Violent video games
1 | Sir: I was disappointed to see the | same basic principle as Doom. Attacks | ||||
Analysis on violent video games (8 | on games for presumed effects of their | |||||
January) trotting out the same old | violent content is merely another stage | |||||
myths about media violence. | in the history of media criticism. | |||||
2 | American researchers into media | Exactly the same comments were made | ||||
violence persistently present | when the novel, newspaper, music hall, | |||||
correlations as evidence of causality | cinema, television, comic books and | |||||
(which is a basic misunderstanding in | videos began to reach a mass audience. | |||||
social science methodology); they | 5 | People need to realise that media | ||||
consistently claim long-term effects | content does not determine | |||||
from studies examining only short- | individuals’ behaviour, and if more | |||||
term immediate responses; and make | people were aware of the range of | |||||
utterly meaningless comments about | effects research over the last 70 years | |||||
the responses of known violent | that clearly shows this, we might | |||||
individuals to media violence. They do | finally see the end of the influence of | |||||
this because American effects research | moral conservatives determined to | |||||
is highly influenced by the socio- | censor the media. | |||||
political environment, in which the | Dr VINCENT CAMPBELL | |||||
media are branded as scapegoat in | Senior Lecturer in Media Studies | |||||
order that other causes of violent crime | 6 | Sir: As a teenager who loves video | ||||
in the US, such as the easy access to | games, I think the problem you report | |||||
guns, are not addressed. | on refers only to the weak-minded who | |||||
3 | What such researchers consistently | are not smart enough to realise that | ||||
fail to even address is why millions of | games are games, not “reality”. I own | |||||
people exposed to exactly the same | Grand Theft Auto Vice City and I just | |||||
media products fail to respond in | see it as a game in which I have | |||||
aggressive and violent ways. | missions to undertake - not a shoot- | |||||
4 | Video games are becoming more | ’em-up. | ||||
graphically sophisticated but not, as | CHARLES ROBINSON | |||||
the article claims, more violent; Space | (Aged 13) | |||||
Invaders involved the wiping out of | ||||||
entire waves of alien invaders, the | The Independent |