The Problem with Violent Video Games
Exordium
Daniel was known as a normal, happy teenager before suffering spinal damage from a staph infection following a skiing accident. He was housebound for a year in recovery, during which time he became addicted to the Halo series of video games, playing them for up to 8 hours a day with his friend Jonathan. The behavior concerned his father enough that he finally issued an ultimatum: either stop playing altogether, or move out of the house.
It was 2007, and Daniel was 16 years old.
Instead of honoring the ultimatum, Daniel simply ignored it. He bought the new Halo 3 game and brought it home, where his father quickly confiscated it and placed it in a lock box with his own 9 mm handgun. About a week later, Daniel found the key to the lock box, then took both the game and the gun. The same day around 7 pm, he shot both of his parents in the head while they sat on a couch. His mother Susan died, but his father Mark survived, and Daniel was arrested while fleeing in the family van.
More than a year later in December 2008, he stood trial for 1 charge of aggravated murder, 1 charge of attempted aggravated murder, and 1 charge of tampering with evidence (because he’d placed the gun in his father’s hand to make it look like a murder-suicide). In court, his attorney didn’t dispute the facts of the crime, opting instead to argue for an insanity defense with video game addiction as the underlying psychological condition. The defense didn’t hold up, and Daniel was convicted of all charges. He is currently serving a life sentence at Grafton Correctional Institution in Ohio.
Considered as a single isolated case, Daniel’s story does not constitute scientific evidence that exposure to violent video games increases aggression or violent behavior. But it is not an isolated case. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were avid players of Doom in the weeks leading up to the massacre at Columbine High School in 1999. More examples exist, but again, these cases do not in themselves constitute evidence of a connection between exposure to violent games and aggression or violent behavior. They merely illustrate the findings of a body of research that has been growing for several decades, which is summarized in a document published by the American Psychological Association in 2020: “scientific research has demonstrated an association between violent video game use and both increases in aggressive behavior, aggressive affect, aggressive cognitions and decreases in prosocial behavior, empathy, and moral engagement” (“APA Resolution” p. 2). Needless to say, most gamers are not and will never become murderers. Thus, it’s not to blame an entire industry or the fans of that industry, but in view of this scientific consensus, my position is that restrictions on the production and sale of violent video games—particularly to minors—should be part of a multi-pronged strategy aimed at curbing gun violence in the United States.
Background
Until very recently, I would’ve identified myself as a gamer. I’ve played every Zelda and Mario game since 1996, started Minecraft in 2011 when it was still in beta, played over 250 hours of Team Fortress 2 while in college—plus Call of Duty: Black Ops, Bioshock, and Skyrim—and spent countless hours on other video games in my life, including some of my indie favorites: Braid, Monument Valley, and The Binding of Isaac.
Then about 4 years ago something happened: my first kid was born. Parents will understand the time and energy required to rear a child in its early years, and non-parents might not believe me anyway, so I’ll move on without comment except to say that becoming a parent caused me to stop playing video games. It’s also worth mentioning that I began a Master’s of English program in the Fall of 2021, and the business of pursuing graduate work currently occupies much of my time. However, I am not completely out of the loop. My friend Carl has consistently updated me about developments in the gaming industry, and he even gifted me a brand new Xbox Series S for Christmas last year, a generous act which led me to log more game time in the past two weeks than in the past two years combined. Specifically, I’ve been playing Minecraft, Fortnite, and Elden Ring, but before making my confession, here’s a brief summary of the conversation surrounding violence in video games.
One of the first games to spark controversy due to its violent content was the 1976 arcade game Death Race. As you might guess, it is a driving game in which players earn points by running over human-like figures called “gremlins.” Reporter Wendy Walker critically reported on the content of this game for the Associated Press, and several other news outlets ran stories about Death Race during 1976 and 1977, including The New York Times. Despite the negativity characterizing most of this coverage, the national attention paid to the game at this time may or may not have resulted in an increase of sales for the publisher, Exidy.
An image from Death Race (1976) showing the player-controlled car before running over a humanoid “gremlin.”
The next major development occurred in 1982 with the comments of then U.S. Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop, who said there was, “no scientific evidence on the effect of video games on children,” but that he was personally concerned about so many young people “becoming addicted to the machines body and soul.” His statements appeared in The New York Times on November 10, 1982, and he accurately predicted at the time that statistical evidence would begin to emerge from health care fields on the connection between video games and adverse mental and physical effects. 40 years later, we do have substantive evidence showing that exposure to violent games can lead to increased aggression.
Mortal Kombat was released into arcades in 1992. It was the first game to include large amounts of blood and gore along with its depictions of violence. Because of its wild popularity, the adaptation of Mortal Kombat from arcades to the home console market in 1993 prompted U.S. senators Joe Lieberman and Herb Kohl to lead congressional hearings with industry leaders (including spokespeople from Nintendo and Sega) about their concerns around violence in video games. They threatened to take action if the video game industry didn’t regulate itself, which resulted in the creation of an advocacy group—known today as the Entertainment Software Association—and the subsequent establishment of the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) to provide content ratings on games sold in the United States.
Meanwhile, technology has continued to advance. A short list of controversially violent game franchises from recent years must include Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty. To avoid getting lost in the details, let it suffice to say that the controversy continues even now despite legal victories by the industry to avoid restriction and regulation.
On a more personal note, I hereby confess to quitting Elden Ring because of the nightmares it gave me after 12 hours of game time. Hardcore gamers will say I’m being too sensitive, but that’s OK because I perceive a connection between emotional sensitivity and healthy adjustment to married life. Being in touch with how I’m feeling from moment to moment has benefited my relationships—both romantic and otherwise—so I believe it’s worth exploring for yourself whether the numbing effect of violent games might be negatively impacting the way you relate to others.
Evidence and Counterarguments
Given the scientific consensus summarized by the APA Resolution on Violent Video Games, the question becomes how are these media associated with increased aggressive cognitions and diminished prosocial behavior. Leading researchers Craig Anderson and Brad Bushman have developed the General Aggression Model to account for the mechanism by which inputs (violent images or game play) get translated into outputs (aggressive behavior). According to their meta-analytic review of the scientific literature—published in Psychological Science in 2001—the model provides a “useful framework for understanding the effects of violent media,” and they further state that “input variables…influence aggressive behavior through their impact on the person’s present internal state” (355). It simply means that playing violent games makes people feel aggressive, a feeling which is then more likely to be expressed bodily than if the person had not been recently exposed to violent media. It might seem obvious if not for the line that goes: “Violent games actually decrease aggression by giving players the opportunity to get it out of their system.” The idea is unsupported by evidence, and we have a social responsibility to correct this kind of thinking.
The stronger argument against my position is demonstrated by a landmark Supreme Court decision from 2011, Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association. The case concerned a 2005 California law restricting the sale of violent video games to minors, which was found to be unconstitutional on the grounds that it violated the free speech clause of the First Amendment. As an art form, video games are protected speech. In contrast, pornography is restricted, but definitions of obscenity apply only to sexually explicit material and not to violence, a fact that reveals much about American culture.
In addition to being about violence, I believe this is also a feminist issue.
Conclusion
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that the United States Army, Air Force, and Navy all have a level of investment in e-sports and the wider gaming world, which provide them access to tens of thousands of able-bodied young people who are targeted using various digital recruitment strategies. This fact serves to highlight the irony in President Trump’s statement from August 2019, which he made in the wake of two mass shootings: “We must stop the glorification of violence in our society. This includes the gruesome and grisly video games that are now commonplace,” he said. In the same time frame, current House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said, “look at these photos of how it took place, you can see the actions within video games.” However, neither of these statements reached the same level of hypocrisy achieved by National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre, who called video games a “corrupting shadow industry that sells and sows violence against its own people” following the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
The problem with political scapegoating of this kind is the same as with other forms of un-reason: no particular act of violence can be attributed to a single cause, as the APA clearly states: “the resolution should not be misinterpreted or misused by attributing violence, such as mass shootings, to violent video game use” (“APA Resolution” p. 1). Violence in our society is a consequential and complex issue, and if we are serious about enacting change—as we should be—then we must be open to questioning our most deeply held values and even our identities.
Bibliography
Anderson, Craig A. and Brad J. Bushman. “Effects of Violent Video Games on Aggressive Behavior, Aggressive Cognition, Aggressive Affect, Physiological Arousal, and Prosocial Behavior: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Scientific Literature.” Psychological Science, vol. 12, no. 5, 2001, pp. 353-359.
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---. “The Effects of Media Violence on Society.” Science, vol. 295, no. 5564, 2002, pp. 2377-2379.
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“APA Resolution on Violent Video Games.” American Psychological Association, 2020.