Hun-Speak

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August 26, 1999 -- Do Violent Games Beget Violent People?

The article in the Ottawa Sun got me thinking a bit. The inaccuracies in the article were abundant. Quake 3 was not pulled off shelves--it isn't even ON shelves yet! In Doom, you didn't go around shooting people, you shot the denizens of Hell. It reminds me of when I was growing up. There was an anti-heavy metal book that frequently attributed quotes to songs, but those quotes were really never in there. We used to try to verify those quotes by listening to tapes and reading the liner lyrics, but many were just never there. Others were ripped out of context. It's nice to see that the media is still holding themselves to the lofty levels of accuracy that they always have.

But on to the main point at hand. I must confess that I've never understood how video games give you the ability to shoot real guns. Certainly, video games (of almost any sort) will improve your hand-eye coordination, which is a good thing in general. But there is a major difference between pointing a mouse and pointing a gun. Case in point: I shot a real gun (a .22 rifle) for the first time in my life at my in-law's farm. I couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. Obviously my "murder simulator" training had failed me.

It also seems very clear that these young men involved in the recent shootings had problems far more deep-seated than simply playing Quake or Doom. If you cannot tell the difference between a game or movie and real life, there are some problems there. I remember my uncle, who was in Vietnam, saying that watching shootings on T.V. dramas or movies never affected him, but seeing the real thing (in Vietnam or when President Reagan was shot) makes you sick. It's not fake any more. Real lives are at stake. Real lives may be lost.

Granted, hindsight is always 20/20, but there are many signs that people (hello, parents!) would have caught had they actually paid attention. The one kid with a sawed-off shotgun in his dresser comes to mind. Hello!?! If I would have had a sawed-off shotgun in my dresser when I was growing up, my mom would have found it. Not that she was always sneaking through my stuff, but--get this--she was actually involved in my life! How novel!

Violence has been in the world since Cain and Abel. No effort of any sort is going to remove it entirely. The thing that will help the most is for parents to be parents. I'm practicing what I'm preaching by being involved in the lives of my two little boys. I watch T.V. with them. I read to them. I play with them. Will this guarantee that my boys will not be homicidal sociopaths? Not necessarily, but it will give them a fighting chance.

The old adage is true: "Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not turn from it." Try it. You might find out that it works!