Violence and Videogames
Share
I’ve always wondered why we, as Americans, shun sexual content but are pretty much okay with violence. This seems to be a general rule, but it’s particularly true of the content that we let our kids consume. In Europe, the attitudes are basically reversed. They also have much lower rates of teen pregnancy and violent crime. So on the basis of that data, it looks like teaching kids openly and honestly about sex, rather than teaching them that’s dirty and will kill them, causes them to either not have sex or to do it responsibly. It also looks like exposing people, kids in particular, to violent images results in more violent crime. Interestingly, Europe is also tremendously less religious than America.
I always thought that our attitudes about sex and violence were the result of our Puritan heritage. While that’s probably true to a certain degree, it turns out that there’s a solid legal precedent for our stance. In an article in the January 10th issue of Time magazine, University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey Stone says, “There is no recognized constitutional principle that allows the government to shield children from violent expression” but there are well defined standards that block sexual content. Plus it’s simpler to categorize sex acts than violent ones, which makes it easier to specify what’s okay and what’s not in laws and policies.
The Time article is really about an effort by the Democratic governor of Illinois to impose fines on retailers who sell or rent games with certain sexual or violent content to minors. Personally, I’m appalled by this. It is the responsibility of the parents to police their children’s activities. You can’t legislate morality and you can’t legislate good parenting, but if parents think it’s okay for their 8-year-olds to play games that involve beating up prostitutes, if they can’t say “No” to their kids, then we as a society have fallen down on the job.
Video games are rated by an industry group, very similar to the way movies are rated. The ratings for games are clear and frequently are more descriptive of why the game received its rating than movie ratings. It’s true that retailers need to check ID before renting or selling games rated for adults in the same way they check ID before selling a pack of cigarettes or tickets to an R movie. (I noticed today that Best Buy does check IDs).
But some of the things parents say in the article are just ludicrous. One man, father of a six-year old boy, compares the governor’s proposal to laws against selling tobacco to minors, saying that in both cases parents need the government’s help to keep contraband out of their children’s hands. It sounds to me like he’s saying that he can’t be bothered to police his children and would someone please do it for him. What we really need are responsible retailers. I bought cigarettes in high school without a problem but got carded well after college. The difference? Responsible retailers.
Another father says of his 16-year-old son, “He can certainly separate reality from the fiction of those things.” I disagree. 16-year-olds are not adults. The vast majority of them lack the abstract reasoning capacity to learn calculus. A kid at this age will say that he understands the difference between fantasy and reality, but I don’t think he really, truly does. It’s like someone who honestly thinks he’s not prejudiced but still tells jokes that involve the N-word.
This attitude that kids are more mature than they really are is also apparent in a mother from Texas who lets her two boys, ages 9 and 15, play Grand Theft Auto, the game that involves beating up hookers. She says, “I want to raise my kids with a sense that I trust them to be good and to know how to set their own limits.” You, ma’am, are a bad parent! A 9-year-old doesn’t know the first thing about his own limitsâ€â€he’ll eat Oreos until he pukes.
Sadly, this approach is indicative of an attitude prevalent in Baby Boom parents. They hated their parents for being disciplinarians, so they resolved instead to be friends to their children. Teenagers are supposed to hate their parents, get over it. Children of all ages need limits, discipline, and parental involvement. I typically hate those “anti-drug” commercials, but the ones encouraging parents to know their kids, to discipline them for being bad, and to not be afraid of disciplining them are right on the money. The parents of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold tried to be friends to their sons and let them do their own thing, and we all know what happened. I’m not saying the parents are solely to blame, but a little more involvement and they would have found the boys’ collection of firearms and pipe bombs.
The bottom line here is that parents need to be involved in their children’s lives. They need to screen everything their children consume, from food…
scottie on 11 May 2005 at 12:48 pm | Permalink
While I fully agree that parents need to take more responsibility for their children and have no business expecting the government to do their parenting for them, the fact of the matter is that there are a lot of bad parents out there and the State has a legitimate interest in making sure something intervenes to keep the worst out of children’s hands.
First of all, that the government can’t legislate morality is, to a point, wrong. Legally, even something considered a constitutional fundamental right can be restricted by legislation if it is done so to promote a compelling state interest (and done so by least restrictive means). So the government can’t legislate morality, per se, but they can to the point they can prove a legitimate interest (other than sheer morality). In this case, I think we can all agree that there is a legitimate interest in restricting the amount of violence young children are exposed to for the purpose of (hopefully) minimizing the amount of violent adults later on. (leading, theoretically, to less violent crime, less prisoners, less taxes needed to deal with overcrowding prisions, etc)
For instance, though the Supreme Court has found that there is a constitutinal right to privacy and a constitutional parental right to decide how their children are raised, these rights can be overcome by a showing of a compelling state interest. There’s a Supreme case from decades ago about a Jehova’s Witness who was taking her niece (though in her custody as guardian) around door to door and was charged with violating child labor laws. This was found constitutional because, despite her right to parent, the State had a compelling interest in making sure children were schooled and not forced to work, etc.
Also, you say that we need responsible retailers - I agree fully. But it seems to me that imposing fines on retailers who disregard ratings on video games and sell to underage children is a way of making retailers more responsible or at least imposing some accountability. The reason you weren’t carded for cigarettes in high school but were in college is because of the new laws that passed making it a bigger problem for retailers caught selling to underage kids. I haven’t read the Illinois law, so maybe it’s not what it sounds like - but to me, it sounds very similar to the tobacco laws passed in the mid-90s.
Anyway, those are my thoughts….