xXHorrorHippoXx
October 14th, 2009, 07:34 PM
I did an essay for school last year, it was a personal one, so I chose to do it on something I feel strongly about. I thought Id share it with you guys and see if you agree or disagree. I warn you...its long.
"Are Video Games Killing our Kids?
Brandon Crisp, a fifteen year old boy who went missing after the confiscation of his Xbox; Virginia Tech, a school where a madman went on a killing spree that was blamed on a video game called Counter-Strike; Grand Theft Auto, a highly controversial video game involving shooting police, stealing cars, and hiring prostitutes; now ask yourself; have you heard of any of the above examples? The chances are extremely high that at least one of them comes to mind. This is because video games are commonly portrayed as a negative source of entertainment that cause children and teens to develop social, legal, and medical problems. Little do most parents know, they can help prevent most of the problems caused by video games. Video games are fairly new to the world and are often falsely accused, being used a scapegoat for the media and parents of gaming children. If the right research is done, it is easy to find that video games are not nearly as bad as they are advertised to be. In fact, video games, played in the right doses, can aid in developing life skills and can improve certain aspects of one’s health. Although video games are often accused of causing health and crime issues in children and teens, the reality is that these accusations are often assumed and video games are not as unhealthy as some may think, especially with the help of parents.
Video games are everywhere; on posters in the shopping malls, in commercials between your favourite television shows, and nowadays, even in grocery stores; but when it comes to the news and media, the games are only ever displayed negatively. These messages are then passed to parents. This causes the misinformed parents, who have children playing video games, to look at them in a negative way and blame the video games for problems in the household; whether it is with violence, attitude, or education. This is because adults who have no interest in video games do not do all of their research. Not all adults are completely uninformed on the subject of video games, but according to an AOL poll, 43% of parents who have children who play video games, have never actually watched or played along with them. Also, 30% of the parents who .do play with or watch their kids play; only do so for a maximum of one hour a week (FOX News).
Without watching or knowing much about these games, it is easy to see how some parents may think that the video games are a negative influence due to the representation of violence, sexuality, and profane language. Many games such as Grand Theft Auto incorporate killing police officers, stealing cars from innocent pedestrians, and dealing drugs. Sexuality also plays a big role in some of the stories that video games tell. It is understandable for uninformed parents to question the morality of games that reward you for murder and robbery. More and more violent video games are offering easier ways to follow your statistics. These statistics can include number of kills, number of deaths, number of headshots, etc. When children or teens are looking up these statistics on the internet, parents may not understand the competitive nature of the game and why their kids are proud about the number of kills they have accumulated.
When parents notice that their child is locked up in his or her room for hours on end staring at the TV screen, they do not for one second think that this is healthy. A thought that goes through many parents’ minds is that their child is getting no exercise from video games and is going to gain weight. Also, when their child is not getting out, they worry about his or her social life and schoolwork. So video games often do have a negative reputation and many of them contain inappropriate content that parents do not want their children to experience.
With all of these bad images of video games implanted into parents’ minds, it is common to have no idea what to do about their child playing them. One thing parents should know is that they can control it, and a lot more than most of them think. Violent games tend to get most of the attention from parents and the media with accusations that these video games are bad for society causing multiple problems in children and teens. Parents may suspect that the violent attitude in the mature rated games is influencing their children in negative ways. Children under the age of seventeen should not be playing mature rated games which incorporate violence and sex. The parents can easily prevent this. The ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) gives a rating to every single video game that is released to the public. These ratings are similar to those of movies and include E for everyone, T for teen, and M for mature, meaning seventeen and over. The 80% of kids under the age of seventeen (Terdiman), who were not able to purchase Mature rated games in 2008 and wanted them, needed a parent or guardian over the age of seventeen to buy the games for them.
Jack Thompson is a Florida Attorney who has a grudge against video games and has tried multiple times to get games such as Grand Theft Auto and Manhunt, off store shelves. He must be one of the most game-knowledgeable people out there, yet he still makes huge assumptions. In an interview with CBS news, Jack Thompson was asked about mature rated games and children. “That fact alone does not square with ISA and ESRB's dodge that ‘the majority of games are not violent or M-rated.’ What matters is how many units delivered are violent, and to whom they are being delivered,†(Vitka). In 2007, 1563 video games were given ratings around the world, and only 6% of those were rated Mature, being 17 and over (Kuchera). Also, in 2008, only 20% of gamers under the age of seventeen were actually able to purchase mature rated titles. So if it is, as Jack Thompson says it, “what matters is how many units delivered are violent, and to whom they are being delivered,†then the parents who are buying these games for their children in the first place are to blame, not the video games themselves. Parents can easily avoid buying games that are not appropriate for their children. They simply must read the ESRB rating on the front and back of video games and make sure to only buy games that are suitable for their kids.
When many parents experience their children playing video games for twenty to thirty hours a week, they tend to get worried about health and social problems. This can be prevented with their help as well. More and more video game consoles are making it easier to restrict the time that kids play video games. Microsoft’s Xbox 360 has built in “Family Settings,†that give parents control with their email and password, to change specific settings to their liking. It is possible to set the amount of time you want your child or teen to play video games daily. For example, if you set the playing time for one hour, fifty-five minutes into playing a game, your child will be notified that he or she has five minutes remaining before the Xbox asks for their parents’ password, and then shuts off. The console can also help restrict kids from playing games they should not be playing, and watching movies they should not be watching. “You can set them to grant or restrict access to offline games and DVD movies based on the game rating and movie ratings respectively.†(Microsoft.com). With the right research and attentiveness to video games, a parent can stay stress-free while their child still enjoys playing appropriate video games in restricted daily sessions.
Parents would not be nearly as concerned about their children and gaming if it were not for the news stories featured in the media. When a crime is committed, whether it is a murder, a robbery, or an act of arson, video games are often partially blamed. Investigators inspect the scene of the crime, question the friends and family of the suspect, and search through the suspects home and belongings. If there is no clear reason why the suspect committed the crime, and there are video games involved in his or her life, the majority of blinkered adults assume that video games are to blame if they contain violent subject matter. Studies by the Division of Information Services show that the average age of investigators in all fields is fifty-one, but studies by the Entertainment Software Association show that the average age of a gamer is only thirty-three, with only 34.5% of people between the ages of 36-65 actually playing video games (BBC News). Generally, if these studies are accurate, then there is a minimum of a 65.5% chance that the investigator involved in each case has never actually seen or played a video game, leaving them uninformed on the subject and not able to correctly place blame on video games.
Take the Virginia Tech incident as an example. Less than an hour after Seung-Hui Cho began his killing spree in the school, Jack Thompson was already blaming video games for Cho’s actions. "These are real lives. These are real people that are in the ground now because of this game. I have no doubt about it," says Jack Thompson. A few days later he follows up with: “This is not rocket science. When a kid who has never killed anyone in his life goes on a rampage and looks like the Terminator, he's a video gamer.†Thompson was quick to assume in this case and in the end was wrong once again. A search warrant was released that contained all the items found in Cho’s dorm room. The list did include a computer, but no video games, video game consoles, or video game gadgets were found. They also interviewed Cho’s suite-mate, Chris Matthews, who said that he had never seen Cho playing video games (Benedetti). The attorney blamed video games before any concrete evidence was truly uncovered, then revealed his assumptions to the media. If it was solely video games that made him go on this killing spree then, according to the NPD Group, the 70% of all Americans who play video games would be committing crimes daily (Antonucci).
Another proof of assumption put into the media is in an interview done by CBS with Jack Thompson. Thompson was asked how many school shootings were related to video games: “The federal government found that in the school year 2003, there were 48 school killings. The year before that there were 16, and the year before that 17. Something is going on. I submit that the video game generation is coming of age.†(Vitka) As you can see, even he is not entirely sure of how many crimes or shootings are actually related to video games, yet he assumes and still manages to blame video games and portray their negative aspects in the media, the media being the CBS website. Investigators tend to assume that video games are a bad influence due to the media publishing stories exactly like this one. This causes the assumptions to go around in a circle; the media saying video games are bad, the event of a crime, the investigators blaming the crime on video games because of what they heard from the media, the media publishing a story blaming video games once again.
With the media constantly headlining stories regarding the negative side of video games, stories that encourage and support the use of video games are often lost and not revealed to many. The media is often saying that “video games fry your brain cells,†and “video games are the modern day drug,†but these are said without acceptable data. Anupam Agnihotri of BodyofWealth.com explains that “It is worth mentioning that most of the studies brought out earlier on the same issue,†the issue being effects of video games on video gamers, “have tried to bring out the negative side of the whole aspect while keeping the brighter side obnubilated.†(Agnihotri) Video games do have their benefits, they are just not revealed as publicly as the negative effects that anti-video gamers or uniformed adults generally want the public to see. Mark Griffiths, a professor at Nottingham Trent University, says that video games can be used positively in the medical fields as psychological distractions. After undergoing serious procedures, children who were given video games as distractions “needed less pain relief and had less nausea and lower blood pressure than those who were simply told to rest after their treatments.†(BBC News)¬ ¬ Also, contrary to popular belief, video games do not harm the vision of people who play them. In fact, according to a study done by medical scientists Renjie Li, Uri Polat, Walter Makous, and Daphne Bavelier, playing video games can improve your vision. “We found that the very act of action video game playing also enhanced contrast sensitivity, providing a complementary route to eyesight improvement.†(Bavelier) Uninformed adults who do not support gaming or do not want their children playing video games often come to conclusions before any scientific evidence is given. In the case of eyesight, video games are now proven to be better medically than previously assumed.
Video games may also be seen as a social life and social skill destroyer by the parents of a gamer but, this is not completely true. Video games are an excellent way of developing, not only social skills, but leadership and relationship skills as well. All of these skills contribute to and improve the daily life of any human being. “Video games are one of the few settings in which children can be teachers if grown-ups take the time to participate, and if they allow the children to lead the way.†(Miami University) By leading a group of gamers or on-screen characters, the children take a role of leadership and learn how to make the best out of a variety of situations as a leader of a team. With the ability to play online, and talk to your teammates in real time, you often discuss strategy and logic in order to win the games. Contrary to what most people think, gamers are not as antisocial as they are perceived to be. In a questionnaire involving seven-hundred children run by Teachers Evaluation Educational Multimedia, they found that “children preferred to play games in pairs or small groups.†(BBC News) These skills can be used in school when participating in group projects or discussions. Video games have also been proven to help children with psychological problems. Manali Oak from Buzzle.com says that “In playing video games, a child gets a sense of participation, a sense of achievement, thus building his/her self-confidence.†(Oak) Video games are now being used as a psychological treatment for children who lack self confidence or social skills.
Lastly, certain video game developers are heading more into an educational field. There are a variety of educational video games available to buy for all three major consoles. Nintendo, specifically, has many educational and family based titles. Brain Age is an educational game that is used to exercise the brain daily. It incorporates math, spelling, memory, and even reading. As you begin to do these activities with better results, your “brain age†becomes closer to twenty, the ideal age according to the game. Games such as this one are being released almost weekly and all have a positive effect on the people who play them. So, video games do indeed have their positive effects on gamers, young and old, by helping them physically, socially, and educationally.
With all of the negative attitude towards video games, it is sometimes hard to believe that they can be good for many things. Our society does not make it easy to come to positive conclusions by releasing inappropriate games while keeping the ratings and restriction abilities slightly hidden. If you are indeed concerned, with the right amount of research, it is very possible to make sure your child is playing video games in a healthy manner to prevent any chance of them committing crimes from day to day, as the media portrays. Who knows, maybe video games will be the teachers of the future!"
Please do not plagerize this paper, im posting it here with trust, and it took me a lot of work to write it.
(got a 92% by the way, excellent mark for the teacher I had)
"Are Video Games Killing our Kids?
Brandon Crisp, a fifteen year old boy who went missing after the confiscation of his Xbox; Virginia Tech, a school where a madman went on a killing spree that was blamed on a video game called Counter-Strike; Grand Theft Auto, a highly controversial video game involving shooting police, stealing cars, and hiring prostitutes; now ask yourself; have you heard of any of the above examples? The chances are extremely high that at least one of them comes to mind. This is because video games are commonly portrayed as a negative source of entertainment that cause children and teens to develop social, legal, and medical problems. Little do most parents know, they can help prevent most of the problems caused by video games. Video games are fairly new to the world and are often falsely accused, being used a scapegoat for the media and parents of gaming children. If the right research is done, it is easy to find that video games are not nearly as bad as they are advertised to be. In fact, video games, played in the right doses, can aid in developing life skills and can improve certain aspects of one’s health. Although video games are often accused of causing health and crime issues in children and teens, the reality is that these accusations are often assumed and video games are not as unhealthy as some may think, especially with the help of parents.
Video games are everywhere; on posters in the shopping malls, in commercials between your favourite television shows, and nowadays, even in grocery stores; but when it comes to the news and media, the games are only ever displayed negatively. These messages are then passed to parents. This causes the misinformed parents, who have children playing video games, to look at them in a negative way and blame the video games for problems in the household; whether it is with violence, attitude, or education. This is because adults who have no interest in video games do not do all of their research. Not all adults are completely uninformed on the subject of video games, but according to an AOL poll, 43% of parents who have children who play video games, have never actually watched or played along with them. Also, 30% of the parents who .do play with or watch their kids play; only do so for a maximum of one hour a week (FOX News).
Without watching or knowing much about these games, it is easy to see how some parents may think that the video games are a negative influence due to the representation of violence, sexuality, and profane language. Many games such as Grand Theft Auto incorporate killing police officers, stealing cars from innocent pedestrians, and dealing drugs. Sexuality also plays a big role in some of the stories that video games tell. It is understandable for uninformed parents to question the morality of games that reward you for murder and robbery. More and more violent video games are offering easier ways to follow your statistics. These statistics can include number of kills, number of deaths, number of headshots, etc. When children or teens are looking up these statistics on the internet, parents may not understand the competitive nature of the game and why their kids are proud about the number of kills they have accumulated.
When parents notice that their child is locked up in his or her room for hours on end staring at the TV screen, they do not for one second think that this is healthy. A thought that goes through many parents’ minds is that their child is getting no exercise from video games and is going to gain weight. Also, when their child is not getting out, they worry about his or her social life and schoolwork. So video games often do have a negative reputation and many of them contain inappropriate content that parents do not want their children to experience.
With all of these bad images of video games implanted into parents’ minds, it is common to have no idea what to do about their child playing them. One thing parents should know is that they can control it, and a lot more than most of them think. Violent games tend to get most of the attention from parents and the media with accusations that these video games are bad for society causing multiple problems in children and teens. Parents may suspect that the violent attitude in the mature rated games is influencing their children in negative ways. Children under the age of seventeen should not be playing mature rated games which incorporate violence and sex. The parents can easily prevent this. The ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) gives a rating to every single video game that is released to the public. These ratings are similar to those of movies and include E for everyone, T for teen, and M for mature, meaning seventeen and over. The 80% of kids under the age of seventeen (Terdiman), who were not able to purchase Mature rated games in 2008 and wanted them, needed a parent or guardian over the age of seventeen to buy the games for them.
Jack Thompson is a Florida Attorney who has a grudge against video games and has tried multiple times to get games such as Grand Theft Auto and Manhunt, off store shelves. He must be one of the most game-knowledgeable people out there, yet he still makes huge assumptions. In an interview with CBS news, Jack Thompson was asked about mature rated games and children. “That fact alone does not square with ISA and ESRB's dodge that ‘the majority of games are not violent or M-rated.’ What matters is how many units delivered are violent, and to whom they are being delivered,†(Vitka). In 2007, 1563 video games were given ratings around the world, and only 6% of those were rated Mature, being 17 and over (Kuchera). Also, in 2008, only 20% of gamers under the age of seventeen were actually able to purchase mature rated titles. So if it is, as Jack Thompson says it, “what matters is how many units delivered are violent, and to whom they are being delivered,†then the parents who are buying these games for their children in the first place are to blame, not the video games themselves. Parents can easily avoid buying games that are not appropriate for their children. They simply must read the ESRB rating on the front and back of video games and make sure to only buy games that are suitable for their kids.
When many parents experience their children playing video games for twenty to thirty hours a week, they tend to get worried about health and social problems. This can be prevented with their help as well. More and more video game consoles are making it easier to restrict the time that kids play video games. Microsoft’s Xbox 360 has built in “Family Settings,†that give parents control with their email and password, to change specific settings to their liking. It is possible to set the amount of time you want your child or teen to play video games daily. For example, if you set the playing time for one hour, fifty-five minutes into playing a game, your child will be notified that he or she has five minutes remaining before the Xbox asks for their parents’ password, and then shuts off. The console can also help restrict kids from playing games they should not be playing, and watching movies they should not be watching. “You can set them to grant or restrict access to offline games and DVD movies based on the game rating and movie ratings respectively.†(Microsoft.com). With the right research and attentiveness to video games, a parent can stay stress-free while their child still enjoys playing appropriate video games in restricted daily sessions.
Parents would not be nearly as concerned about their children and gaming if it were not for the news stories featured in the media. When a crime is committed, whether it is a murder, a robbery, or an act of arson, video games are often partially blamed. Investigators inspect the scene of the crime, question the friends and family of the suspect, and search through the suspects home and belongings. If there is no clear reason why the suspect committed the crime, and there are video games involved in his or her life, the majority of blinkered adults assume that video games are to blame if they contain violent subject matter. Studies by the Division of Information Services show that the average age of investigators in all fields is fifty-one, but studies by the Entertainment Software Association show that the average age of a gamer is only thirty-three, with only 34.5% of people between the ages of 36-65 actually playing video games (BBC News). Generally, if these studies are accurate, then there is a minimum of a 65.5% chance that the investigator involved in each case has never actually seen or played a video game, leaving them uninformed on the subject and not able to correctly place blame on video games.
Take the Virginia Tech incident as an example. Less than an hour after Seung-Hui Cho began his killing spree in the school, Jack Thompson was already blaming video games for Cho’s actions. "These are real lives. These are real people that are in the ground now because of this game. I have no doubt about it," says Jack Thompson. A few days later he follows up with: “This is not rocket science. When a kid who has never killed anyone in his life goes on a rampage and looks like the Terminator, he's a video gamer.†Thompson was quick to assume in this case and in the end was wrong once again. A search warrant was released that contained all the items found in Cho’s dorm room. The list did include a computer, but no video games, video game consoles, or video game gadgets were found. They also interviewed Cho’s suite-mate, Chris Matthews, who said that he had never seen Cho playing video games (Benedetti). The attorney blamed video games before any concrete evidence was truly uncovered, then revealed his assumptions to the media. If it was solely video games that made him go on this killing spree then, according to the NPD Group, the 70% of all Americans who play video games would be committing crimes daily (Antonucci).
Another proof of assumption put into the media is in an interview done by CBS with Jack Thompson. Thompson was asked how many school shootings were related to video games: “The federal government found that in the school year 2003, there were 48 school killings. The year before that there were 16, and the year before that 17. Something is going on. I submit that the video game generation is coming of age.†(Vitka) As you can see, even he is not entirely sure of how many crimes or shootings are actually related to video games, yet he assumes and still manages to blame video games and portray their negative aspects in the media, the media being the CBS website. Investigators tend to assume that video games are a bad influence due to the media publishing stories exactly like this one. This causes the assumptions to go around in a circle; the media saying video games are bad, the event of a crime, the investigators blaming the crime on video games because of what they heard from the media, the media publishing a story blaming video games once again.
With the media constantly headlining stories regarding the negative side of video games, stories that encourage and support the use of video games are often lost and not revealed to many. The media is often saying that “video games fry your brain cells,†and “video games are the modern day drug,†but these are said without acceptable data. Anupam Agnihotri of BodyofWealth.com explains that “It is worth mentioning that most of the studies brought out earlier on the same issue,†the issue being effects of video games on video gamers, “have tried to bring out the negative side of the whole aspect while keeping the brighter side obnubilated.†(Agnihotri) Video games do have their benefits, they are just not revealed as publicly as the negative effects that anti-video gamers or uniformed adults generally want the public to see. Mark Griffiths, a professor at Nottingham Trent University, says that video games can be used positively in the medical fields as psychological distractions. After undergoing serious procedures, children who were given video games as distractions “needed less pain relief and had less nausea and lower blood pressure than those who were simply told to rest after their treatments.†(BBC News)¬ ¬ Also, contrary to popular belief, video games do not harm the vision of people who play them. In fact, according to a study done by medical scientists Renjie Li, Uri Polat, Walter Makous, and Daphne Bavelier, playing video games can improve your vision. “We found that the very act of action video game playing also enhanced contrast sensitivity, providing a complementary route to eyesight improvement.†(Bavelier) Uninformed adults who do not support gaming or do not want their children playing video games often come to conclusions before any scientific evidence is given. In the case of eyesight, video games are now proven to be better medically than previously assumed.
Video games may also be seen as a social life and social skill destroyer by the parents of a gamer but, this is not completely true. Video games are an excellent way of developing, not only social skills, but leadership and relationship skills as well. All of these skills contribute to and improve the daily life of any human being. “Video games are one of the few settings in which children can be teachers if grown-ups take the time to participate, and if they allow the children to lead the way.†(Miami University) By leading a group of gamers or on-screen characters, the children take a role of leadership and learn how to make the best out of a variety of situations as a leader of a team. With the ability to play online, and talk to your teammates in real time, you often discuss strategy and logic in order to win the games. Contrary to what most people think, gamers are not as antisocial as they are perceived to be. In a questionnaire involving seven-hundred children run by Teachers Evaluation Educational Multimedia, they found that “children preferred to play games in pairs or small groups.†(BBC News) These skills can be used in school when participating in group projects or discussions. Video games have also been proven to help children with psychological problems. Manali Oak from Buzzle.com says that “In playing video games, a child gets a sense of participation, a sense of achievement, thus building his/her self-confidence.†(Oak) Video games are now being used as a psychological treatment for children who lack self confidence or social skills.
Lastly, certain video game developers are heading more into an educational field. There are a variety of educational video games available to buy for all three major consoles. Nintendo, specifically, has many educational and family based titles. Brain Age is an educational game that is used to exercise the brain daily. It incorporates math, spelling, memory, and even reading. As you begin to do these activities with better results, your “brain age†becomes closer to twenty, the ideal age according to the game. Games such as this one are being released almost weekly and all have a positive effect on the people who play them. So, video games do indeed have their positive effects on gamers, young and old, by helping them physically, socially, and educationally.
With all of the negative attitude towards video games, it is sometimes hard to believe that they can be good for many things. Our society does not make it easy to come to positive conclusions by releasing inappropriate games while keeping the ratings and restriction abilities slightly hidden. If you are indeed concerned, with the right amount of research, it is very possible to make sure your child is playing video games in a healthy manner to prevent any chance of them committing crimes from day to day, as the media portrays. Who knows, maybe video games will be the teachers of the future!"
Please do not plagerize this paper, im posting it here with trust, and it took me a lot of work to write it.
(got a 92% by the way, excellent mark for the teacher I had)