Is My Dorsal Fin Showing?
Exerpt from the "Deep Water" article:
"And as Clive Thompson so deftly put it, videogames might show me HOW to be a killer - - one bullet per victim, adjusting for wind, moving from target to target, etc - - but does that simple knowledge increase my propensity for actually BECOMING a mass murderer? Surely anyone can read a book about car maintenance but does that make them a mechanic? Any person with a library card can check out a technical manual about how to paint . . . but the painting, the creation of something new and wonderful, belongs to a whole other set of rules.
There is a Gestalt about videogame violence that allows us to realize that the game itself is more than a sum of just the parts. The narrative, the frame rate, the polygon count, these are just the pieces of the game itself. The one measure that cannot be quantified is the subjective measure of "gameplay experience." I think it's honest for the ESRB to generate a rating for a game based on the content (the number of explosions, expletives, and murder victims). But to assume that by simply playing a "Mature" rated game I am going to start carjacking people, create havoc, and generally make a nuisance of myself is just plain shortsightedness.
The DESIRE has to be there.
Playing Need for Speed may give me an elusive driving edge. Mastering Time Crisis may teach me to be a better shooter. Enjoying Grand Theft Auto may mean that I'm a sadist. But to assume that just because I play Halo means that I am apt to pick up a gun and go into study hall to work out my aggression . . . well, that just demonstrates how quickly the media latches onto whatever they deem to be my raison d'etre. Chances are, I was a bad person way before I took the shrinkwrap off the box. If I was going to commit a crime, it's more than likely that playing State of Emergency had nothing to do with my decision at all.
We as a society are so quick to try to place blame, to decide WHY this all happened. We would do better to see things for what they are, and not always look for the man behind the curtain.
Maybe I am a bad guy just because I'm a bad guy. San Andreas ain't got nothin' to do with it."
"And as Clive Thompson so deftly put it, videogames might show me HOW to be a killer - - one bullet per victim, adjusting for wind, moving from target to target, etc - - but does that simple knowledge increase my propensity for actually BECOMING a mass murderer? Surely anyone can read a book about car maintenance but does that make them a mechanic? Any person with a library card can check out a technical manual about how to paint . . . but the painting, the creation of something new and wonderful, belongs to a whole other set of rules.
There is a Gestalt about videogame violence that allows us to realize that the game itself is more than a sum of just the parts. The narrative, the frame rate, the polygon count, these are just the pieces of the game itself. The one measure that cannot be quantified is the subjective measure of "gameplay experience." I think it's honest for the ESRB to generate a rating for a game based on the content (the number of explosions, expletives, and murder victims). But to assume that by simply playing a "Mature" rated game I am going to start carjacking people, create havoc, and generally make a nuisance of myself is just plain shortsightedness.
The DESIRE has to be there.
Playing Need for Speed may give me an elusive driving edge. Mastering Time Crisis may teach me to be a better shooter. Enjoying Grand Theft Auto may mean that I'm a sadist. But to assume that just because I play Halo means that I am apt to pick up a gun and go into study hall to work out my aggression . . . well, that just demonstrates how quickly the media latches onto whatever they deem to be my raison d'etre. Chances are, I was a bad person way before I took the shrinkwrap off the box. If I was going to commit a crime, it's more than likely that playing State of Emergency had nothing to do with my decision at all.
We as a society are so quick to try to place blame, to decide WHY this all happened. We would do better to see things for what they are, and not always look for the man behind the curtain.
Maybe I am a bad guy just because I'm a bad guy. San Andreas ain't got nothin' to do with it."
posted by Steve Metcalf at 9:44 PM
1 Comments:
Wow. This one actually got built into a whole new article called "Useful with Fists." It's about videogame violence and its effects (or lack thereof) on today's youth.
The phrase comes from the book "Trigger Happy" by Steven Poole.
"Deep Water" is now a whole 'nother article.
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