Politics, Current Events & Hot Button Issues

[scuzz]

First off I'll start out by saying I don't care much about this topic but this was one of those topics the local news station posted on facebook. Which annoys me because they have been posting a lot of "rile" topics lately that are just to get views, comments, etc but aren't really news at all.

Now the "news" story was more specifically talking about violent video games. Though it also made mention to violence in all modern media (TV, movies, and music). The news story was talking about a group or whatever who is collecting/destroying violent media in return for gift cards. (Which I also think is stupid because I doubt it is changing anyones mind who plays violent video games to stop. It just gives them no longer wanted video games which just pile up in landfills or otherwise pollute our earth.)

I personally agree that our generation and those below us and to come are and will be more desensitized in part because of these things. Though I don't believe violent media causes violence. 

I mean I am pretty desensetized but it isn't even from video games or movies etc because those are fake. I myself have seen many real messed up videos of real murder and other horrific things (Mostly because I don't like to be ignornat even if it means seeing the bad things). I can watch any real video like that and not even flinch, not show or even really feel any emotions etc. Though I'm still the opposite of a violent person. Even though I can also watch any video of animal abuse or animals slaughter and not be grossed out in the slightest I still chose to be vegetarian because I just know it is wrong. Sure maybe there is the chance that other people aren't like me and this will make them snap but most of the time I doubt it. Also I speak of videos though in real life I have never really been witness to anything so horrible. I'm sure if something were to happen in front of me I would be more emotional and actually have a reaction of some sort but like I said it hasn't happened yet so I can't say.

Most people who snap have either mental problems or family issues and issues in real life or a combination of the following. I myself was raised in what I would say is a good house hold with good parents and got a good education all of which I think made me the person I am today. The media I saw doesn't have that deep of an impact on me to effect my morals. I treat others the way I would want to be treated. I know I don't want to hurt especially physically so therefore I wouldn't do it to others. I know it is wrong to hurt others so I don't do it. Simple as that haha.

EDIT:
Also just wanted to add even though violent media doesn't make me violent it does tend to make me paranoid. Which I think is the more common reaction of people. Mostly when you hear all the horrible things on the news it makes it sound like everyone in the world either wants to rob you, rape you, hurt you, kill you etc. It makes us lose trust in humanity. Though in reality the percentage of the people doing these bad things to the percentage of people in the world is low.

andddd one LAST thing haha I always make my posts so long but ... why is it we always blame the "odd man out" people blame violent video games, movies and tv because  the general public is already against them. So the media tells parents that these things are bad and parents go yea I don't want my kids doing those things anyhow any make them give up there video games. Though if you try and blame the military, war, sports, hunting, killing animals, etc anything that has been around for a long time but that still supports violence, competition and other things you will be seen as crazy.

[illusione]

Several studies have been done looking at the link between violent behavior and violent video games, and none have found anything conclusive. 

The problem with the idea that depictions of violence in modern media cause increased violence is that our society is probably less violent now that it has been at any point in the past 10,000 years. And I actually think our generation is far more squeamish about blood and guts and death than humans ever have been in the past. We might be desensitized to it when watching through the safety of a screen because it's easy to emotionally distance yourself from a bunch of moving pixels, but when it comes to actually experiencing violence and death we're still horrified. Most people are happy to shoot at CGI gangsters with CGI guns but still freak out when the nurse wants to take blood.  

At the end of the day before CGI guns, kids had toy guns, and before toy guns kids held up two fingers and made sound effects... It not new. It's not modern. There have always been psychopaths. There have always been people who snap. Humans have always have been violent, and what makes them more violent is not seeing violence but living in a culture that glorifies it.

[stayclassy]

scuzz, your post is kinda hard to read with all the changing font but I read enough to get the gist of it lol...

Movies and video games do not make us more violent. Psychopaths are the ones who see them as reality whereas the rest of us don't. Even if there isn't violent media, there is still the access to weapons (guns, knives, whatever). People didn't start killing when TV was invented.

It's important, however, with children that we talk to them after a violent show. Studies have shown that if the violent actor in the show got rewarded or did not get punished, children are more likely to act out the violent behaviour. If the violent actor got punished then children are less likely to imitate the behaviour.

[Nyctimene]

I agree with illusione.

If violent video games (specifically 'First Person Shooters' or FPS...no one is complaining about RPG games..) make people violent, why are the crime rates lower than they were back in the 90s before FPSs had ever been invented?

There's a huge difference between fake violence happening to a bunch of pixels on a screen and real life. Did any of the teens in Columbine or Virginia Tech who have probably spent countless hours playing FPS games stop to laugh at other kids being shot? Offer to join? Video it on their cells 'cuz it was cooool'? No. They were terrified. They ran. It was awful. Not a single one found real life violence fun or cool.

Even my 8 year old son gets it. He plays a lot of the Transformers PS3 games which are FPS. He said freely himself "I don't like violence in real life." and "This is just a game. It's not real."

I think the people whining about video games are the ones we need to be worried about, not the kids playing them. The kids playing them know it's fake which is why they're not making a big deal if someone's head gets blown off. The people whining about them are the ones who can't seem to tell fantasy from reality and want to act like pixels are real people with empathy and real families and lives.

It's just passing the buck. It's easy to blame Call of Duty or Halo for violence and school shootings than it is to blame ourselves, blame parents for their child's failure, blame society for it's faulty gun laws, etc.

[boomtiing_ox]

Video games don't kill people, people kill people.

There's probably thousands of kids who play COD (Call of Duty) a worldwide known FPS game. How many of those kids have gone out and shot someone? Anyone who tries to blame video games for real life violence is just looking for an excuse and isn't looking at the fact there is something obviously pyshcologically wrong with the child. I've been playing violent and FPS games since I could pick up the toy gun that went with the playstation 1 lol. Have I killed anyone? Nope

[stayclassy]

I think the bigger problem is the ones who say teachers (and even kids!) should bring guns to school.

[Nyctimene]

I don't want kids to bring guns but I would like to see teachers trained and armed in schools. But that's just me and a different topic.

[scuzz]

Sorry I figured most people wouldn't want to read through all of my rambling so I tried to make the rambling bit smaller the more important parts of my thoughts bigger the main points bolded etc. So even if someone just reads the big words or skims the bold words they will at least get the gist of where I stand on the topic.

[flamingoccm]

I'd say a violent reality generates more violence than video games. Don't you think that a child growing up in inner-city America where they're surrounded by gang violence is a lot more likely to pick up a gun than some kid growing up in SmallTown, USA somewhere? I do! 

I will say that I think parents need to be aware of their children and how much they use violent games because I didn't subscribe to the theory between violent actions and violent video games until I watched my roommate play COD for 8 hours straight without moving. I do believe that it desensitizes you and I do believe that it does damage you emotionally in some way because you interact more with inanimate objects than you do with real people. However, do I believe my COD-addicted roommate would pick up a gun and shoot up a school? Absolutely not. Fundamentally, sane people don't go out and shoot up an elementary school or a movie theater. These people are DEEPLY disturbed. 

I'm with you though---it makes me paranoid more than anything else. If I'm walking to my car alone, I go with my keys in hand and I religiously check around my car for someone waiting to grab me because I've seen way too many Lifetime movies when I'm home sick. I don't wear earphones when I'm walking by myself because if someone's going to grab me, I want to be able to hear them coming. I do make sure I have an exit plan when I'm sitting in a classroom, especially if there's a guy in there that gives me a weird vibe.

I knew a guy in my high school who I did believe had the ability to bring a gun to school and use it. I was walking in the hall after school and I found him choking out another student and I'd never been so scared in my life. I told him to leave the kid alone and there was a split second where I feared he'd turn around and attack me, and I know I don't have the strength to push him off. When I told a teacher and it got him suspended, I was afraid to be around him in school. You don't know what's going to make people snap.  That's terrifying to me.

Frankly, I think our generation is one that is full of emotionally unstable people who have no ability to think rationally or get half a perspective on life. It's really scary to me that you see things like "cut for bieber"...What the fu.ck happened to our society where that felt like a healthy option? Some little girl had to think that up! Where do you draw the line between crazy and homicidal?

[stayclassy]

"it makes me paranoid more than anything else. If I'm walking to my car alone, I go with my keys in hand and I religiously check around my car for someone waiting to grab me because I've seen way too many Lifetime movies when I'm home sick. I don't wear earphones when I'm walking by myself because if someone's going to grab me, I want to be able to hear them coming."

I do the exact same. But I don't think that's because of the crime rate. I think it's awareness. Things like these always happened but now we keep an eye out. It's a good thing to be careful.