While luckily we hear about it less frequently these days, there are always stories popping up in the news covering some tragedy or mishap that the mainstream media has connected to playing video games. This recent episode of natural selection is just another link in the chain.

I think that most of the controversies are stemmed from the same issue, but for the sake of an example, I’ll be discussing the most popular topic: Video game violence.

Ever since the high school massacre in Colorado nearly a decade ago, video games have been the scapegoat for a supposed wave of violent adolescent behavior–even though teen violence has actually decreased in the past several years. In fact, the most recent shootings at Virginia Tech prove that even non-gamers are capable of atrocities.

There have been studies that show that playing video games does increase the aggression centers in the brains of children versus those of control groups that do not. I won’t contest that in the slightest. However, I’ve seen no evidence that suggests that these reactions are unique to playing video games. I demand the evidence that shows that no other stimuli can create those same results.

What I would most like to see are the results of those tests when applied to children exposed to sports fanaticism, military upbringing, excessive drinking, or anything else that we laud as a traditional American pastime. I wouldn’t demonize any of those things, though I would expect them to bear similar effects on a child’s behavior.

What most people don’t understand is that violent video games are a symptom, not the disease that causes disturbed behavior. Our tastes reflect our character; they don’t define it. Kids who have violent tendencies are drawn to themes that suit that personality.

Video games-like any other form of multimedia-are a means of escapism. We indulge in them in order to distract ourselves from the stresses that we face in our daily lives. It’s normal. The issue is not whether or not the form of escapism we take is dangerous, but to what degree we allow ourselves to avoid reality.

The sign to look for is when a child (or even a full-grown person) begins to blur the lines of fantasy and reality. When I was growing up, I had a friend whose parents were not getting along in their marriage. To distract himself from the stress of his parents fighting, he would pretend to be his favorite cartoon characters, even while at school. Though junior high and high school, he didn’t seem to grow out of it as he focused his attention to imitating Michael Jackson (back when MJ still could be considered “cool”). My only hope is that he eventually got the therapy he needed to overcome his childhood trauma…or at least found success in the entertainment industry.

My point is that this was an example of unhealthy escapism. Some people (like the boys from Columbine) reach a breaking point when dealing with real-life stress. So much that they act toward replacing their reality with the fantasy. I can’t say whether those boys had been dealt an over-abundance of stress or if they were ill-nurtured to have a low threshold of tolerance. But clearly they’d had enough and in the end they felt their only option was to enforce their ideal plight upon their classmates.

One of America’s greatest vices is its pride. We all like to boast that we’re the greatest at all things, though in reality we do so little to prove it. This tends to put us all into a heavy state of denial, quickly assuming that our woes are the result of external sinister forces. We’re more comfortable joining arms to slay a mythical dragon or sacrifice a virgin to a volcano than consider poor choices we’ve made to put us in their peril.

I’m not here to paint a dismal picture of our culture and write us off as doomed. We can overcome these plagues in our society, but only if we’re realistic about their causes. People make bad choices because of ignorance and poor values. Ignorance can be overcome by continuing to educate ourselves and grow intellectually. Values can be adjusted by examining the influences of our upbringing and aspire toward spiritual reconciliation.

As we progress into the 21^st Century, it’s time that we reject the idea of “The devil made me do it”.

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 17th, 2009 at 12:06 am and is filed under Games, Rants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.