Violence And Videogames

VIOLENCE in Videogames!

Truth or Media Propaganda?

Is violence in videogames real or is it something for the media to blame unfortunate events on? In the past 10 years video games have been an increasing form of entertainment and have been out selling televisions, radios, and computers since late 2000 with the release of Play Station 2. Almost everyone has heard the horror stories of people dieing or being killed with videogames in the same room, but have you ever read the whole story besides what's on the news to see what exactly happened? Chances are probably not. Most likely your views have been manipulated by the media in some way; it has happened before. There is no thought, in my mind that would lead me or anyone else to believe that videogames cause violence and aggression by young adults or children.

If videogames are so bad then why do parents let there kids buy them? Well actually studies have shown that 90% of parents are unaware of the videogames there children own or what is on them. ESRB, the company that rates all console videogames takes careful consideration to how they rate the games. Take Grand Theft Auto for example, it was a best-selling adult game that should not be played by 12 year-olds. That is why it is rated "M" and you have to be 17 to buy it. Although some videogames are rated "M" for mature and "T" for teen, strict age control is not the answer. It would be an a extreme negative influence for a child ages 7 to 12 to be playing games rated Teen or "M" for Mature, neutralizing their conscience to violence due to lack of knowledge of what is going on and the real life effects of violence. But people of the ages 15 and 16 with a sufficient amount of real life knowledge and understanding of violence does not make much of a difference if any at all when playing Mature rated videogames.

One of the first things to be associated with violent teens is videogames. I bet you know someone that has commented about some videogames promoting violence. In fact studies show that violence in young teens is affected more by their daily life; there are 27 risk factors to violence rated higher than exposure to violent media such as academic failure, socioeconomic status (social status), poor parent-child relations, weak social ties, and being a male. As it turns out kids are not killing each other more frequently than they used to, surprisingly the exact opposite is true. Statistics show that since 1995 the rates in violent crimes by persons aged 12 and over have been steadily decreasing (as seen on the graphs on the following page). Believe it or not all the graphs were pulled directly from the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Statistics. This is the most up to date government data that is also used by the FBI. In the 2004 Crime report from the FBI shows that the crime rate had dropped 2.2% and the Murder rate had hit a "all time low" for the past 40 years. What does "all time low" mean? It means that the Videogame era has produced the most "NON-VIOLENT" teens ever. The best selling videogame for 2004 was none other than Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

The media has lead many people to believe that videogames are one of the main sources of aggression in young people today though cheap editing and attacking videogames every time there is an xbox 30 yards from a crime seen. The media likes to go after video games because they