My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

[Rodin]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

Lol, Macht, I've also heard of that whole red ink thing. I'm going to be majoring in Psychology in College. And when I become a psychologist, I'm going to tell it like it is. Which most are afraid to do. Cut the crap...here's what you need to do, end of story. I see psychology as stating the obvious, nothing more.

[TheGrandMom]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

A lofty endeavour Rodin, good luck to you! A bit of insight for you though, you won't be able to "tell it like it is" until you have your own private practice. Until then you'll have to tow the line, earn your kudos and make a name for yourself. But in the end it all ends up where you want it to be...so its all good!

[kuu]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

Like that dr. Feelgood or whatever his name is.

Most people who can afford a Psychoanalyst aren't really happy about "tell it like it is".

Realistically, I think most of psycology people goes into the HR field rather then the medical field. It's more like using your knowledge to not put a foot in your mouth, rather then and be blunt to get the point across.

[Rodin]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

A lofty endeavour Rodin, good luck to you! A bit of insight for you though, you won't be able to "tell it like it is" until you have your own private practice. Until then you'll have to tow the line, earn your kudos and make a name for yourself. But in the end it all ends up where you want it to be...so its all good!

Come live in York, PA for a while. You'll see that even fresh out of college I could open up a successful clinic here. So many nutcases and freaks around here. Did you know that we still have an active KKK in York County, PA? There's a lot of people want therapy here, and need it. Also, most of psychology is dumbing your conclusions down so the patient won't be offended. I'll get my point across, but I won't be blunt about it. Here's an example.

Patient comes to me.

Patient: Doc, I keep having recurring nightmares that a girl I knew is running away from me down a tunnel. (Classic Freudian Dream)

What I'd say: You seem to be not able to let go of feelings for this girl, maybe a phone call is in order? Or perhaps even set up a date?

What I'm thinking: Call her dumbass....


99% of psychology is stating the obvious (not counting people with Schitzophrenia, or any other "real" disease.) That's what my Professor had printed on the very top of his syllabus., minus the parts in parentheses.

[Keyura]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

99% of psychology is stating the obvious (not counting people with Schitzophrenia, or any other "real" disease.) That's what my Professor had printed on the very top of his syllabus., minus the parts in parentheses.

i have a mentor who's a professor of sociology and he was telling me when i was doing a report on the corellation between mental illness ("real" disesases") and social disorders and how they were all personified, he told me that there are mental disorders and sociatal disorders (the basis for my thesis) and the distinction in modern sociology is often blurred. many sociatal disorders are treated with medicine rather than therapy, when theres not anything chemically wrong. if anyone wants to get a good view on the jaded perspective of psychology, look up stuff by Dr. Thomas Szasz. its a garunteed eye-opener if you've never thought that way before.

[Shiro_Hayate]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

My god "American's have 3 things, God, gays, guns". I'm pasting this EVERYWHERE! That's so frickin' true.

Oh and by the way, why don't they blame how kids are acting thanks to the people running around with pants down to their knees screaming "YOYO, I CAN"T GET A JOB THIS WAY, BUT I LOOK LIKE A BADASS WITH GUNS". There is one game that I want to get banned, and it's called 50 Cent -_-

[Kaylik]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

oh thank god, someone who thought the exact same things i have. "Violent video games corrupt the nations youth" my arse. first off yes you are right, its mostly the parents fault, it is there job to check the parental rating or make sure this a game they dont mind there children having, i have a friend whos parents do check the ratings but mainly look at hthe game content, but we shouldnt have too cause games dont do anything. now admitedly a rated M game in the hnds of a six year old...um ya prolly not. second a lot of people say that the video game has caused these kids to shoot there school, or kill themselves cause there online girl friend broke up with them, and it turns out all these kids were a little mentally unstable. if your a good parent like you said you should know that they are crazy (pardon me for a lack of a better word^^) so if they are crazy WHAT THE #$@% are the doing with this kind of game anyway i mean come on. Banning games wont do any good cause like you pointed out there are still R movies and porn well guess were gonna have to ban those then too, cauase if not it only proves the idiocracy of the government^^,(which i'm sure has been proven on many occasionsXD). Now on a posotive note, some games can be helpfull, it improves hand eye coordination and can improve your vocabulary. the military, who is connected somehow t the government XD, are using videogames to train soldiers in what if situations. I know when i read a book my vocab expands quite a lot but also when i play certain videogames my vocab has expanded, and for anyone who has played legacy of kain: defiance knows what im talking about. Now i know i have been trying to defend video games but its kinda hard with a game like grandtheft auto, where you can go on the streets and kill just about anyone or put in codes and watch porn or whatever. so thats my 2 cents, i do have more to say but i think i rambled on long enough^^.

[Rodin]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

i have a mentor who's a professor of sociology and he was telling me when i was doing a report on the corellation between mental illness ("real" disesases") and social disorders and how they were all personified, he told me that there are mental disorders and sociatal disorders (the basis for my thesis) and the distinction in modern sociology is often blurred. many sociatal disorders are treated with medicine rather than therapy, when theres not anything chemically wrong. if anyone wants to get a good view on the jaded perspective of psychology, look up stuff by Dr. Thomas Szasz. its a garunteed eye-opener if you've never thought that way before.

Thanks Keyura, I'll look into that. It looks pretty interesting. Also, my Psych teacher told me that most mental/social disorders need to be cured by a slap on the wrists, than a plethora of expensive medicines. But, most of those medicines are placebos too, which is another thing to consider.

Double Post Edited:

oh thank god, someone who thought the exact same things i have. "Violent video games corrupt the nations youth" my arse. first off yes you are right, its mostly the parents fault, it is there job to check the parental rating or make sure this a game they dont mind there children having, i have a friend whos parents do check the ratings but mainly look at hthe game content, but we shouldnt have too cause games dont do anything. now admitedly a rated M game in the hnds of a six year old...um ya prolly not. second a lot of people say that the video game has caused these kids to shoot there school, or kill themselves cause there online girl friend broke up with them, and it turns out all these kids were a little mentally unstable. if your a good parent like you said you should know that they are crazy (pardon me for a lack of a better word^^) so if they are crazy WHAT THE #$@% are the doing with this kind of game anyway i mean come on. Banning games wont do any good cause like you pointed out there are still R movies and porn well guess were gonna have to ban those then too, cauase if not it only proves the idiocracy of the government^^,(which i'm sure has been proven on many occasionsXD). Now on a posotive note, some games can be helpfull, it improves hand eye coordination and can improve your vocabulary. the military, who is connected somehow t the government XD, are using videogames to train soldiers in what if situations. I know when i read a book my vocab expands quite a lot but also when i play certain videogames my vocab has expanded, and for anyone who has played legacy of kain: defiance knows what im talking about. Now i know i have been trying to defend video games but its kinda hard with a game like grandtheft auto, where you can go on the streets and kill just about anyone or put in codes and watch porn or whatever. so thats my 2 cents, i do have more to say but i think i rambled on long enough^^.

Thanks to me playing Final Fantasy XI. I have been reading so much kana, that it has become almost as familiar as the English alphabet to me. Maybe someone should tell Hillary Clinton that there are UPSIDES to video games as well.

[kuu]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

i have a mentor who's a professor of sociology and he was telling me when i was doing a report on the corellation between mental illness ("real" disesases") and social disorders and how they were all personified, he told me that there are mental disorders and sociatal disorders (the basis for my thesis) and the distinction in modern sociology is often blurred. many sociatal disorders are treated with medicine rather than therapy, when theres not anything chemically wrong. if anyone wants to get a good view on the jaded perspective of psychology, look up stuff by Dr. Thomas Szasz. its a garunteed eye-opener if you've never thought that way before.

Yes that is the interesting topic, but it's a little outside the issue.

The core issue is if, A child/teenager is more susceptible then an adult on these social distorders. Because bascially, the idea is that, violent/sex videogames ment for adults are currupting the minds of children.

There are evidence to both sides, as on a physical human mental growth issue, children are more weakminded then adults, but whether that significantly throws a child into the "mental lane" is kinda hard to swallow. Children going postal, or sucidal, or rapist, may just be as satisically as an average adult.

The problem then, is why are we giving double, or in this case, quadruple standards to "sheltering" children, as oppose to an adult. Slap an adult stranger and you get a yelling, slap a child and you can be doing 2yrs in jail, So to say.

[tdh]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

There have been a number of posts like tihs in the past, and there have been a number of debates tossed around those past posts. (Now that I think about it, I think I've now commented in just about all of them.)

There are a number of problems in the system. And the ratings board is a good thing. I think most people realize that, but there are problems in that sytem. It's a self governed system. They don't really report to anybody. If they mess up, who exactly are they responsible to?

That question, is why I think a number of retailers don't really enforce the ratings. We all know Wal-Mart's take on games. "They're a family store" so they only carry items that are family friendly. Much like Blockbuster of the '90s. Only having watered down movies. (Showgirls comes to mind. They had the move, but it wasn't the theatrical version.) But I've been in EB at my local mall and on various occassions seen an employee sell a M rated game to a kid who was visably 12 years old, and didn't even make an attempt at checking the child's age. Other times, I've seen a manager however laugh at a 15 year old saying he couldn't sell him a M rated game.

But the video game industry did essentially what the comic book publishers did in the '50s. They realized Congress was going to step in and do something due to the nature of the books. So they created their on code and basically censored themselves. Turned out, that the Comic Code worked for DC and Marvel for years before they both basically abandoned it. Congress got hot on the pants of the video game industry so they snapped together the ESRB

There have been studies saying some very good things about video games. Some schools in Illinios actualy use video games for physical fitness, as do some physical therapy companies. Another study out of the UK said that the level of concentration required in a lot of video games are on par with the concentration found in professional atheletes.

For me, I broke both bones in my arm just past the wrist '92. I had a cast past my elbow, and couldn't do much else. So I hung out with my neighbor playing SNES. When the doctor finally removed the cast, he noticed that I didn't have the same kind of muscle atrophy usually found in cases like mine. The doctor was also worried about the possibility of nerve damage. But once I told him all the video games I'd been playing and other tests he told my Mother point blank that the video games was my rehab, and prevented any sort of lingering effect from the break.

I don't have any children, but I do belive that some games just shouldn't be played by some audiences. IF you ask me, some "adults" aren't mature enough to play games like the GTA series. I also think that some kids shouldn't play some first person shooters.

I believe I heard that the Washington DC sniper and his son had mentioned playing a lot of first person shooter games to help prepare themselves for what they'd done. Of course Congress jumped on that. They'd been looking for something to get them back on the track of choking the video game industry. Nevermind the father was in the military. Nobody mentions what the can do a person. They never seemed to consider that those people are the ahborations. Most people play violent video games because it's not acceptable to go around shooting people, car jacking old ladies, or running prostitutes over on the side walks. It's a way to relieve stress.

If anything needs to be done, it's the enforcement of the ratings, and perhaps a more comprehensive ratings system. But we must admit. This is a gaming webpage, with forums for gamers. We're all preaching to the choir for the most part. Perhaps it's time that video gamers really started to get involved in the political aspect of things. Writing our state legislator, flooding your congress person with emails to let them know how you and your friends feel about the issues. Of course it can be argued that those emails go unheard, so you can call and/or fax them as well.

Some things may need to change, and who better to change them than the people the rules effect?

[Rogan]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

I think video games are fine the way they are, people don't get violent from video games, theyre either violent people or not, video games just might have some effect on the people who are violent, and they keep saying that kids are getting hold of these games, well if the parents are THAT worried they would probably be going into the store and buying games with the kids making sure theyre not M rated

[kuu]

Re: My two cents on how violent video games are being handled.

I don't think there's any end all study in that field. Psychology is a pretty resent science.

While constantly induced into a certain state can change the minds of people over long periods it remains to be seen how the change is determined.

Say you play violent video games for long extensive periods, you can either have:
1:No effect
2:More pusuaded to do violent things because of exposure
3:Becomes disillusioned and can actually be more tolerant to not going into violent tendencies

Same with sex...
Watching porn all day making someone into a sex maniac is bad
but
turning them into a mature person is good, as you if get all flustered and emotional from the first moment of flesh won't make you much of an adult.

Playing Doom or something all day back then didn't make me want to shoot someone, if anything it made me disillusioned to the glory of such an act. Pull trigger see splash...been there, done that.