection between real life violence and combat, and games with violent content. If a person is predisposed to murder as you propose, then chances are they were going to commit murder regardless of what media or entertainment they consume. From what I can glean from the summary for "On Combat", it's contents only relate to those prepared to go into actual combat. Then there are the difficulties of actually obtaining a weapon. A person with a predisposition towards violence of such a caliber that they would actively seek out to do harm to those around them would likely have a noted history of violence, meaning they'd never pass the background checks necessary so they could actually get their hands on a gun. Yes, a person can be violent without having a history of it, but if they were really set on "mass murder", it's doubtful they'd have the patience to go through the whole process, and just use a bladed weapon, which is much easier to obtain.

Bad thing about summaries is that they do not tell everything. The book is mainly geared towards Police and Soldiers, he only briefly touches upon the subject for one chapter. And now that I think about it more, It could have been his other book "On Killing".

http://www.amazon.com/On-Killing-Psychological-Learning-Society/dp/0316040932/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1356047205&sr=8-1&keywords=on+killing

Then there's everyone who's ever played a violent game. Again, most people just don't possess the capacity to make the conscious decision to kill other people. With all due respect, the point your trying to make has just about every flaw as the "murder simulator" argument. Pressing a button to fire a virtual firearm to eliminate a virtual enemy will never prepare you to use an actual firearm to kill another living person, and it never will. I know cynicism is the name of the game here on the Escapist, but I really don't think you're giving people enough credit.

As I said above 1% of soldiers are "wolfs". Assuming that most of these people go towards the military or police (where they are taught control, usually). Then maybe one in every (educated guess alert) 1 in every 1000 might be triggered. That is still a really high number considering the 400,000,000 people in the US, so 400,000. My guess is that most of the dangerous ones are in prison already so that also reduces the risk. Never the less it is still there.

I understand what you're saying, and I respect where you're coming from, but there's so much more to consider on the subject and you simplify things far too much.

Well, thank you for the respected. Based on some other replies it is a nice change of pace.

 

[DataSnake]

The lunatics will get guns illegally, problem solved.

Quick question: if you wanted to buy a gun illegally, would YOU know who to ask? Then what makes you think the average psycho would?

 

[FalloutJack]

I suggest paying Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman to do it. They're professionals who will report the facts and blow things up. I call that a case of the win-win insofar as American research is concerned.

 

[direkiller]

On one hand, this guy is clearly biased against games.
On the other hand, at least he has the decency to ask for a proper study instead of immediately trying to ban stuff, which is more than I can say for most politicians.

But are we going to get a "proper study" or a proper study?

I'm just saying, many of these "studies" end up being witch hunts anyway.

To be honest, I have no idea. Is the National Acadamy of Sciences an impartial organization?

About as impartial as you can hope for.
Most of the study's done on the subject have been impartial as well. It's the the media that plays it how they want.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKzF173GqTU case and point

 

[FalloutJack]

Ugh...

Alright, that's enough out of you. Honestly, a guy can't make a serious or not serious or semi-serious comment anymore. Would you just leave it already? We don't need someone poo-pooing anything. As General Melchett would say, it's bad for morale.

 

[dmase]

So basically do a study that's been done and already agrees with current regulations on movies and videogames? Should kids be playing violent videogames... any amount of time online for psn or xbox live would say no. Basically all you can do is inform parents and I don't know how more apparent you can get besides putting on the front of the box art contains intense scenes involving decapitations and execution style shootings.