How Videogames Became the Bogeyman 125
Tom Leupold, writing for the Inside Bay Area site, explores why videogames have become an American bogeyman. Talking with prof. Dmitri Williams, he discusses the rise, fall, and resurrection of games as a part of mainstream society. From the article: "Today, as games have once again infiltrated the mainstream, a growing number of adults are again enjoying gaming and understand there are games that are appropriate for different age groups. But that hasn't stopped crusaders from trying to censor them in the name of 'saving' the children. Williams, 34, said those under 38 have a different view of games than their elders. Most have grown up with games and, like television for the previous generation, games are embedded in their culture. "
How Videogames Became the Bogeyman (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:How Videogames Became the Bogeyman (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, I think everything that came along since the Roman Era has been the "End of Western Civilization". Kids have always been lazier and less interested in knowledge than privious generations. Evil currupting forces have always pulled them from the Straight and Narrow(TM). Even Christianity, when it first came along was a threat.
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Considering it is necessary to actually call for a separation of science and church, I could see that happen again.
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Erh... thinking about it, replace "would be" with "is".
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It's still a threat even now, considering some of the shit going on these days.
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Like those "Goth" type people.
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Well, seems like they got at least one thing right.
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The comic book argument is revisionist history. The true story is something like this:
Sales of comic books like the older pulp magazines sank like a rock after World War Two. There were new and more compelling, forms of entertainment. TV. The paperback novel.
The crime and horror comics were an attempt to recapture that older audience---but, let us be honest here---the cover art
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I disagree. I think what happens is that the world continuously changes more and more rapidly, and each successive generation is more and more equipped to deal with that change. I have a lot of criticisms for my generation (I was born in the early 80s; please don't call me a "millennial", I hate that), and for the one coming right afterward
Re:How Videogames Became the Bogeyman (Score:5, Funny)
Then I think of MySpace.
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OK, probably more than 10-15 years from now, but, yes.
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Not me man. I not only grew up with video games, I grew up with Slayer and King Diamond. Marilyn Manson came a little later on, but by then it was a schtick that had been done before. After that, *nothing* is shocking.
My kids are worshipping satan? Hell man, giv'er!
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Remember, it's not the content of the youthful fad that's important, it's the fact that it pisses off your parents.
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What if they want to slice out a part of their brain?
What about when they want to listen to music that is jsut a high pitch whine, that gives you a headache in under a minute??
Don't ever think that you have seen it all. It will make it even more shocking.
Two words: (Score:1)
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Then I think of MySpace.
Um, MySpace isn't even wrong. It's just that those kids should be capable of so much more than that. I think webdesign or just basic published page layout may need to be an elementary school class now. Forget reading. Learn the basics of just put 2 ad banners up: one at the top and one at the side, and 2 nav panels and
don't blame all of us.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Blame it on stupid people, instead, some of whom happen to be old. We're not all like that.
Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:5, Insightful)
Message to parents! If your child screws up, it is probably your fault! Sucks, doesn't it?
Re:Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:5, Insightful)
Or possibly the child's...
(That shouldn't seem like a radical idea, yet somehow always seems to be missed.)
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Up until a certain age, we (society) pretty much assume that anytime a kid screws up it is the parents' fault. An being oblivious/ignorant does not give the parents a free pass for their kid's behavior.
Re:Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:4, Informative)
Up until a certain age, we (society) pretty much assume that anytime a kid screws up it is the parents' fault. An being oblivious/ignorant does not give the parents a free pass for their kid's behavior.
Which translates to, until a child is able to determine social norms independently, society blames the person who is responsible for instructing a child on how to act within society when the child does not conform to social norms.
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We can blame the child but it would be useless because until a certain age, he doesn't know better and has no idea of the consequence of his actions. And once he's past that point he's already got his own personality and way of thinking, and his own set of experiences that are beyond his control which are affecting the courses of action
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When they commit a crime we really don't like.
For a strictly numerical answer, how about 14? I didn't bother to look for anyone younger.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c
Re:Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:4, Insightful)
And of course... an appropriate quote to refute:
One who is a child does need to be instructed on how to behave... the responsibility for this education does not belong to anyone except the parents... it is no one else's responsibility to teach a child how to act well...
The problem is that too many parents now (and most likely in the past as well), think that children can grow up fine with no supervision of their activities... no knowledge of what their kids are doing...
Without a parent/grandparent/aunt/uncle/sibling teaching/raising a child... it's a total crapshoot as to how the kid will turn out... the downside to this is it's actually WORK to raise a child, and not just let the TV turn into a babysitter...
Nephilium
The trouble is that things never get better, they just stay the same, only more so. -- (Terry Pratchett, Eric)
Re:Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:5, Informative)
Here's my take on the whole thing - raising kids is a tricky business. Many people take different approaches, and very few parents will agree on everything. Most parents that I know want their kids to grow up to be better people than they are. Most work quite a bit to reach that goal.
One argument that seems common is that anything that is banned or censored is controlled at the request of parents who don't want to take responsibility for their own kids. So, the argument goes, it is the fault of bad parenting that I can't watch saturday-morning porn on NBC - lazy parents that don't want to raise their own kids. However, the laziest parents I've known don't care about what their kids listen to, see, or do, certainly not enough to try to ban it.
On the other hand, it seems that there are a lot of parents that don't spend enough time with their children, but still act as if they did. It's easy to imagine parents like these being shocked that their kids are into bad things, and going ballistic. Legislating a solution, instead of trying to work one out with their kid. These are not always helpful.
Personally, I try to spend a lot of time with my kids, get a good relationship, teach values and social expectations. (Currently we're working on pooping in the potty.) However, I appreciate the fact that my kids don't have to grow up too fast. I'm glad that Nick Jr. doesn't have violent or racy ads inbetween shows, and I'm glad Dora the explorer doesn't swear. It's nice that there's entertainment that's age appropriate, and I appreciate the help. As kids get older, there's a delicate balance between letting them make their own mistakes and bad judgments, and cushioning their fall. At the end of the day, it's up to the kid to decide whather he wants to take what you taught him and try to be good, or ignore it and seek other pursuits.
So, you try to be a good parent, try to help your kids be good people, and appreciate any help you can get from society in general. Some people would like the world to be adults-only, but I really appreciate that there are some places that are safe for kids.
In relation to the perception of games, I personally hope that the Wii will help change people's perceptions. Unfortunately, the current crop seems to be more aimed at hardcore gamers, who expect adult-themed games to be an option. My 3-year-old probably couldn't handle a dual shock, but I bet she could have a lot of fun with a Wii. Hopefully there will be better content out there which will show a kid-friendly side to this medium as well. Heck, if the devkits are cheap, I'd be happy to make some.. :).
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"However, I appreciate the fact that my kids don't have to grow up too fast. "
But they will still grow up faster than you want them to, and you will always feel you have not quite have them ready to go out on their own, but go they will- wide eyed and full of energy.
Always try to keep in mind that you will be teaching by example more than any other method. They can emulate you sooner and easier than they can grasp any "instruction" you try. and will.
Like most
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And this is why I don't have kids (Score:2)
Currently we're working on pooping in the potty.
This is one of many reasons I will never have kids. Somehow, giving birth, or becoming a sperm donor, slowly but surely transforms one from the kind of person I might actually want to talk to into the kind of person who posts on Slashdot about their kid's progress in the taking-a-shit department and uses phrases like "age appropriate" in everyday conversation. As life becomes more routine and mundane the brain atrophies, c
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First of all, I didn't mean to imply that all morality should be thrown out. I do believe that all morality originates from people, ultimately, but I also believe that a moral code is a necessary, good thing. People are social creatures, we have to live together and depend on each other for survival, so we're going to need a set of rules we mostly agree on for t
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My grade 8 teacher was always one of the most reasonable people I have ever met, primarily because, as he said, he never forgot what it was like to be a kid.
I have tried as best as I can to do the same, and one thing I remember is this: at age 14, every one of my peers was responsible and self-aware enough to think that being absolved of responsibility for our actions because of our age was an absolute joke. We knew what we should and should not do and were fully in control of
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As much as people will argue against this, the fact is that the majority of Mature games are targeted towards Teenagers and if they could no longer sell them to teens the sales would evaporate. Being 26 I believe that I'm reasonably representative of most adult gamers and I can honestly say that I purchase 1
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a) a vast majority of buyers are over 35?
b) Less than 10% of games are M
c) 2/3 of gamers are over 18?
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Have you ever connected to any online server, anywhere, ever? 95% of people who play games online seem to be about 12...
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Just because they seem to be 12 doesn't actually make them twelve, it just makes them idiots.
Ummmm (Score:2)
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Re:Some parent's don't like responsibility (Score:4, Funny)
Obigitory Fat Bastard: (Score:2)
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I'm still upset that none of the Jack Chick pamphlet pushers I've met have had a copy of Dark Dungeons with them... I've requested it over and over... and they never have it... bunch of slacking hobos...
Nephilium
"The big foreign car drove itself, but I held the wheel for the sake of appearances." -- Farewell, My Lovely (Chapter 9)
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They're just pissy (Score:3, Funny)
Games and Movies and Music oh my! (Score:1)
Games and Movies and Music oh my!
We can't be exposing our youth to violence [cbsnews.com] and smut [hbo.com] now can we?
Won't somebody please Think Of The Children?
Nobody under the age of 18 is allowed to read this post.
Movie Ratings in America (Score:2)
Take for example, The Whole Nine Yards [imdb.com]. For those who haven't seen this movie, it's a compedy. There is nothing beyond comical violence in it. There *is* some nudity when Amada Peet is topless.
Now, take a look at the ratings. Pretty much every single country except the US has it rated for Young Adults 13-14. The US has it rated "R", which means it is barred from anyone
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No, it's not. You should probably familiarize yourself with the rating system before criticizing it. It means that it's barred to unattended children under 17. Parents can bring a child of any age they like to the film. Basically the rating says, "We think a significant amount of parents might find this inappropriate for their teenagers, so we'll let them make the call." Sorry but I can't find a single thing wrong with that. Children
great example of this (Score:2)
1) Darryl Hannah got topless for about 3 seconds.
2) Some guy got hit in the face wi
Lobbying Money (Score:5, Insightful)
typo; be = bet (Score:2)
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See D&D for reference. It was a HUGE issue in the 80s, college kids spending nights brooding over some dungeon puzzle, hurling fireballs around and resurrecting their friends. MADD was all over it, and the hype was up.
Today? A sizable population of the RPG market actually IS adults, a wide range
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Yeah, D&D is the greatest example. With rock and roll, people can, in fact, seriously argue that did cause a lot of problems, namely, the 60s. It didn't, it was the other way around, but people can stand there and pretend otherwise, even those who were actually around then and participated.
Same with lots of other stuff that got protested, like cop-killing rap (Remember that?) and comic books. They didn't cause problems, they existed at the same times as problems, as outlets, and people looking for scap
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"So the response to 'Grand Theft Auto might make kids violent!' is 'Oh, you mean like D&D?'"
I love that...good stuff.
I'm probably older than than the average aged
Anyway, we played "Army", "Cowboys and Indians", "Cops and Robbers", and "Space Explorers and Martians" growing up. Real-time RPG at it's finest...massivel destruction frequently entered the plot: EVERYBODY DIES!!! Oh Noooo!
Videogame violence
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38? (Score:4, Insightful)
I think he needs to go higher than 38, I'm 41 and I too grew up with video games. I play HL2 deathmatch on a server where the majority of players are older than me.
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How Videogames Became the BogeymanMonday Morning Q (Score:3, Interesting)
I do remember a campaign to restrict sales of adult-themed games to adults and a profound distrust of developers who pushed the limits of the M-rated game to protect their sales through Walmart.
If you want to know why videogames became the Bogeyman, you only have to look at adolescent idiocies like Hot Coffee and Super Columbine Massacre RPG!
It is not Fallout, or System Shock, Resident Evil or Half-Life, or any of a hundred other significant, popular, M-rated games published within the last ten years that make the headlines.
It is the handful of games from the handful of publishers we all know are aiming for the flashpoint.
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Two words: Jack Thompson [illspirit.com].
The Super Columbine Massacre RPG was designed to attract media attention (i.e. it was a media whore, just like you know-who). In the same manner of JFK reloaded, it causes a massive amount of "omg-evil" reaction to something that is ultimatly minor - in the same way that Ce
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There are three problems with this argument.
The first is in Rockstar's disastrous PR which claimed that Hot Coffee was a third-party mod.
The second is the fact that mini-game could be unlocked in the PC and two console pressings of GTA:SA. That strains coincidence when you have already been caught in a lie.
The third is that you will not be allowed any excuse if you release AO content into the wild. Mark Twain had to pull a first print run of "Huckleberry Finn" b
Re:How Videogames Became the BogeymanMonday Mornin (Score:1)
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Re:How Videogames Became the BogeymanMonday Mornin (Score:2)
id you actually pay attention to Hot Coffee or SCMR? Hot Coffee required players to download and install a mod, the content was not available to players who simply purchased and played the game. There was no "cheat code" you could enter to get the content. SCMR was an attempt at serious social commentary, it emphasized imagry the killer's deaths, as well
just you wait... (Score:1)
The culture war (Score:3, Interesting)
Thanks to Nintendo, the fad has now become a staple of entertainment and everyone's left wondering why. This confusion quickly leads to hatred and FUD which brings us up to date. And now you know the rest of the backstory....
Good day.
Bogeyman is right (Score:5, Insightful)
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Fireball on the other hand is an area spell that doesn't demand a target.
Use the right tool for the job.
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Control (Score:3, Insightful)
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Lots of people care what you think. If, for example, you believe in a different god than they do, some people think you should be converted, and failing that, you should be killed --- regardless of whatever actions you may take. Doubly so if you speak about your god, or theirs
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Lower crime is who's fault then? (Score:4, Insightful)
What can we blame for the lower per capita crime rates?
Particularly when we consider some things weren't crimes, or weren't widely reported earlier.
Yes we have had graphic headline grasping crimes lately, but there has always been something. I'm sure there were pissed off kids taking swords or clubs to each other before they invented guns.
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This answer is both snarky and serious at the same time:
Immigration
Snarky, because so many people hate the Mexicans for pouring into the U.S.A.
Serious, because immigration and the children of immigrants are pretty much the only thing driving population growth these days.
More people + steady crime rate = less crime per person
(unless you didn't mean to say "lower per capita crime rates")
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What is also interesting is that it gave evdence to show t
Attention Jack Thompson... (Score:1)
Games? Oh yes... (Score:5, Insightful)
It sucks billions and billions out of foolish peoples' pockets...
More riots, beatings, and other assorted violence take place because of games!
During games, people are exposed to repeated messages selling them alcohol and sex as well!
Did I mention that hundreds of pro and amateurs are permanently injured or killed playing these "harmless" games?
In fact, there are numerous studies proving that these games suck money away from vital education programs and game-players often score lower on standardized tests!
Yes, they are evil.
Wait a sec, we *are* talking about sports aren't we???
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Very well said. Wish I had mod points today.
-:sigma.SB
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I never understood that... (Score:2, Insightful)
Shifting the blame, that's all (Score:3, Insightful)
The parents? How DARE you! Those poor people gotta live with what their son did now! They cannot be the ones to blame. So it has to be...
Glad we found a culprit.
Other bogeymen (reworded) (Score:2)
Off the topic of video games but on the topic of blaming everyone but the parents.
Music is the weapon. Retail is the defense. (Score:5, Interesting)
Rock and roll used to evoke similar hostility. But that's changed, as rock moved from rebellion to senility and lost its political connection.
It's suprising how little hostility hip-hop and rap evoked, considering that much of '90s rap was about killing people. ("Devil, to gangbanging there's a positive side and the positive side is this--sooner than later the brothers will come to Islam, and they will be the soldiers for the war; what war, you ask; Armageddon; ha, ha, ha, ha, ha" -- "Armageddon"; RBX, The RBX Files, 1995, Premeditated Records, © Warner Brother Records, Time Warner, USA.) But hip-hop and rap switched from guns to "bling", thereby encouraging shopping. "According to American Brandstand, a Web site that tracks brand names on the Billboard top singles chart, of the 111 songs that made the Billboard Top 20 in 2003, 43 mentioned a product; 84 different brands were named."
So we can expect that as in-game advertising becomes more pervasive, media criticism of games will become muted.
Re:Music is the weapon. Retail is the defense. (Score:4, Insightful)
I honestly don't know what to make of the current situation. It is really easy for me to imagine all old ignorant hags sitting in the position of power and trying to restrict my choices/actions/thoughts for monetary, power or whatever reason but then it may happen that when our generation comes to that stage and have the same kind of power in our hands, we may end up trying to restrict something which (some of us atleast) genuinely feel is wrong but is really popular with the younger generation. Oh well, I just hope the concept of karma works. Will suck really if things don't balance out in the long run.
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Target #473a: video games! (Score:2)
At one point, it was it was rock 'n' roll, or jazz for the elite rebels. In the '60s it was pot and long hair. Acid (courtesy of the CIA) has been used as a target at times, as has heavy metal, movies, cartoons, video games, and now online chat/blogging communities.
On the one hand, they're all scapegoats. Someone is always looking for a _cause_ for evil or deviant behaviour. Bad messages for the sake of entertainment are meant as entertainment, and will
How Videogames became the Bogeyman (Score:1)