farla | I think I should move someplace where kids don't play videogames

So I caught a passing reference to Bioshock involving weird little kids. Being always interested in weird little kids, I then sought out the various interesting videos of the game.

I pay only passing interest in games, so I'm quite impressed by how designers are better and better able to render people, environments, and how to kill people with things in your environment. Apparently the AI isn't too smart. I did not notice because I was distracted by the fact every enemy in the game has dialogue. They talk to themselves and when they see you their dialogue changes to reflect that. So stuff happens like a guy lighting himself on fire and running at you screaming "Don't go! I just want to talk! I just want to talk to someone!" Or a insane mother talking to an empty baby carriage. It also changes when you attack them. And the movements of the people are very well done. They obviously spent a great deal of time rendering how a body collapses after you beat their head in with a wrench.

No, really. It's really impressive. They put a lot of time into things like body language and movement. The little kids are especially well done. They skip around, talk happily to their companion, scream when they see someone coming for them, run in fear from you, cry when you brutally murder their cyborg protectors in front of them, and scramble backwards sobbing in terror as you approach to kill them. They did a very good job on that. I was impressed.

It makes for a very good movie. Movie, in which there is a distinction between what is taking place on the screen and events you are causing yourself. People who actually play the game are future serial killers, however, and should have some sort of warning brand etched onto their foreheads to identify them. Seriously, the kind of people who do this are not well.

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From:

farla.livejournal.com

I think your argument and mine aren't quite on the same page.

My focus here is about desensitization from images, not the subject matter. If I say I killed a kindergarten full of kids, and if I made a video of doing so, one is clearly more upsetting. If you watch the first video link, do you cringe or flinch? From a visual standpoint, you're interpreting these events as happening to a person. You can step back and say it's not really happening to a person, yes. But you can do the same thing in real life (http://www.snopes.com/photos/gruesome/interrogate.asp). You're not a discerning consumer, you're teaching yourself to ignore visual cues.

Find a video that you find too gory. Watch it a dozen times. How long before it stops having any impact? Find another video. See how many times it takes not to be bothered by that as well. Before long, you should be able to watch any new video without flinching at all.

That's desensitization. And it works the same if you're watching fake figures or real ones. There's a certain point you stop processing it.

Example A: Kid grows up in a good family, decent values, only got to see certain movies or play certain games when they were psychologically ready (more or less). They come out as a healthy, well balanced adult.

Example B: Kid grows up with parents who really don't give a shit, brings the kid to R rated movies with vivid sex scenes, lots of violence, and other nifty things. Also let's the kids play whatever they damn well want. Ten years later we got ourselves a billy-bad-ass little punk who's head I would love to smash through a wall.

That's...pretty much what I'm talking about. Kids play these games, and what they play affects them.

My little brother's eleven. He can walk into a store and buy Bioshock or Manhunt (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGuhX5AmjuA). What are kids going to be like growing up playing things like this?

Oh, and BTW: in Bioshock, you don't need to kill the children. It is only an option.

Right, I know.

And there's something kind of interesting that Bioshock players discuss killing the little sisters as the moral quandary in the game. Because what was upsetting me was the realism - the way the characters move and react, and the way the violence against them is shown.

You run through the game killing the splicers. The splicers are look, move and talk like people, and their dialogue is often nonaggressive. They're obviously insane and not in control of their actions. When you hurt them, they act as if they're hurt. And yet there's no mention of the decision to avoid killing them.

Again, my issue isn't what the subject matter is. It's the portrayal. Running around killing stick figures labeled "toddler" may fit the description of "a game where you murder children", but it's a lot less disturbing than running around killing things that look and act indistinguishably from people.

Or, to put it another way -

I often hear people say they're able to tell it's not a real person they're hurting. But if looking like a real person isn't the goal, why do the games spend so much effort in making them look more and more realistic, especially parts like body language?

If you see a figure waving, you see someone waving at you, you don't check to see if the fingers are rendered properly and dismiss the entire thing as meaningless visual blotches if they aren't. If you see a figure reeling from a blow, you see someone who's just been hurt.

If gamers aren't affected by this, then they have no reason to praise enemy realism, and the designers have no reason to design the enemies like this. Yet they do. If there's another explanation, what is it?

From:

blackaeronaut.livejournal.com

I understand that you're concerned about desensitization. Get in line, so are a lot of parents and teachers out there.

Look, human beings through the ages have busily set about desensitizing themselves as I pointed out in my previous response. My question to you is do you think it really has an impact on our society?

How many acts of violence are attributed to 'too many video games and movies'? Especially by children? Almost always, it is because there is something broken with that person's mind and very little to do with desensitization.

Again, I point to the two previously posted examples. Both played the same violent games and watched the same violent movies. What do you think was the difference?

I, myself, am not concerned about desensitization. In fact, when my children are ready, I would want them to see that video of the man committing suicide. I want them to see and understand the problems in our world. That way, when they become productive adults, they won't be worried about desensitization. They'll be a lot more concerned with the broader problems in our world, which have little to do with desensitization a lot more to do with the Seven Deadly Sins.

From:

farla.livejournal.com

Look, human beings through the ages have busily set about desensitizing themselves

1) No, they generally didn't. Text =/= visual.

2) That something happened does not mean it's good.

Again, if I say I killed kids, and if I show you a video of this, it's not the same thing. I read and write violent things regularly, and yet you're either far more desensitized than I am, or you didn't click the Manhunt link.

Again, I point to the two previously posted examples. Both played the same violent games and watched the same violent movies. What do you think was the difference?

Wait, that's what you meant?

You said

Example A: Kid grows up in a good family, decent values, only got to see certain movies or play certain games when they were psychologically ready (more or less). They come out as a healthy, well balanced adult.

Example B: Kid grows up with parents who really don't give a shit, brings the kid to R rated movies with vivid sex scenes, lots of violence, and other nifty things. Also let's the kids play whatever they damn well want. Ten years later we got ourselves a billy-bad-ass little punk who's head I would love to smash through a wall.

If you mean a situation where both kid A and kid B see roughly the same media, but one has attentive parents and one doesn't...

My two cousins were heavy videogame players, but my aunt and uncle monitored what games they played. Across the street were two other boys they were friends with, who let their kids play whatever games they wanted. They were all middle class, goes-to-Church-on-Sunday, involved parents.

The other kids were fucked up. The younger boy would do something, like shove or poke you, for no reason. If you retaliated, such as poking back, he'd react as if you'd walked up to him and punched him in the face. Then, after he'd tried to shove you into the wall, he'd go complain about how you attacked him. He acted as if other people were just there for his entertainment and had no feelings of their own. Back when first-person shooters were first becoming popular, I remember he played through level upon level exploiting the fact shooting people in nonlethal areas made them writhe around in pain on the ground.

Another time, when I was eight or so, my family was visiting some acquaintances at a party who had a six year old or so son who was allowed to watch anything he wanted. I remember we watched part of The Mask, which is pg-13 if I remember right. He was a friendly, perky kid who would abruptly start kicking me or another of the kids for no reason.

Middle class kids. Upper middle class, even. Loving, attentive parents and doting extended family. Fucked in the head.

Did it make them go commit murders? No. It made them sociopathic. It altered their basic behavior and the way they interacted with others. I have never met kids who behaved like that without exposure to violent media.

They'll be a lot more concerned with the broader problems in our world, which have little to do with desensitization a lot more to do with the Seven Deadly Sins.

...I realize that this may be a simple incompatibility of views, but...

We're currently torturing people. We put a sixteen year old in Guantanamo and when he committed suicide years later, the news mocked him for it. An eighteen year old girl quipped "Good" in response to being told we'd killed a million Iraqi citizens.

I don't think something like Lust is really the problem here.

From:

blackaeronaut.livejournal.com

1) No, they generally didn't. Text =/= visual.

Sorry, but does the Globe Theater ring any bells? How about the Roman Colosseum? These are not isolated examples, either - merely the most grand ones. In fact, at some points in time, text was not a heavily used medium at all because books could not be mass-produced up until a relatively recent point in time. Stories were told in other ways: story tellers using the vocal tradition, traveling bards and theater troups, etc. Granted, many of these were not horribly graphic, but then y6ou had thing like Rome's gladiators, which was a widespread 'sporting' event throughout the Empire.

2) That something happened does not mean it's good.

I never said that it was. All I'm trying to point out there is that there is a precedent for it. The Roman Empire did not fall due to desensitization, though it may have helped a bit. It fell largely do to lead poisoning of a good deal of it's upper-class citizens.

Now that stuff about the kids, that's pretty much what I meant. Some things, young children are not ready for and I agree whole-heartedly that they should not be playing games like Bioshock or Manhunt. Their minds are still very impressionable. Besides, if any of my children ever did anything like that, I'd start disciplining them right away. I wouldn't even give it a chance to escalate.

I would not let any of my kids see something like The Mask until they were something like twelve. Nor would I let them play M-rated games until I felt they were ready. This I would take on a case-by-case basis because, like R-ratings in the movies, sometimes games get the M-ratings for the littlest things.

Also, while they may be doting, loving, and attentive, there seems to be one thing that these parents have failed to teach their children: compassion and the Golden Rule. I know that some people think it's a stupid concept, but I don't. Personally, I think that people who feel that compassion and the Golden Rule are stupid have been playing too many video games. ;)

No, lust is not the problem here. That particular problem stems from a combination of Pride and Sloth with a bit of Wrath thrown in.

My major nit-pick here is that you seem to hold the gaming industry responsible for this when really it is the parents of such children. The gaming industry is not the like the cigarette companies, which intentionally targeted youths and children, at least, not with the Mature games. They want adults to play their adult-themed games, teens to play their teen-themed games, and children to play their child-themed games. Talk to any developer out there and they'll tell you what audience they're targeting with game X.

I, myself, would not touch certain games. I have never play any of the Hitman games, and I once tried playing GTA: San Andraius but stopped soon after I started. But Bioshock, I would want to play. It's moral quandaries are not the same as you would find in a game like Grand Theft Auto or Hitman.

From:

farla.livejournal.com

First, Rome isn't really a good example - you're referring to a particular small area of a small-in-overall-terms empire, and one that imploded. Historically, we tend to remember the sensational. Most of the world wasn't watching people fight each other to the death. Even in Rome, most people weren't. And what's often forgotten about the Coliseum is that even then, many of the battles weren't to the death (there are debates over how many gladiatorial battles were to the finish, but all agree it wasn't standard, and they also had nonviolent performances), and no one, not even those in the front row, were viewing the battle up close. It's somewhat comparable to Spanish bullfighting - horrible and brutal in execution, but with those elements not visible to most of the spectators. On top of all that, if reports of the time are accurate, the point was to show stoicism in the face of death - that even the lowest would die bravely, and so should Roman citizens - not gore.

It fell largely do to lead poisoning of a good deal of it's upper-class citizens.

No, it fell because it stopped expanding and the empire ran on a pyramid scheme that required steady influxes of new territory to support itself, and because they were brutal repressive dictators to the people they conquered, so that they needed a large standing army to keep control of the outer provinces. The lead poisoning may have something to do with why they didn't manage to realize and fix this in time, but the Coliseum decadence also reaches its high points about the same time they're behaving worst.

Christianity? Comes from the fact that the guys in charge of Jerusalem were so awful people were willing to revolt at the drop of a hat with no real chance of success, because they were so regularly abused. Pilate was such a psychotic fuck that Rome of "hey let's let lions eat people!" fame ultimately recalled him in horror at how he was handling things.

They are really just not an example to point to. There's precedent, but it'd be better to find precedent not linked so closely to disaster. Maybe the Romans weren't affected by viewing violence, but maybe that's because they were already self-destructive violent nutcases.

Also, while they may be doting, loving, and attentive, there seems to be one thing that these parents have failed to teach their children: compassion and the Golden Rule.

Those aren't taught, though. Oh, they're reinforced, but like most widespread morality systems, they're based on innate values. We're hardwired to understand pain reactions. Even small children will react to crying. So will monkeys, for that matter. Any normal person can understand reactions, as well - if I shove you, and you shove back, I'm supposed to learn that there's a cause and effect there. I'll learn that even if I can't empathize, just as I should learn that touching a hot stove burns me even though it doesn't happen because the stove is angry I touched it.

You have to go out of your way to lose these things.

My major nit-pick here is that you seem to hold the gaming industry responsible for this when really it is the parents of such children.

Well, yes. I hold movie companies responsible for creating movies with excessive violence. Additionally, parents aren't able to screen everything, especially if the kids are smart enough not to play it around them. Latchkey kids don't necessarily have neglectful parents, but at the same time, if Mom and Dad show up at seven, and the kid normally eats and does homework around then, it's easy for them to have no idea he just spent the past four hours playing some incredibly violent game (And if they catch on three months later, the kid will quite reasonably point out that they've had it for months with no problems, so what's the big deal?).

Also, there are a lot of laws in place because we recognize that parents aren't always responsible. Kids shouldn't buy cigarettes, so there's a law against it. Kids shouldn't drink, so there's a law against it. Kids shouldn't be put to work at a young age or stop going to school, so there's a law against it. Kids shouldn't see violent movies, so there's a law against that, too.

From:

farla.livejournal.com

The gaming industry is not the like the cigarette companies, which intentionally targeted youths and children, at least, not with the Mature games

Then why don't they want laws preventing kids from buying them? Kids are playing these games. Twelve year olds are the major gaming group. If a developer says that Hitman is an attempt to target 30 year olds...well, the tobacco industry spent years maintaining their ads were aimed at adults, and it's not like telling people you intended your gore splatterfest to be for kids will go over much better.

I remember years back a boy I knew told me about some game he was playing. I was in fourth or fifth grade. There was part of the game where you met prostitutes in a room, and you could shoot them and kill them, or you could pay them money to strip and have sex with your character. He told me that his favorite thing to do was pay them money, then shoot them while they were half undressed so that their guts exploded all over the place like that.

This same kid once told me he'd clubbed my cat to death with his rollerblades. He hadn't, but to this day, I don't know if that's just because my cat wouldn't come near strangers. Later he threatened to dig up the grave of another cat if I wouldn't come out and play with him. Another time he pretended he was electrocuting his much younger brother and kicked him hard enough to stun to try to lend enough verisimilitude to convince me.

Was this because he was playing videogames? I don't know. But none of the other kids who didn't behave like this ever volunteered the information that they enjoyed playing a game where you paid women to strip and then shot them halfway through. And I don't really see many adults as being people who would want to play a game like that, so I'm really left with the idea that he was the target audience for the game.

But Bioshock, I would want to play. It's moral quandaries are not the same as you would find in a game like Grand Theft Auto or Hitman.

Two points:

First, does the game need to be photorealistic and with an emphasis on hand to hand up close combat to cover the moral quandaries of the game? My issue isn't the basic idea of killing people or the choice of saving/harvesting kids. It's making those people look and act recognizably human, and then viewing the results up close.

Second, since you enjoy the game, you're going to be biased against the idea of removing it in particular. This doesn't mean your arguments aren't valid, just that you're weighting things to also include the fact you want the game around as well as the issue of causing desensitization or not. (Similarly, I tend to like fantasy violence with no real consequences over realistic, even though it's suggested that gives people impressions that violence is okay, so I'm biased in favor of keeping that around.) Enjoyment isn't a meaningless consideration, but at the same time, better to work out if the underlying thing is a problem by itself, then how much of that is acceptable given artistic licence and such.

From:

blackaeronaut.livejournal.com

Okay, forgetting the whole Roman Empire thing for now (not that I don't love to argue the point with you)...

Those aren't taught, though.

Well golly-gee, Wondergirl! Ain't it obvious how we've gone from an age where the Golden Rule was preached to one where we're satisfied that our kids at least don't do drugs and don't get themselves pregnant? That is my point entirely. We no longer bother to actually teach these invaluable things to our kids.

And as for reactions... You seem to have forgotten one important fact about people in general: There is no such thing as a normal person. Everyone has quirks. Everyone has secrets. That principal of yours barely applies to the majority. I have a lady-friend who is quite the masochist - she even goes so far as to say that she likes menstrual cramps and thinks they feel 'cleansing'. I, myself, have got demons in my head that if you knew about you'd probably think me a sick and depraved person. Did the media or the gaming industry plant these things in my head? Some of them. Others are products of the dark side of my own imagination. I'm not perfect. Neither are you, nor is anyone else out there. That is why we need to make up for these imperfections, and it does not start with demonizing the Other Guy.

And yes, all children are latch-key kids. I was an unholy terror in that respect! Once, when I was three, I got out of my grandmother's house and walked five blocks down the busy road to a neighbors back yard where they had a huge trampoline that I liked. Gave my Mom a heart attack.

It all starts at home. Keep the TV's, gaming systems, and computers out in the open where they can be easily monitored. Program parental controls on said appliances. They exist (though with PC's any number of different, highly effective remedies can be administered), the industry has provided them. NOW USE THEM. You only have yourself to blame if your kids get ahold of your pin numbers because it was A) too easy to guess or B) left out in the open. As I said before, the Gaming Industry is not trying to pollute young minds. They are not the next Joe Camel's of the world, so stop trying to make them out to be such.

Oh, and if little Tommy's parents don't support your veiws on parental controls, then Joey can't go to play at Tommy's house... But Tommy is more than welcome to come over where we have working parental controls. I am not saying that it is a perfectly effective measure, but it still remains a very powerful tool to aid the vigilant parent.

Oh, of course, any child that is determined enough of going to find someway of getting past the system as a whole... But then, that is also where the parents come in to counsel, guide, and educate. You see, with an effective system in place, it is going to be pretty obvious that someone's been doing something they shouldn't be doing.

Now comes the part where I become very blunt, direct, and brutally honest (not, necessarily, in that order).

I have to wonder, do you even have kids of your own yet? If so, quit arguing the point with me and go spend some time with them for crying out loud! I can guarantee you, as a member of the US Navy, any spare moment I can get I am going to be spending with the family I hope to have sometime in the future.