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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Computer games, what is over the line?
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
From Grand Theft Auto, first person shooter games of all kinds,Pipe Trouble (link to game's site), and now, The Life of Anne Frank, we have seen the growth of video games into just about everything.
At what point has a video game gone too far? Is the Anne Frank game over the line? Suicide bombing? What if someone made a game about the twin tower, 11 Sept attacks? At what point is it too much?
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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HCH
Shipmate
# 14313
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Posted
It seems to me things could get worse. It is easy to imagine games based on:
--- escaping slaves (from either POV)
--- shopping at Macy's after Thanksgiving
--- gang life in any of various cities
--- triage in an emergency room
--- a suicide bomber (achieve the maximum effect)
--- the Inquisition (how long can you hold out?)
--- the sinking of the Titanic
--- surviving a day of high school
--- buying drugs without being cheated or arrested
--- survival in Rwanda or Sierra Leone, etc.
--- the Dust Bowl in 1930s Kansas
Some of these are worse than others (Macy's! high school!) and some may already have been invented.
Posts: 1540 | From: Illinois, USA | Registered: Nov 2008
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TurquoiseTastic
Fish of a different color
# 8978
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Posted
But it is easy to imagine a film being made about any of these topics. Or a book being written. And they might be good, inspiring films, or terrible, awful films. It would depend on how it was done.
There was, for example, quite a famous and popular series of games ("Dungeon Keeper") based on being a chief torturer. It wasn't to my taste, but it had a predominantly jokey tone which kept it from being too grim.
Or take the multifarious horror films that are out there (Saw etc. spring to mind) - basically (imaginary) extreme human suffering as entertainment. I think most computer games are mild compared to that. I guess there could be (maybe there are?) games based on these franchises which could be pretty unpleasant. I don't like these films, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have harmful effects, but we seem to tolerate them. So I expect we will just tolerate games of this nature as well.
Posts: 1092 | From: Hants., UK | Registered: Jan 2005
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
I blame Jesus. I was a total Age-of-Empires, Medal-of-Honour, Call-of-Duty addict. I used to have to cross the Vistula every night for weeks in a T34. Modern Warfare. Just AWESOME. Last year I was confronted by Jesus the pacifist. And I just can't do it any more! And I miss it!!
I wish I could go back to it!!! I can't.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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the giant cheeseburger
Shipmate
# 10942
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by HCH:
It seems to me things could get worse. It is easy to imagine games based on:
...
--- triage in an emergency room
...
Some of these are worse than others (Macy's! high school!) and some may already have been invented.
Is this close enough to tick one of your boxes?
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If I give a homeopathy advocate a really huge punch in the face, can the injury be cured by giving them another really small punch in the face?
Posts: 4834 | From: Adelaide, South Australia. | Registered: Jan 2006
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by HCH:
It seems to me things could get worse. It is easy to imagine games based on:
--- escaping slaves (from either POV)
--- shopping at Macy's after Thanksgiving
--- gang life in any of various cities
--- triage in an emergency room
--- a suicide bomber (achieve the maximum effect)
--- the Inquisition (how long can you hold out?)
--- the sinking of the Titanic
--- surviving a day of high school
--- buying drugs without being cheated or arrested
--- survival in Rwanda or Sierra Leone, etc.
--- the Dust Bowl in 1930s Kansas
Some of these are worse than others (Macy's! high school!) and some may already have been invented.
As an avid console and recently a PC gamer and one time game tester, I recall a console game that came out in the 2000's that stirred up a lot of controversy, wasn't a very good game and bit the proverbial dust rather quickly. It was so unpopular that I can't remember the name of it but you were a soldier fighting the "gooks" in Vietnam. You had to go and burn villages down and kill the Vietcong. Gosh, what a great idea! My partner plays a lot of console games about World War II. She takes great delight in killing Nazis. I wonder why it's okay to kill Nazis but not so acceptable to kill V.C.?!
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 3451 | From: Tacoma, WA USA | Registered: Aug 2007
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Bob Two-Owls
Shipmate
# 9680
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Posted
The fantastic game Canis Canem Edit (dog eat dog, retitled Bully for the American market) was a school survival game that got banned in Brazil. The actual game was more like my experience of school as a pupil rather than my more recent experience as a teacher. Hi-jinks and general naughtiness rather than full-on Columbine or Sandy Hook simulation.
(I would give you a link but The Ship does not want to play ball with the parentheses in the Wikipedia URL)
Posts: 1262 | Registered: Jul 2005
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BroJames
Shipmate
# 9636
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Posted
Link to Wiki article, thanks to tinyurl.com
TBH I just don't like any video games which involve killing things, and even more when it's people. I suppose killing zombies might be OK, but the whole zombie thing creeps me out!
ISTM that the whole thing encourages an objectifying process in relation to others which is akin to pornography. These 'people' only matter in relation to their impact on us, and ours on them. There is no backstory, as their always must be in real life of grieving parents, siblings, spouses or children. The less like real people they are the better, but in general the gaming industry is heading in the opposite direction.
Also there is a false sense of immortality in the player who can easily be reincarnated for the next episode of the game.
I guess I'm just a killjoy!
Posts: 3374 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2005
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
What if someone made a game about the twin tower, 11 Sept attacks? At what point is it too much?
In some ways, this has already been done. It's called Flight Simulator. You are meant to avoid the buildings, take off and land safely, but there's nothing to stop you aiming at tall buildings.
In a very early incarnation of the game, I remember aiming to fly underneath the Golden Gate Bridge, though I repeatedly failed by going either into the water or the bridge.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
Posts: 3791 | From: On the corporate ladder | Registered: Jan 2012
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The medical triage game might exist, too - for training triage nurses.
It's not as easy to draw the line as you might think.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The simulator used by pilots isn't a game - it's a flight simulator.
Several times a year the go into one to practice things like loss of an engine, fire in the hold etc, which can not be practiced for real.
Medical professionals simulate emergencies in practice - but they don't use games.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
Boogie - I think you misunderstand. What I had in mind, and what I think Jane R also had in mind (correct me if I'm wrong) is a game like this. There are lots of similar titles.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
Posts: 3791 | From: On the corporate ladder | Registered: Jan 2012
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Amorya
Ship's tame galoot
# 2652
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The simulator used by pilots isn't a game - it's a flight simulator.
What's the difference?
Amorya
Posts: 2383 | From: Coventry | Registered: Apr 2002
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Hawk
Semi-social raptor
# 14289
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Posted
Games seem to pushing the envelope in recent years. In Modern Warfare (2007) there was a scene where you played an undercover operative in a russian terrorist cell during a terror attack. You walked through an airport level executing as many civilians as possible. Yet this scene didn't have to be played to progress the game, and there was no encouragement to shoot civilians, you could walk through the level not firing your gun until the SWAT arrived and still complete it.
In Modern Warfare 3 (2009) you play a father taking photographs of his wife and child outside Big Ben as a van pulls up behind them and explodes, killing them both. Its pretty horrific, but again you can skip it, and you're not encouraged to commit any active role yourself.
Yet in GTA V there's a scene where you have to torture a man to get information from him. The character you play is a psychopath and you have to pick between using pliers, wrench, waterboarding or electric clips and actively torture the man four seperate times to get information while he screams and pleads for mercy. There's no way to skip the scenes, or choose not to torture the man. This is in comparison with Modern Warfare where you chase a suspect through a favela to capture him but the subsequent torture for his information takes place off-screen and you don't see or take part in it.
This is an example of the evolution of violence in big-budget mainstream games. Although if you look at lesser-known titles game companies have been playing with torture-porn for years. I'm not aware of anything as extreme as the scene in GTAV though. I think that's definitely crossing the line.
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“We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know." Dietrich Bonhoeffer
See my blog for 'interesting' thoughts
Posts: 1739 | From: Oxford, UK | Registered: Nov 2008
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Amorya:
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The simulator used by pilots isn't a game - it's a flight simulator.
What's the difference?
Amorya
A flight simulator does everything, motion, visuals, the lot.
This is exactly like the one my son trained in, he spent 1000s of hours in one before he was let loose in a real A320.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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the giant cheeseburger
Shipmate
# 10942
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Amorya:
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The simulator used by pilots isn't a game - it's a flight simulator.
What's the difference?
Amorya
A "flight simulation" computer game such as Microsoft Flight Simulator or one of the many others is designed for entertainment, to give a fun experience that is a little bit like flying and to have pretty graphics which look good on a home computer. You get a very average jack-of-all-trades approach that includes simplified controls and performance, and usually very inaccurate scenery and airport layouts that don't include the details a real pilot would use for landmarks when flying low. The level of detail is so low that there are whole companies which make their living from selling packages of better graphics for the ground and better models of aircraft to use in the games.
A proper simulator for training focuses on the controls and performance of a particular aircraft which are replicated in the full layout of the cockpit rather than on a computer screen. You don't get the nicest graphics, because the ground looking pretty is very much secondary to accurately simulating the performance of the aircraft including simulated failure modes.
Some pilots may use consumer-grade computer games like Microsoft Flight Simulator to check out a rough idea of what an unfamiliar area looks like. Most airlines would frown on that though, because a 2D image generated by a consumer-grade computer game simply cannot provide a realistic simulation of actually flying over the landmarks in real life. Better training methods would include navigational chart study, viewing videos shot from on board cameras, or riding in the cockpit with an experienced pilot on a real approach.
The same applies to rail drivers. They have full cab simulators (which are usually made by the same company making the real rolling stock) for training on the equipment. They may also have consumer-grade simulation games which they can use for a rough idea of a rail line's layout and landmarks (if it's been constructed well) which complement route learning videos and route learning trips on board actual trains. Doing a training-grade simulator that does an accurate job of both equipment and routes has never been done yet, the closest it gets is an equipment simulator with recorded video of the real route looking out of the simulator's windows.
[ 02. October 2013, 13:22: Message edited by: the giant cheeseburger ]
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If I give a homeopathy advocate a really huge punch in the face, can the injury be cured by giving them another really small punch in the face?
Posts: 4834 | From: Adelaide, South Australia. | Registered: Jan 2006
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Boogie: quote:
The simulator used by pilots isn't a game - it's a flight simulator.
I am aware of the difference between games and (real) flight simulators, thanks. However, I am reliably informed (by a member of the Royal Aeronautical Society) that Microsoft's game 'Flight Simulator' IS used by many commercial pilots to study the layout and approaches to airports they are unfamiliar with. Presumably they also fly in with someone who does know that airport the first couple of times, but the more practice (real, game, or simulated) they have, the better. IMNSHO.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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goperryrevs
Shipmtae
# 13504
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hawk:
Yet in GTA V there's a scene where you have to torture a man to get information from him. The character you play is a psychopath and you have to pick between using pliers, wrench, waterboarding or electric clips and actively torture the man four seperate times to get information while he screams and pleads for mercy. There's no way to skip the scenes, or choose not to torture the man. This is in comparison with Modern Warfare where you chase a suspect through a favela to capture him but the subsequent torture for his information takes place off-screen and you don't see or take part in it.
It's interesting that your wording is "you torture a man". For me, playing through that scene, it was Trevor torturing the man. Not me. Same as when I watch Jack Bauer torturing someone in 24.
Computer games are obviously immersive in that the player 'inhabits' the character, and that can be to various degrees. Simply the view from which the game is played can have a large effect. Call of Duty is first-person, so it 'feels' like you're the one shooting at people. GTA is (mostly) third-person, so, even though you're pressing the buttons, you're watching the scene like in a movie.*
With GTA as well, you're playing as 3 different characters, so for me, it feels even less as if I "am" one of those characters. I'm just interacting in their story, seeing how it plays out.
With a role-playing game, it's different again. You get to name your character, choose their physical attributes and skills, and you can often play through the whole game from a first-person view. Decisions you make in the game have a tangible effect in the world, rather than the story being 'on rails'. And as a result, many people seem to find it very difficult to make the bad moral choices in those kind of games, because it seems more 'real'. I've come across a few people who played through and completed Fallout 3 being 'good', and decided to start again and be evil instead, only to find that they can't go through with it. Even so, as the name gives a way, it's a role-playing game. It's not you. It's you adopting a role, playing a character.
* Even then it's more nuanced. Peep Show (a TV show filmed only from 1st person view) doesn't make me feel like I "am" the characters, but shows me the world from their point of view.
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"Keep your eye on the donut, not on the hole." - David Lynch
Posts: 2098 | From: Midlands | Registered: Mar 2008
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
At what point has a video game gone too far?
Never.
It's a game. Not real life. Fantasy. Made up. Pretend.
If you find a game that happens to push your buttons the wrong way, don't play it. If you find a game which encourages you to fantasise in ways you find uncomfortable, don't play it. Those are matters of personal taste and personal responsibility, and provide no grounds for drawing some ethical line around games which no one should be allowed to play.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
And Flight Simulator is used by many airline pilots to practise flying into airports they are unfamiliar with. Isn't it better for them to practise with a computer game, when hitting the Golden Gate Bridge or overrunning the runway will not kill anyone?
The medical triage game might exist, too - for training triage nurses.
It's not as easy to draw the line as you might think.
Yes, for example the Anne Frank game noted above struck me as horrific... until I read the link and realized it sounded a lot like some of the things you will find in a well-designed interactive museum like the Holocaust museum. Whether or not they do it well, I couldn't say, but the intent seems to be to build empathy rather than undermine it. (Note that your first person experience is as Anne, not a Nazi).
That being said, unlike other posters here, I have serious concerns about video game violence. I believe we are seeing effects here in the US. I think lines should and do need to be drawn, and am attempting to draw them with my own children. At the same time, I won't pretend that drawing the lines will ever be neat and tidy.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Arabella Purity Winterbottom
Trumpeting hope
# 3434
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
That being said, unlike other posters here, I have serious concerns about video game violence. I believe we are seeing effects here in the US. I think lines should and do need to be drawn, and am attempting to draw them with my own children. At the same time, I won't pretend that drawing the lines will ever be neat and tidy.
I have the same concerns. I have them about television and the movies as well. I work with kids who have severe behaviour problems. Over the last few years I've been more and more convinced that a lot of these kids don't have that inner knowledge of "real" vs "fantasy." They seem to see, for example, GTA, as art imitating life, and they take it very seriously, much more seriously than I ever would (yep, I've played it and enjoyed it). For me, its a game. For them, its training.
Its an interesting change for me, because when I worked for the censorship office 10 years ago, I was very against the censorship of games. Now I've seen the effects of the increasing violence of TV/movies/games on vulnerable young people, I'm not so convinced.
Its also an area in which I don't trust the research at all, since it is almost all highly polarised (effects all good, all bad).
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Hell is full of the talented and Heaven is full of the energetic. St Jane Frances de Chantal
Posts: 3702 | From: Aotearoa, New Zealand | Registered: Oct 2002
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arabella Purity Winterbottom:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
That being said, unlike other posters here, I have serious concerns about video game violence. I believe we are seeing effects here in the US. I think lines should and do need to be drawn, and am attempting to draw them with my own children. At the same time, I won't pretend that drawing the lines will ever be neat and tidy.
I have the same concerns. I have them about television and the movies as well. I work with kids who have severe behaviour problems. Over the last few years I've been more and more convinced that a lot of these kids don't have that inner knowledge of "real" vs "fantasy." They seem to see, for example, GTA, as art imitating life, and they take it very seriously, much more seriously than I ever would (yep, I've played it and enjoyed it). For me, its a game. For them, its training.
Its an interesting change for me, because when I worked for the censorship office 10 years ago, I was very against the censorship of games. Now I've seen the effects of the increasing violence of TV/movies/games on vulnerable young people, I'm not so convinced.
Its also an area in which I don't trust the research at all, since it is almost all highly polarised (effects all good, all bad).
yes. All that.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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goperryrevs
Shipmtae
# 13504
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
yes. All that.
Ditto, but the key word is "kids".
There is absolutely no way that kids should be playing these kinds of games, just as they shouldn't be watching similar films.
BBFC makes the ratings but there is very little done to enforce them. Exposing kids to games and films like this when they're too young is utterly wrong. IMO there's a lot more than needs to be done in terms of education and policy. For example, if a teacher finds out a primary school kid is watching and playing 18 rated material, there should be a call to Social Services. Problem is, a the moment that would probably mean visits to half the parents of the kids in the class in some schools. Might not be a bad thing, though...
And then there's the issue of how screwed up the rating system has become as well... Many ratings are way too low.
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"Keep your eye on the donut, not on the hole." - David Lynch
Posts: 2098 | From: Midlands | Registered: Mar 2008
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Justinian
Shipmate
# 5357
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by HCH:
It seems to me things could get worse. It is easy to imagine games based on:
--- escaping slaves (from either POV)
--- shopping at Macy's after Thanksgiving
--- gang life in any of various cities
--- triage in an emergency room
--- a suicide bomber (achieve the maximum effect)
--- the Inquisition (how long can you hold out?)
--- the sinking of the Titanic
--- surviving a day of high school
--- buying drugs without being cheated or arrested
--- survival in Rwanda or Sierra Leone, etc.
--- the Dust Bowl in 1930s Kansas
Some of these are worse than others (Macy's! high school!) and some may already have been invented.
If you count tabletop RPGs rather than computer games that's variously:
--- Steal away Jordan
--- Fiasco
--- Arguably any Cyberpunk or most World of Darkness games
--- Pass
--- Both Montsegur 1244 and Dogs in the Vineyard come close in different ways (Montsegur is about the fall of one of the Cathar strongholds, and Dogs is about the price you are willing to pay)
--- Fiasco again
--- Monsterhearts
--- A GM in any WoD system. Or Fiasco.
--- Dog Eat Dog
--- What are you doing there? (I can't answer that directly).
Fiasco in particular is an awesome two hour game that I'd recommend to anyone with an interest in storytelling/writing/acting and who likes black comedies. And I'd recommend all the named games.
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My real name consists of just four letters, but in billions of combinations.
Eudaimonaic Laughter - my blog.
Posts: 3926 | From: The Sea Coast of Bohemia | Registered: Dec 2003
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the giant cheeseburger
Shipmate
# 10942
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by goperryrevs:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
yes. All that.
Ditto, but the key word is "kids".
There is absolutely no way that kids should be playing these kinds of games, just as they shouldn't be watching similar films.
BBFC makes the ratings but there is very little done to enforce them. Exposing kids to games and films like this when they're too young is utterly wrong. IMO there's a lot more than needs to be done in terms of education and policy. For example, if a teacher finds out a primary school kid is watching and playing 18 rated material, there should be a call to Social Services. Problem is, a the moment that would probably mean visits to half the parents of the kids in the class in some schools. Might not be a bad thing, though...
And then there's the issue of how screwed up the rating system has become as well... Many ratings are way too low.
There are two problems with the ratings systems:
1. Depending on the national system, many of the ratings are often recommendations rather than restrictions. The G (General), PG (Parental Guidance recommended for children under 15) and M (not recommended for children under 15, contains mature themes) ratings in Australia are all purely advisory.
2. Even when certain ratings do restrict rather than just recommend, only purchases are regulated and not use. The MA15+ (Mature Audiences), R18+ (Restricted - Adults) and X18+ ratings in Australia are all restrictive in regards to the purchase only, if a parent/guardian chooses to do so they can allow their child to watch/play such material or even attend a movie at a cinema with them if it's a MA15+ movie.
It does work to a certain degree, earlier this year Saints Row IV was the first computer game to be refused even the R18+ classification (and therefore refused sale) under new guidelines here. It would have been good if GTA V got the same treatment.
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If I give a homeopathy advocate a really huge punch in the face, can the injury be cured by giving them another really small punch in the face?
Posts: 4834 | From: Adelaide, South Australia. | Registered: Jan 2006
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Russ
Old salt
# 120
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by TurquoiseTastic:
I don't like these films, and I wouldn't be surprised if they have harmful effects, but we seem to tolerate them. So I expect we will just tolerate games of this nature as well.
Agree - computer games are just another art form, and the fact that they are newer than films or books doesn't of itself make them any better or worse.
I too suspect that there's something unhealthy in the quantity and degree of violence that many people routinely engage with through the media of film and TV, that our culture tolerates a little too much in this regard. But there seems to be no clear principle, no well-defined line that helps us judge that this scene in this movie is OK but that scene in that movie isn't.
Best wishes,
Russ
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Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
At what point has a video game gone too far?
Never.
It's a game. Not real life. Fantasy. Made up. Pretend.
If you find a game that happens to push your buttons the wrong way, don't play it. If you find a game which encourages you to fantasise in ways you find uncomfortable, don't play it. Those are matters of personal taste and personal responsibility, and provide no grounds for drawing some ethical line around games which no one should be allowed to play.
Couldn't have said it better myself, Eliab. You'd think we'd be past the pearl-clutching stage on this, but apparently not!
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
Posts: 2512 | From: Oakland, CA | Registered: Feb 2008
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Eliab: quote:
If you find a game that happens to push your buttons the wrong way, don't play it. If you find a game which encourages you to fantasise in ways you find uncomfortable, don't play it. Those are matters of personal taste and personal responsibility...
...and that's fine for responsible adults, although for some people 'don't play it' might be easier said than done. I shouldn't waste time posting on the Ship when I ought to be doing something else, but I find it hard to stop myself.
However, I share cliffdweller and Arabella's concern about the effect of very violent games, TV and films on children. They don't understand the difference between reality and fantasy as well as an adult. So they learn a) that it's OK to beat people up or even kill them to get what you want and b) that you can do stupidly dangerous things and survive unscathed. Then they go to school... or the park... or cross the road...
Of course responsible parents will try to keep unsuitable material away from their children, but even things that are supposed to be suitable can be problematic (eg The Rescuers II, which has a scene where a small lizard is shot at almost point-blank range with a shotgun and walks away unhurt). And what about children with clueless or irresponsible parents, do we just write them off?
If this is pearl-clutching, then call me Mother of Pearl. I do think it's hard to draw the line, but there ought to be a line somewhere.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
However, I share cliffdweller and Arabella's concern about the effect of very violent games, TV and films on children. They don't understand the difference between reality and fantasy as well as an adult.
Just a question, why would we draw the line at just these sorts of media, what about books? I mean, once you go down the slippery slope type of reasoning - what prevents you from banning anything that is even vaguely questionable (which pretty much where a lot of fundamentalists would stand).
As something that might be interesting, there is one MMO i'm aware of where theft, deception, piracy etc are not only present but are actively encouraged by the game makers. This is an interesting article written by someone who plays that MMO (EVE) which (jargon aside) may make interesting reading as to another point of view:
http://aidenmourn.wordpress.com/2013/06/27/in-defense-of-the-dark-side/
He makes the definition between the self and the roles we play - in a way that makes parallels with little boys pretending to be cowboys (or using a stick as a gun to shoot each other etc).
There's an interesting sidenote here too:
http://aidenmourn.wordpress.com/2011/09/07/the-way-you-are-playing/
The paragraph starting:
"If you play this game long enough, (actually it takes about a week to run into your first one), you’ll begin to notice that there is a sizable group of misguided do-gooders in this game who honestly believe that who they are in a video game is a DIRECT EXTENSION of who they are in real life."
[ 05. October 2013, 09:58: Message edited by: chris stiles ]
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
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Arabella Purity Winterbottom
Trumpeting hope
# 3434
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Posted
A few years ago I would have agreed. Now I work with kids who really, really don't get that violent games are fantasy. And that teenage soaps are fantasy. And that movies are fantasy. Really.
Their parents don't care, either. I'm reminded of friends who thought that their 13-year-old daughter's request to watch Pulp Fiction was perfectly OK, then wondered why she and her friends were so upset (perfect sleepover movie, not). And they were generally OK parents.
I think its hilarious that someone has mentioned books. The kids I'm talking about wouldn't know what to do with a book if it landed in their McDonalds.
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Hell is full of the talented and Heaven is full of the energetic. St Jane Frances de Chantal
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
What Arabella said.
Oh, and I do understand the difference between playing an RPG or video game and doing this sort of thing in real life. There are people out there who don't, though. I'm surprised you haven't met any of them.
And you think *I* have a sheltered life?
[ 05. October 2013, 11:49: Message edited by: Jane R ]
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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chris stiles
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# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
What Arabella said.
Oh, and I do understand the difference between playing an RPG or video game and doing this sort of thing in real life. There are people out there who don't, though. I'm surprised you haven't met any of them.
[Not all of my post was in response to you - I brought up the links because I felt it was interesting in the context of the entire subject.]
I've met people like this - however my question to you is if you are going to go down the road of banning things based on these people, ISTM that you'll have to go a lot further than the list of things you mentioned (there's a reasonable case for banning large amounts of childrens fiction, based on this kind of argument).
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
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cliffdweller
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# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
However, I share cliffdweller and Arabella's concern about the effect of very violent games, TV and films on children. They don't understand the difference between reality and fantasy as well as an adult.
Just a question, why would we draw the line at just these sorts of media, what about books? I mean, once you go down the slippery slope type of reasoning - what prevents you from banning anything that is even vaguely questionable (which pretty much where a lot of fundamentalists would stand).
Ah, the slippery slope argument.
Again, we all agree that "drawing the line" is going to be difficulty, messy, and possibly unfair at times. I have to "draw the line" with my kids all the time, and haven't found that easy to do. I start with some broad guidelines (no R movies, for ex.) and then make exceptions on both sides of the line (there are R movies I'll allow, and PG13 I won't).
It's not easy, but the fact that something is hard, that it doesn't lend itself well to black-and-white solutions, that it can be misused, is no the same as saying it's not worth doing.
When it comes to genre, yes, our family looks at violence in all media, not just video games. It is the overall violent imagery in our society that is the problem, not video games in particular. That being said, different forms of media seem to engage the user in different ways, which may magnify the impact. Reading a book engages the reader in a very different way than a movie, which engages the viewer in a different way than a game. I'm concerned about all forms of violence in media, but from my own non-scientific observation, I'm more concerned about first-person video games than I am about literary media.
ymmv
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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chris stiles
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# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Again, we all agree that "drawing the line" is going to be difficulty, messy, and possibly unfair at times. I have to "draw the line" with my kids all the time, and haven't found that easy to do. I start with some broad guidelines (no R movies, for ex.) and then make exceptions on both sides of the line (there are R movies I'll allow, and PG13 I won't).
Yes, and I'm sure most of us - whether parents or not - make the same sorts of calculations all the time. Including the exceptions on both sides of the line (which incidentally indicates how difficult this sort of thing to legislate).
quote:
It's not easy, but the fact that something is hard, that it doesn't lend itself well to black-and-white solutions, that it can be misused, is no the same as saying it's not worth doing.
Absolutely, and on a personal level each of us will make a similar set of calculations for either ourselves or our families. On a societal level there are already age related classifications for things like video games. So other than a general moral concern, I'm not sure what more should be done.
quote:
I'm concerned about all forms of violence in media, but from my own non-scientific observation, I'm more concerned about first-person video games than I am about literary media.
I would agree with you to an extent. OTOH I'm sure there are plenty of people for whom reading 'The Fountainhead' at 13 would ultimately be more morally corrosive than playing GTA V - and I know some of them too.
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by chris stiles:
I would agree with you to an extent. OTOH I'm sure there are plenty of people for whom reading 'The Fountainhead' at 13 would ultimately be more morally corrosive than playing GTA V - and I know some of them too.
Agh, good point!
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
However, I share cliffdweller and Arabella's concern about the effect of very violent games, TV and films on children. They don't understand the difference between reality and fantasy as well as an adult.
As a general principle, I think that is entirely untrue.
Stories, fantasy, games, pretend, dress-up ... these are things that ordinary children understand very well indeed. Better than many adults.
quote:
So they learn a) that it's OK to beat people up or even kill them to get what you want and b) that you can do stupidly dangerous things and survive unscathed. Then they go to school... or the park... or cross the road...
Now you're just making shit up.
Whatever the hell you are talking about there isn't normal psychology. Thousands, millions, of kids watch cartoons, play war games, enjoy all sorts of fantasy violence, and almost none of them think it's OK to kill and walk in front of cars. That's pathological behaviour.
quote:
Of course responsible parents will try to keep unsuitable material away from their children
I think it more important to help children form characters that are resilient enough to cope with unsuitable material than to shield them from it. Censorship might be part of that process but it is a means to an end. Responsible parental censorship should work towards its own abolition - the aim is to produce children who don't need it.
But all that is beside the main point. The question in the OP is whether there are ideas that we shouldn't be allowed to make part of our play - that is things we shouldn't be allowed to enjoy thinking about. Fuck that. I remember the joyless shits of the church of my childhood arguing that people like me shouldn't be allowed to play D&D, for exactly the same reasons that today's joyless shits give for video games. It's not about protecting children. It's resentment of other people's love of frivolous pleasure. Since frivolous pleasure ranks amongst the very greatest achievements of our species, opposition to it is simply inhumane.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
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Dafyd
Shipmate
# 5549
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
The question in the OP is whether there are ideas that we shouldn't be allowed to make part of our play - that is things we shouldn't be allowed to enjoy thinking about.
There's two questions here - one is whether certain ideas in entertainment ought to be illegal or banned. And then there's whether enjoying thinking about certain things is morally wrong in itself.
OK - the people who want things banned generally want things banned because they depict sexual activity, or imply sexual activity that the person disapproves of, or deal with the 'occult', etc. But I don't think it's fair to lump together those campaigns for banning with criticism on grounds of racism or sexual discrimination, for instance. More generally, if art is interesting it is because it provokes thought, and art cannot take credit for provoking thought when it is clever or inspiring unless it also loses credit when it's banal or unethical.
I wouldn't want to ban Ayn Rand or Left Behind. But it seems wrong to say that because they're fiction they can't be criticised. It ought to be possible to criticise 24 for its depiction of torture. (Allegedly 24 did play some part in legitimising torture in the minds of some people in the CIA. I do not think those people were simply misreading.)
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
But all that is beside the main point. The question in the OP is whether there are ideas that we shouldn't be allowed to make part of our play - that is things we shouldn't be allowed to enjoy thinking about. Fuck that. I remember the joyless shits of the church of my childhood arguing that people like me shouldn't be allowed to play D&D, for exactly the same reasons that today's joyless shits give for video games. It's not about protecting children. It's resentment of other people's love of frivolous pleasure. Since frivolous pleasure ranks amongst the very greatest achievements of our species, opposition to it is simply inhumane.
OK, my turn to call BS.
I can't speak for the folks, joyless or otherwise, at your church growing up, but I will say that for most of us, particularly most of us parents, engaging in this conversation, it is very much about protecting children. It is ALL about protecting children. That doesn't mean me-- or "they" (others who might draw lines differently)-- aren't wrong. That's entirely possible. But even if we or others are going about it in entirely the wrong way and causing more harm than good, the motive is NOT "resentment of other's frivolous pleasure." Like most parents, I find my children's "frivolous pleasure" probably the source of my own greatest joy and "frivolous pleasure" . I also believe, apparently with you, that it is the primary way that children learn, grow, and develop character. So please stop creating a strawman by misrepresenting the motives of those who disagree with you and stick to debating whether or not some degree of censorship of video games does or does not help them reach their goal of yes, "protecting children."
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
There's two questions here - one is whether certain ideas in entertainment ought to be illegal or banned. And then there's whether enjoying thinking about certain things is morally wrong in itself.
Possibly there are things that it is (sometimes, for some people, in some contexts) to enjoy thinking about. I just don't think that it's anyone else's business.
A recent example from my experience: a friend lent me a DVD of the film "The Boat that Rocked" which I had not previously seen. Fairly early in the film, there's a scene where an adult character about to take a woman to bed, and desirous of doing a favour for a younger character, is trying to contrive a way of substituting this horny, teen, virgin for himself in a way that will not arouse the suspicions of his sexual partner. Morally (though not, at least at the time the film is set, legally), this is basically rape. It is also played entirely for laughs.
I didn't enjoy that scene. I couldn't watch it without engaging my strong sense of disapproval at what was being portrayed, and the discrepancy between that, and the reaction which I took the film-maker to be aiming for, was so great that it put me off watching the rest of the movie*. I could have watched, and appreciated, a similar storyline in a horror film with no difficulty. I hated it in a (purported) comedy.
I wouldn't say that a film with a rape scene is for that reason immoral. I certainly wouldn't say that people psychologically equipped to enjoy "The Boat that Rocked" are less moral than I am. If they can appreciate the slapstick humour of that scene, good luck to them. If they find in it some vein of irony or black humour that I was too dense to see, then I'm cool with them enjoying it. It's just that I didn't, and that I, with my psychological make-up, would be a worse person if I started to find that scene funny, so I won't be watching that movie again.
I've no problem with people who can't, or don't want to, enjoy the darker humour which I can and do appreciate, so long as they don't start saying that my hobbies cross some objective line of moral acceptability. We're talking 'made up stories' here. It's all subjective. Subjective effects on particular viewers are the only things that count, and these are highly variable.
*(It's fair to say that as the film is not, in fact, very good, I didn't require a whole lot of putting off)
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Pomona
Shipmate
# 17175
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Arabella Purity Winterbottom:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
That being said, unlike other posters here, I have serious concerns about video game violence. I believe we are seeing effects here in the US. I think lines should and do need to be drawn, and am attempting to draw them with my own children. At the same time, I won't pretend that drawing the lines will ever be neat and tidy.
I have the same concerns. I have them about television and the movies as well. I work with kids who have severe behaviour problems. Over the last few years I've been more and more convinced that a lot of these kids don't have that inner knowledge of "real" vs "fantasy." They seem to see, for example, GTA, as art imitating life, and they take it very seriously, much more seriously than I ever would (yep, I've played it and enjoyed it). For me, its a game. For them, its training.
Its an interesting change for me, because when I worked for the censorship office 10 years ago, I was very against the censorship of games. Now I've seen the effects of the increasing violence of TV/movies/games on vulnerable young people, I'm not so convinced.
Its also an area in which I don't trust the research at all, since it is almost all highly polarised (effects all good, all bad).
Children inappropriately accessing adult material is no reason to stop adults from accessing adult material. Violent video games are adult material, period. The fault is not with the games makers, but with the parents who allow their children to play them. It also sounds as if the children you mention need help with their emotional intelligence, something which is also not the problem of people who make adult material intended for use by adults.
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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]
Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
I can't speak for the folks, joyless or otherwise, at your church growing up, but I will say that for most of us, particularly most of us parents, engaging in this conversation, it is very much about
protecting children. It is ALL about protecting children.
I don't think that you're a joyless shit. The criticism wasn't made at you.
quote:
So please stop creating a strawman by misrepresenting the motives of those who disagree with you and stick to debating whether or not some degree of censorship of video games does or does not help them reach their goal of yes, "protecting children."
Protecting kids from what? The wrong sort of fun?
Children don't live in a moral vacuum. Children's TV, films, books, lessons at school, are crammed with 'morals'. Children are exposed to moral teaching all the time. The pro-censorship side conveniently ignores this, apparently supposing that they get all their ethics from Grand Theft Auto. It always picks new technologies to criticise as pernicious. It used to be going to the cinema that would destroy the morals of our nation's children (now grandparents and great-grandparents). Then it was TV. Role-playing games had their moment in the spotlight, before computer games became the new season's villain.
Children (or, at least, a lot of them) have a healthy appreciation for the exciting, the macabre, the rebellious, the daring, the inappropriate and the outrageous. This is A GOOD THING. It means that they are people, that they are human, that they have independent, working minds. The pro-censorship side don't get that, and have never got it. They pick on stuff that's new, that they find uncomfortable, that they don't understand. What the fuck are they protecting children from? From thinking.
I hate it. I loathe the whole fucking disrespect for children that tries to protect them from their own minds. I despise the blanket condemnation of this or that sort of entertainment that denies personal and parental individual responsibility.
Without wanting to impugn your personal motives (seriously) I do think that anyone who takes the view that a sort of entertainment that they themselves don't like is therefore morally unacceptable for everyone has gone badly wrong. I don't like it when people (generally very ignorant of what I enjoy about them) tell me that my hobbies are immoral. I should not follow their example in relation to things that I don't much enjoy.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
That doesn't mean me-- or "they" (others who might draw lines differently)-- aren't wrong. That's entirely possible. But even if we or others are going about it in entirely the wrong way and causing more harm than good
I tend to agree with your sentiments - though I also agree with Eliab that it's often new forms of things that come under suspicion.
One fairly clear example of this was the D&D panic - in retrospect I'm sure most of the panic was down to plain ignorance of what was going on.
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
I can't speak for the folks, joyless or otherwise, at your church growing up, but I will say that for most of us, particularly most of us parents, engaging in this conversation, it is very much about
protecting children. It is ALL about protecting children.
I don't think that you're a joyless shit. The criticism wasn't made at you.
quote:
So please stop creating a strawman by misrepresenting the motives of those who disagree with you and stick to debating whether or not some degree of censorship of video games does or does not help them reach their goal of yes, "protecting children."
Protecting kids from what? The wrong sort of fun?
Children don't live in a moral vacuum. Children's TV, films, books, lessons at school, are crammed with 'morals'. Children are exposed to moral teaching all the time. The pro-censorship side conveniently ignores this, apparently supposing that they get all their ethics from Grand Theft Auto. It always picks new technologies to criticise as pernicious. It used to be going to the cinema that would destroy the morals of our nation's children (now grandparents and great-grandparents). Then it was TV. Role-playing games had their moment in the spotlight, before computer games became the new season's villain.
Children (or, at least, a lot of them) have a healthy appreciation for the exciting, the macabre, the rebellious, the daring, the inappropriate and the outrageous. This is A GOOD THING. It means that they are people, that they are human, that they have independent, working minds. The pro-censorship side don't get that, and have never got it. They pick on stuff that's new, that they find uncomfortable, that they don't understand. What the fuck are they protecting children from? From thinking.
I hate it. I loathe the whole fucking disrespect for children that tries to protect them from their own minds. I despise the blanket condemnation of this or that sort of entertainment that denies personal and parental individual responsibility.
Without wanting to impugn your personal motives (seriously) I do think that anyone who takes the view that a sort of entertainment that they themselves don't like is therefore morally unacceptable for everyone has gone badly wrong. I don't like it when people (generally very ignorant of what I enjoy about them) tell me that my hobbies are immoral. I should not follow their example in relation to things that I don't much enjoy.
Yes, that's a sound and compelling argument of the core OP question of whether some sort of limits/ censorship is effective/ appropriate. That's the sort of discussion that is helpful
And it's most helpful because, unlike your prior post, you aren't misconstruing our motives. Despite your denials here, you WERE impugning my motives and those who wish to "protect" our children.
I appreciate your argument that that very "protection" may, in fact, do more harm than good. I appreciate your argument that children need to explore the same themes, emotions, etc. as adults. I don't entirely agree, but I can appreciate your point. And I can do so more effectively when you recognize that my intent and the intent of most everyone else arguing the pro-limits side is not "jealousy of their frivolous pleasure". It may be a misguided over-protection, but it is certainly not jealous desire to shut down all joy.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
It was Alfred Bandura who showed in the 1960s that children watching other children be aggressive on TV or by direct observation were more aggressive afterwards (does anyone else recall the bobo doll studies?). The effects held for several hours, but he didn't research the prolonged exposure and video and computer games did not exist.
I found a couple of links to the American Psychological Association which states.
quote:
http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2003/10/anderson.aspx
Myth 1. Violent video game research has yielded very mixed results.
Facts: Some studies have yielded nonsignificant video game effects, just as some smoking studies failed to find a significant link to lung cancer. But when one combines all relevant empirical studies using meta-analytic techniques, five separate effects emerge with considerable consistency. Violent video games are significantly associated with: increased aggressive behavior, thoughts, and affect; increased physiological arousal; and decreased prosocial (helping) behavior.
quote:
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2010/06/violent-video-games.aspx
video game violence can increase aggression in some individuals, depending on their personalities.
So this suggests that some games are probably bad for at least some children, and this is based on their individual differences in personality, but probably affects all children in some general ways, just like eating lots of sugar is probably bad for all children but particularly bad for this who are prone to diabetes and associated conditions like metabolic syndrome.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Eliab: quote:
I remember the joyless shits of the church of my childhood arguing that people like me shouldn't be allowed to play D&D, for exactly the same reasons that today's joyless shits give for video games. It's not about protecting children. It's resentment of other people's love of frivolous pleasure.
If this is really what you think of my reasons for concern about violent computer games, then there is no point in continuing this discussion. But just for the record, I have played RPGs myself (though Ars Magica rather than D&D); I'm not arguing from a position of complete ignorance, as you seem to imagine.
As no prophet has pointed out, there is some evidence to suggest that video game violence is very bad for some children and may affect the behaviour of all of them. Arabella works with children whose development has been affected by exposure to violent and inappropriate media.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I remember the joyless shits of the church of my childhood arguing that people like me shouldn't be allowed to play D&D, for exactly the same reasons that today's joyless shits give for video games. It's not about protecting children. It's resentment of other people's love of frivolous pleasure. Since frivolous pleasure ranks amongst the very greatest achievements of our species, opposition to it is simply inhumane.
Well that is a steaming pile of reasoning, yeah?
I'd argue while the arguments behind adult condemnation of D&D was were not based on reality, it was not about denial of pleasure. All I've read was about Satanism, in the case of Christians and disassociation with reality, in the case of others.
Not a drop of "We hates you, children, we does."
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I wouldn't say that a film with a rape scene is for that reason immoral.
If rape is immoral, then a rape scene played for fun is as well. You may argue the censorship line, but your moral reasoning is inconsistent.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I hate it. I loathe the whole fucking disrespect for children that tries to protect them from their own minds. I despise the blanket condemnation of this or that sort of entertainment that denies personal and parental individual responsibility.
It is not respect to treat them no differently than adults, it is ignorance.
Children do not reason identically to adults. This is science. Children are not merely adults with fewer experiences, their brains function differently. There brains are being shaped by what they are exposed to.
Though not conclusive, studies seem to indicate that exposure to violence leads to desensitisation. ISTM, for all ages,not just children.
BTW, loads of difference between D&D and GTA. One is imagination, the other is killing hookers.
Yes to game ratings, yes to labeling GTA adult.
Like many other things, the real argument is not censorship or no, but where to place the line.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
As no prophet has pointed out, there is some evidence to suggest that video game violence is very bad for some children and may affect the behaviour of all of them.
That's part of what I hate about the censorship argument. It treats statistical influences on behaviour as causes. They aren't. It's nonsense to suggest they are. People - children included - make choices. They have a degree of responsibility. If you want to stop a child being aggressive, you need to engage with that child as an individual.
I'm not denying that in some cases, restricting access to violent fantasies is going to be a good idea. My own approach to my kids is that I only play fighting games with people who are gentle in real life. And it works for my kids. Fighting games (which they love) have been a way to help them to be much, much less aggressive. I'm sure that there are other kids for whom it would not work.
The censorship side ignores individual differences and choices, and so is dumb, no matter how many statistics it can muster, because every single act of violence is the result of an individual choice by a particular person.
There simply isn't a short cut to good parenting. Even if it were possible to keep all violent games out of all children's hands (hint: it isn't) that's not a substitute for a responsible carer who knows and loves the child making a decision based on actual experience of what works for that person.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Dafyd
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# 5549
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Posted
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Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
There's two questions here - one is whether certain ideas in entertainment ought to be illegal or banned. And then there's whether enjoying thinking about certain things is morally wrong in itself.
Possibly there are things that it is (sometimes, for some people, in some contexts) to enjoy thinking about. I just don't think that it's anyone else's business.
I am a bit dubious about the 'I don't think it's anyone else's business'.
It's certainly not a good argument if somebody says that 'if a woman has consented to sleep with one man she has therefore consented to sleep with any man'. They don't get to us 'it's not anyone else's business' to be immune to criticism.
Now, you say that The Boat that Rocked uses a bed trick. It assumes that the implied reader will not have any moral objections that spoil the comedy for them, and that implies that the implied author and implied audience must to some degree endorse the above principle. So why should it's not anyone else's business work there?
It's fiction? But I can think of plenty of fiction which we praise for putting forward the right moral message. Huckleberry Finn, for example. That's a comic novel. Yet when it has Huck preferring to go to Hell rather than turn in an escaped slave, we praise that. So if it's not a category error to approve as it's written, it can't be a category error to criticise it if, with the implied author's approval, Huck had made the opposite choice.
The boundaries between fiction and non-fiction are blurry. There's no rigid wall that would allow one to say, on that side art for art's sake and on this side real life.
That it's possible in moral panics to criticise the wrong thing for the wrong reason, or even the right thing for the wrong reason, doesn't make criticism wrong as such. That's throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You don't throw morality as a whole out of the window merely because some people think some sexual acts are immoral when they aren't. The problem with moral criticism of RPGs isn't that it's criticism; it's that it's inaccurate.
There is I am told a Doctor Who script, never made for television, but subsequently made for radio, in which Zoe is brainwashed by radical feminists and has to be snapped out of it by Jamie smacking her. Finding that grossly offensive, and being glad it was never made for television, is not at all the same as objecting to Doctor Who as such.
[ 07. October 2013, 20:53: Message edited by: Dafyd ]
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we remain, thanks to original sin, much in love with talking about, rather than with, one another. Rowan Williams
Posts: 10567 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Feb 2004
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Eliab
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# 9153
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Posted
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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
I'd argue while the arguments behind adult condemnation of D&D was were not based on reality, it was not about denial of pleasure. All I've read was about Satanism, in the case of Christians and disassociation with reality, in the case of others.
It was entirely about denying people something which was known to be fun, based the assumption that something which was new, and not really understood, was therefore bad. A mix of malice and self-delusion. Just like the video games argument. It's exactly the same shit we've heard before.
Sure, some people swallow these arguments who ought to know better, and therefore really think they're doing right. But they're wrong.
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If rape is immoral, then a rape scene played for fun is as well. You may argue the censorship line, but your moral reasoning is inconsistent.
What?
How?
Why?
Surely what is immoral about rape is that it hurts people? That would be a pretty major moral difference between a rape and a rape scene, surely?
Now for me, and probably for you, rape is so distasteful, a frivolous portrayal of it is also distasteful, but that doesn't make it immoral. There's nothing inconsistent about saying that.
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Children do not reason identically to adults. This is science. Children are not merely adults with fewer experiences, their brains function differently.
Up to a point. But the differences between how individuals respond to various media are greater than just a binary division between 'adult' and 'child'.
And it simply isn't the case that games are the only influence, or the most important influence, on behaviour. Encouraging responsibility, discernment, common sense and self respect is much more important in education. Those things are inconsistent with censorship. You can't simultaneously build someone up to be a responsible adult and tell them that they are so morally immature there are fucking gamesthey aren't allowed to play. Censorship is a surrender of moral aspirations. It says that people can't be trusted to make their own decisions, and that is disrespectful.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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