This came up in a lecture I had today.. why now? Partly becuase it’s been in my mind since then and my friends have just left so this is my first stint of free time tonight.
Does violence in a computer game.. or in the media in general lead to violent people? One of my sociology modules was on media back when I studied this and the general view in the lecture today was that people prone to violence will be more likely to emulate what they see or witness. If you’ve read anything I’ve previously waffled about you probably know the direction this will take. Unfortunately I didn’t bring my sociology notes with me to uni so I can’t give out the names of the studies or cases I might be alluding to. I’ll remember some.. but probably not enough.
Their have been cases in the past were children have been brought up in unusual fashions, the most obvious being the instances of feral children, two examples I know are of a boy raised by wolves in Russia and a girl by Chickens in spain..but other instances include living a life in a room and all sorts of cases. This raises questions in the ole’ nature/nuture debate (the phrase ‘its our nature to be nurtured’ is opening a can of worms).. so how does this tie into media and violence? Well the typical new right way of thinking.. which pretty much covers every point of reference for the movers and shakers of todays political and social climate would probably support the view that some people.. are just prone to be violent. Or rather its down to the fact they were raised in a single parent house hold and so didn’t recieve the proper ’socialisation’ required for normal people in the first place. Quite frankly its a shame to witness so many generally agree to thinking like this.
My view? The media is quite possibly one of the single greatest agents for violence. Even when I was walking to uni this morning I was thinking of a phrase in the film ‘lord of war’ where a character suggests ‘bullets are a much surer way of securing votes than politics will ever be’ (paraphased.. obviously) and why is that? On one level it might be fear.. fear you’ll be shot or targeted if you stood against the shooters.. on another level its the slight of hand on unseen shores which becomes a tool of politicians.. bullets themselves making valuable commodities in some places. Regardless, its the way in which your told about this.. and media surprise, surprise is the means of communicating.. today not so much information. More opinions nowadays.. but then again we could say thats always been the case.. and despite what everyone says about media in the masses you’d be surprised.. or not to find theres a select minority who still managed to shout the largest.
I have the habit of going off topic.. I personally feel while.. despite the fact that the media is expressing the views of a select minority.. even with all this airy fairy stuff going on with people having there own websites or whatever. We will obviously as individuals be affected by the media content in different ways, however becuase our existence is purely defined by responses to external stimuli.. as social characters. When we exist in a media saturated society the more likely we are to act or appear in a fashion which is influenced by the media, in the Jamie Bulger killings.. exposing children to movies where doll’s torture and kill people (Childs Play & Chuckie).. the fact they later go out and do the same thing to people who cannot defend themselves.. or are otherwise seemingly innocent in the true sense of the word raises some questions to me. Likewise with the Nathan Martinez case and the rampage he went on mirroring Natural Born Killers. Kids in studies, teenagers in studies all support the claim that watching content with violence apparent in it will encourage to some degree violence within those concerned.. right from Tom and Jerry to something like.. Apocalypse now.. or actual footage of war etc.
Now I hear.. ‘I played violent video games.. i watch/watched horror movies.. why arn’t I like that?’ you can’t deny the experiance hasn’t changed you in some way. I call it differential association, well its something I learnt but yeah. The more were involved in a environment which we’re ‘different’ to in terms of values (so the normative value system.. verses a ghetto) we’re more likely to associate with the immediate environment and so our values shift emulating successful rolemodels.. no one wants to be a looser and if good guys finish last who wants to be the good guy? Especially when your growing up. So as media consumers and the media itself finds us targets the media finds itself creeping out of the TV set invading not only the living room but the fabric of our lives. We see it communicate trends, symbols in media promote meaning.. likewise.. so does violence. You may not use it, but you will be used to it.. to a greater degree accepting of it.. and perhaps even get to the point where you find some cases of violence funny or as entertainment. I’ve got a friend at Oxford who liked to crucify pidgeons and hurt cats purely becuase he could.. I came to the conclusion though that to a lesser degree he was acting out instances seen in the Jamie Bulger case. Now it might of been in his nature to hate pidgeons with the same passion the pharisee’s hated christ. But given the fact he was brought up stuck in front of a TV.. we all were, given his life experiances and his place in the spectrum of human character as a child how did media affect him.. or us.. we social beings. The most direct example is web chatrooms.. your told someones a little kid, and kid A might go meet them but kid B turns out to be a peadophile.. kid A wasn’t born naturally prone to meeting up with peadophiles but becuase of media affecting his value and this medium exploited in an unethic or unmoral way kid A has become a victim to the system. Some people would be suspicious about meeting characters online.. some don’t but your values are affected by the message the media tells you as an individual.. we’re not consumers.. we’re apparently all individuals and the media makes it its job to apparently personalise itself to the consumer to the greatest extent possible. I guess in short a serpent amidst the roses, threatening us with a transfer of values. Values which somehow add meaning or relavency to us with what we see in the media. If your locked in a room with a tape playing over and over.. all you will know in the end is the tape. Its like talking, shouting, whispering.. without the words.
Waffle, waffle.. I dunno.. I hope someone reads this.
2 Comments
The media is in many ways a reflection of humanity. We portray things through it that appeal to us. Violence, sex, these things come naturally to humans, they are rooted in our history, perhaps even in our biology.
Society and law are the artificial constructs of our conscious mind trying to overcome our biology. When we are inducted into that society correctly (ie, through a proper upbringing) we respect it. Violence is not something new to us, we live if anything in the least violent era of our species ever (at least in the west). Hard to believe? Think back to older societies that didnt have the taboo of violence that ours does. Rome for example.
Violence has always been entertaining it seems. At least in our modern age we have the luxury of being able to experience violence in a simulated fashion. For any well adjusted member of society, violent media does not cause violent behaviour. if it did our streets would be overflowing with blood.
We must assume then that there is some other more sinister factor that leads to violent behaviour, perhaps amplified by the media.
My sincere belief is that it is the parents and the peers and the teachers of people that instill respect for human life and a sense of morality. If these elements are lacking, if the teachers, the friends and the parents fail to instil these values, then you get people who are amoral.
These kind of people are the ones who act upon violent media. The columbine shooters were not driven to kill by the games and movies they played and watched, they were driven to kill because they were let down by their peers, parents and teachers.
Inspiration is harmless without motivation. TV programmes and video games may inspire us to violence, but can it really motivate us?
In a word I’d say yes.
I dunno man, your answer smacks of something which would fall into the New Right. Don’t take it in a bad way but this is just my natural observation (if it could be called natural) and response to your opinion.
Your vestments of morality, good upstanding and respect for human life are nothing but subjective connotations subject to whims of human nature which in itself is nothing but the by-product of ritual and tradition. To really genuinely believe that humanity will one day ‘evolve’ past all its problems is nothing by the by-product of decadence, idealism and introspection. They slip and slide like a wet bar of soap from one individual to another and even then within oneself should the self come across a change in character. Its nothing but a illusion and a by-product of socialization and brainwashing which the state feeds its populace.
Why would someone seek to overcome what comes naturally unless they are afraid of it? When we.. or perhaps in this instance I refer to violence we do not talk of acts against people but rather.. that which is violent. The notion that this is.. an act of aggression.. and if so I do not see any such taboo on topics, indeed our media is saturated in such and if some how someone distinguishes an extension of the media, whatever form it takes attempts to remove itself from reality then this in no way negates the values such would seek to transfer as a result. This has knock on effects throughout our existence.
The concept that this is our least violent era of our species is laudable likewise.. perhaps horrific to the extent that we are blind to it or worse desensitized to it. Considering we are the most vocal of the world, (the west) the fact we now export our blindness to all corners of the globe is a disturbing prospect. Your overtly optimistic humanistic response.. which not to pry at (but which I am responding to) contradicts some of the most noteworthy atheist philosophers to have existed.. if in fact your creedo is nothing but ‘In man we trust’.
To live consistently to your world view would not make oneself happy if they are indeed repressing what comes naturally to themselves. Studies show that whilst the economically better off are more inclined to work.. and reap later on. When it boils down to it people still are after the same thing and when this is expressed by the working classes it is at its most notable as they cannot succeed as the middle classes do and so turn to practical and alternative means of obtaining status. To many this is taking what you can whatever means how you can.. and this is still present in the middle classes.. the fact the business man who rips off others with economic fraud and extortionate pricing is merely a legal form of mugging. But.. justified by society and so OK by all westernized human standards. The fact that the mugging is the most blatant means it is the most reported.. yet economic wealth equates political wealth and so why implement changes to stop people being screwed over and mugged by fat cats. Fat cats who indeed help sometimes make policy, even then the police only uncover a whole 10% percent of reported crime.. and if its that low.. how much crime really goes on if its not reported by the public for whatever reason. Think of it like an Ice Burg.
Like an Ice burg a humanistic semblance for morality is deceiving and a mask for what really is lying beneath the surface. You realize life without meaning.. a value.. or purpose it quite frankly absurd (and if not.. why enter place yourself where you now find yourself to be in society?) likewise without objectivity which for me is God given your meaning, value or purpose is largely negotiable up to you.. yet to agree would probably negate your initial response. Your innate values of ‘In man we trust’ is inconsistent as for you there is no God. Yet you make this leap.. and your values as you reference them cannot exist without something like God. So.. from my own perception of such.. this equates humanism.. equated with practical living impossible. If our values are negotiable and in fact then nothin but a facade violence in the media doesn’t actually even matter.. who cares? Unless we’re socialized to the disturbing extent to believe we might actually care for something like this. Given my personal stand point I fail to see the difference in the Roman Empire and the Western.. if we’ve advanced at all its only in the means of conveying and delivering the ending of life. It said the older someone gets the more they realize they don’t know, a potential conclusion then is that quite simply theres nothing.. but facades and ghosts. To continue to live life consistently and cooperatively the belief in nothing but subjectivity (esp. considering morality/violence etc. and existence) is terminal.
Its not formalized really.. but I hope you get the jist.