Don’t Blame Video Games
Recent tragedies such as the El Paso shooting have caused some politicians to swivel towards violent video games for something to blame these unfortunate events on. In a White House address after the aforementioned shooting, President Trump said that we as Americans “must stop the glorification of violence in our society. This includes the gruesome and grisly video games that are now commonplace.” Another politician, Dan Patrick, lieutenant governor of Texas, said on the “Fox & Friends” TV program that the federal government needs to “do something about the video game industry.” Politicians have been blaming violence on video games for decades now, ever since the 1990s, when the Columbine High School shooting was blamed on Doom, a first-person shooter.
These politicians have little reason to believe that violent video games might be causing violence. It is obvious that they have not done enough research and are relying on old, outdated and inconclusive studies to get information from. Recent studies by experts such as Dr. Chris Ferguson of Stetson University prove that violent video games have little to no relation to real-world violent or aggressive acts. He even added that “the data on bananas causing suicide is about as conclusive.”
A quick Google search of “do video games cause violence” will lead to pages of articles all stating that there is little to no link between violent video games and real-world violence. So why do politicians keep blaming mass shootings on video games? I can’t be the only one that doesn’t understand the thought process of these people.
Many people who enjoy playing video games will agree that the games they play do not make them violent. Max Prezeau, a freshman, stated, “I don’t think video games cause violence. In fact, I think that video games can be an outlet for potential anger or violence.” He went on to say that sometimes, when he is feeling aggravated or down, he will turn to playing video games, which help him diminish his frustration and control his temper. Another freshman who wished not to be named explained to me that “if you punch a tree in Minecraft, you’re not going to go out and punch a tree in real life. It’s just common sense!”
The evidence is clear that these politicians aren’t researching hard enough about the information that they share on a national level. They seem to be missing the many positives of video games, and are trying to bring down the video game industry. I simply don’t understand why these politicians are overlooking recent and accurate studies that clearly state that violent video games do not have any link to real-world violence.
