by Matt Maerowitz

Created on: June 24, 2008

The cycle of blame for society's behavior is nothing new. In the 60s it was the loud and psychedelic music, in the 70s and 80s it was the violence on TV, and in the last two decades, it has been video games. Video games started to take a large amount of heat in the early 90s when Mortal Kombat was released in the United States for the Super Nintendo. Mortal Kombat was the first game to display blood that would come out in heavy spurts when a player takes hits. The game Doom was also an early game that substantiated the concerns that video games were simply too violent. These concerns spread like wildfire as the media was quick to jump on stories regarding the violence that can be found in video games. Pretty soon parents tried to steer clear from these violent titles and some stayed away from video games entirely in fear that video games promoted bad culture. The gaming industry knew that they had to do something to prevent many game publishers from going out of business. As a result, the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) was formed, which rated video games based on the level of appropriateness of game content. This allowed parents to know how violent a game was before allowing their children to play it.

Despite ESRB ratings, many people still blame video games for causing violent behavior in youth. In some sense, video games have allowed blame to shift away from movies that get R or PG13 ratings. To be honest, I have always found violent movies much more problematic than video games. Video games appear to be less realistic because they use animated graphics whereas many violent movies depict actual people on the screen. Regardless of your view on this issue, the blame game is not going to help anyone because video games are here to stay. The more important question asks how society can promote a healthy gaming community.

Society needs to continue to promote healthy messages that outline the importance of community and illustrate the ills of violence. In terms of the gaming community, it is important for mass media outlets to stress a distinction between video games and reality. Ever since I was a young child, I have taken the attitude that video games are intended to be fun and nothing more. While this may seem to simplify many video games, this approach is a healthy one for society to take. If society as a whole was to take the attitude that games are nothing more than a form of entertainment, then violence in video games can be divorced from societal violence. This can allow both society and the gaming community to flourish.

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