This essay, similarly to my APUSH one, covers themes and issues which have much relevancy on my global studies and the modern age.
Today, video gaming is one of the most popular pastimes across America, and eighty-five percent of the games people play feature violence. Gaming is the fastest growing and by far the most expensive industry in entertainment, and more than sixty percent of Americans play video games every day. Every video game is a combination of sub genres and mechanics, blended together by engines and graphics to deliver enticing and addictive gameplay for its niche audience, which typically is a few million ‘gamers’ focused on that specific game for its lifespan or popularity period. Despite the goal to keep making unique games, one thing unites most modern video games: the portrayal of violence. Whether it is a ‘beat ‘em up,’ real-time strategy game, or a first-person shooter, gamers log on daily to shoot, stab, and disintegrate other players and AI-controlled characters. Due to all of that personal, direct consumption of violence by gamers, violent video games’ effects are the subject of many studies, and politicians, journalists, researchers, and concerned parents are giving increasing attention to the possible consequences. Does video game violence make gamers aggressive and desensitized to real-world violence? If it does, should action be taken to safeguard the millions of Americans hooked on violent gaming? From unruly competitiveness to pure anger, violent video games are bringing out emotions in their broad audiences that are uncommon in any other entertainment medium, hobby, or even profession, and in the long term, should be strictly monitored and more action should be taken to prevent children from accessing inappropriate games. Every game has its key demographic, but children primarily populate many extremely popular modern multiplayer games. Games such as “Minecraft,” “Fortnite,” and “Roblox” all have large child demographics, and each one features violence as a core element. Despite the violence being cartoonish and seemingly unrealistic, guns and killing are either at the forefront of their gameplay or easily accessible in these games. Even notorious gaming franchises, like “Call of Duty,” “Counter-Strike,” and “Battlefield,” in which the core gameplay revolves around shooting ‘realistic’ weapons to kill or as of recently “eliminate” enemy players, have large child player bases. There have been efforts to limit access to games through the Entertainment Software Rating Board, which applies rating to games based on their age appropriateness, like movie ratings, to identify is how mature the covered subjects are. But in the age of the internet, it is easy for children to fake their age on lax online shops (if age verification is even required) to purchase games online. Even with ratings meant to protect them from mature subjects that might hurt their innocence, children can still buy mature games in the U.S. without supervision. Whether they have siblings, parents, friends, or just stumble on the game over the internet, it is a common reaction for all of us, including children, to be enticed by what we should not have: in this case, children wanting Teen and Mature-rated games. But why should children not play those games? Video games can be very addicting especially for children and teens, but can prolonged exposure to the subjects that cause older age ratings affect children too? Countless parents believe so and want to protect their children from harm partially because, since the rise of video gaming, many negative tropes and stereotypes have been given to gamers. As enormous and diverse as the video gaming industry is today, fifteen years ago video games in America had the reputation of being popular with people low on the popularity ladder of society, basement-dwellers, stoners, and nerds. The rise of parental blogging also contributed to sentiments about protecting children from viewing and experiencing violence as visceral as it is in modern games. And recently, evidence from proper studies has claimed that playing violent video games causes aggression. One article from the American Psychological Association stated that “students who reported playing more violent video games in junior and high school engaged in more aggressive behavior.” In another article from the US National Library of Medicine, similar observations were made that violent games increased aggression after playing for a while. The second also highlighted other negative health effects from violent video games such as attention problems that hurt the school performance of the studied kids. Many other studies claim similar effects from video games, but there are also many studies from equally respected organizations that claim playing violent video games have little to no effect on the children’s wellbeing. One by the Royal Society claimed that “there was no evidence for a critical tipping point relating violent game engagement to aggressive behavior.” The consensus is not one-hundred percent clear, but the majority of studies on the issue claim that people who play violent are more likely to become aggressive. That said, the aggression is there, but it is rarely serious enough to cause other problems. Incidents like smashing computer monitors or keyboards, yelling at parents and significant others, and even death threats are prevalent points of humor in the broader gaming community, but are not as special as they are made out to be. Disregarding any harmful effects, is killing virtual humans the path we want for our pastimes and even careers? It is less atrocious than killing actual people, but what happens when the line between virtual and material blurs? In a military context, drones are defining modern warfare and allow anonymous operators to kill in foreign countries through a computer screen, just like in a shooting game, except for the enemies, which are made out of human flesh and bones rather than pixels. The military knows this and has targeted gamers for recruitment. One drone operator, Brandon Bryant, was interviewed by Vice about his experience in the military. Vice’s video highlights how simple the act of killing has become, at least for a gamer who is targeted specifically by a military recruiter, but also that Bryant still felt the impact of his missions. When video games are so similar to real violence and can be used to essentially train people, as in the case with Bryant, they are far more destructive than just a hobby. The problem with this argument is that very few gamers will go on to be drone operators, which is a job that exists in a grey ethical zone. Desensitization to guilt is a less studied effect of violence in gaming, and most gamers will not have to deal with it if they abide by laws, but if video games become more similar to war and keep the consequence-free gameplay that partially makes them so successful, future generations might be less remorseful as a result of violent gaming without a way to offset gaming’s effects. Jobs deriving from gaming can be found beyond the military, though. Being a YouTuber is the dream for a lot of modern American youth, and gaming is an extremely popular form of content on the platform. Gaming YouTubers can make a reasonable income with enough of an audience, and the top creators make millions of dollars from ad revenue and sponsorships. Beyond that is live streaming, a form of content that revolves around gaming by playing their game with a live audience. Content creators, as they are called, have a very desirable job and can be pretty self-sufficient by just playing video games. For their job, gaming content creators probably play the most out of anyone in America, and from playing so much, there are plenty of examples of rage and destructive habits that litter the scene. But they do play the most, and, rarely, that anger goes anywhere besides in the game. Probably the most popular argument for getting rid of violence in video games comes from Politicians and Journalists, who frequently point to gaming as a cause for mass shootings. After the Columbine shooting in 1999, the families of victims sued twenty-five gaming companies for violent video games’ influence on the shooters. Then in 2018 there was a mass shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, and the shooter was an avid gamer. The rise of American mass shootings has somewhat risen with the rise of gaming, but both trends have little correlation. Violence is very different from aggression and is a much more serious reaction to someone’s environment. Mental health issues are the true culprit behind mass shootings, and violent video games may even help people’s mental health by “basically, by keeping young [people] busy with things they like.” They are places to fight and kill without actually hurting anybody. What would the consequences be if violent video games stopped being made and relevant ones lost support? First, a lot of people would lose their primary hobby, and some would lose their job. Video games are unique because they can be great for competitive people and people who just want to play casually. Shooting games are mostly populated by semi-competitive players and have the largest number of competitions and content creators of any gaming genre. The upsides would be getting rid of a cause of aggression, which can spiral into real-world issues, but at the same time, prohibiting violence in video games would also take away an outlet for aggression caused by the real world. It is impossible to know what did not happen because someone took their anger out on virtual characters rather than real people. How many more school shootings might there be if video games were not there for so many angry, lonely, and distraught kids. In the case of reducing or banning violence in gaming, the ends do not justify action today because there are so few examples of harm coming from violent gaming when the number of gamers is accounted for. If violence in games were reduced to an E (Everyone) rating, games could keep their competitive and creative natures without the problems that games bring. After an attempt to stop children from buying excessively violent games in 2011, The Supreme Court ruled that video games are a form of art. Games as a medium can be used to cover mature and societal themes, just like a movie, and are covered under the first amendment according to this ruling. However, that does not mean that violent games do not have negative effects on their players. Addiction is common to violent games, but it is caused by the choices of the developers during production, not by the game’s violence itself. Without clear evidence that violence in games leads to real-world violence, games should not have any further restrictions imposed on their portrayal of violence, unless it can be definitively shown that serious detrimental effects are impacting a large number of gamers. From a care-based perspective, the most important factors are that violent games are an outlet for some people’s anger, that violence in games is proven to cause aggression, and that games can desensitize people to guilt, causing issues, especially with children’s moral development. However, the aggression caused by gaming is minimal, and eliminating opponents is much better than killing real people. Where violence in games is today is still far away from being close to realistic, and it is understood that the masses are not deeply desensitized to violence, which they might be in the future from more realism in games. Until there is evidence of that desensitization, it is hard for anyone to say that killing in games does more harm than good, for the game’s appropriate audience. Children cannot be left out of the equation though, for if the gaming industry continues on the current trajectory, it is, and will be, very important to protect children from experiences that might not desensitize the average gamer, who is 18-34 but could impact children’s development. Violent video games are so popular that banning or stopping their production would be practically impossible without mass outcry. Playing games is by far the most popular hobby in America, and everyone from toddlers to senior citizens plays daily from our tablets, phones, computers, and consoles. So unless there was a massive awareness campaign around the supposed harms of violent gaming, any proposition that was aimed against the industry would have a lot of trouble passing. Free will is a core tenet of our society, but we do have restrictions on what we can do. Street drugs are illegal in most places in the US because many are very addictive and pose serious health risks to their users. Just like a video game, drugs can be an escape from reality. But without certainty that they cause aggression or desensitize people to violence, violent video games mostly played on 2D screens with relatively unrealistic graphics and animations have other reasons to be removed. The profit made from games will continue to rise as games improve every year. The curve of improvement to gameplay is not close to peaking any time soon, but when it does, games will be so addictive and immersive that people’s realities might be entirely shaped by gaming in a science-fiction-like future. But in the present, there simply is not enough evidence that video games pose a public health risk, and should not be prohibited from American society, yet. From example like a kid stealing his parent’s car after doing it in a game, and from how addictive gaming is, action should be taken to prevent children’s access to teen and above-rated games. A recommendation from the American Psychological Association in 2015 was for gaming companies “to design video games that include increased parental control over the amount of violence the games contain” and to keep in mind their target audience’s psychological development. I chose to research violence in video games because I have been told and can tell that at least for me, I am more aggressive after playing shooting games. But I believe my reason for playing is a lot different than the majority of players. Instead of using games as an escape, I love the competitive side of gaming, and the main reason I play video games is to satisfy my competitive drive. Gaming is almost too good: I can play when I feel like it and have so many possibilities to outplay and out-practice my human opponents. The studies I found throughout my research do not give conclusive evidence for or against the notion that games cause aggression, especially in children, and the reason behind that is because violent games do cause aggression, but it is limited enough that most players easily calm down. I also believe that gaming in its current form is good enough. The more realistic that graphics, physics, and senses get in games, the more that people could lose track of reality. Virtual reality is seen as the next step in gaming, replacing monitors with goggles and keyboards with physical movement. Still, we are far from a product so streamlined, immersive, and large that it will not feel like gaming anymore. It will be very important to monitor how our emotions will be affected, and also how addictive games will become. Who knows what will happen to society if an entire generation is addicted to a game? If technology advances to the point where there are no more monotonous labor jobs left, maybe video games will give people purpose, considering how many there are and will be and how creatively and skilled people can play them. Whatever the future looks like though, if aggression and desensitization to violence are increased, violence in video games should be reigned in by making sure that companies cannot produce extremely realistic games, and in the present, stricter laws should be enacted that punish publishers and distributors if children get a hold of inappropriate games. Bibliography “APA Review Confirms Link Between Playing Violent Video Games and Aggression.” American Psychological Association. American Psychological Association. Accessed January 12, 2021. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2015/08/violent-video-games. Bergland, Christopher. “Violent Video Games Can Trigger Emotional Desensitization.” Psychology Today. 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