Why do some people view games as being somehow
evil, as being some kind of force of nature which corrupts the young and
mentally vulnerable? The truth in my opinion is that it probably has a
lot to do with fear, in particular the fear of the unknown. There are
many arguments that can be made for this fear but one thing that cannot
be denied is that a lot of it is whipped up in to a frenzy by the media.
I remember being young and the first Mortal Kombat coming out to a sea
of negative press about how such a level of gore would pollute people’s
minds, there was sensational outcries from this group and that group all
of which amounted to the old chestnut ‘’Wont somebody think of the
children?’’
This
wasn’t a new thing though no when you take a step back and look at the
big picture pretty much every generation has had what you can call a
Moral Media Panic. Something has been claimed to be the cause of all of
our ills. This can be seen with the situation that happened with the
horror comics of the 1940’s and 1950’s. There were comics such as Tales
from the Crypt, the Vault of Horror and countless others which contained
scenes of gore, super natural monsters, and murder etcetera. I think
they can best be described as scary camp fire tales turned into comic
book form. These became the target of mounting criticism for their
content and their potentially harmful effects on children, with claims
that these comic books contributed to rising rates of juvenile
delinquency.
Many
cities in America tried to ban some of these publications but this was
effectively overturned with a United States Supreme Court ruling in 1948
that there banning was unconstitutional. Obviously those who wanted
these books banned didn’t take this lying down various reports and
articles were published and this whirlwind kept everything up in the
air. In response to public pressure and the bad press they had received,
an industry trade group, the Association of Comics Magazine Publishers
was formed with the intent of persuading those within the industry to
enter an agreement allowing them to police the situation itself. Does
this sound Familiar? If you’re a big fan of Video Games you might
realise that this is somewhat echoed by the story behind the PEGI system
for Video game classification.
A
lot of what the political parties that are in power do is to listen to
the voices of those they are responsible for and try to act in a way
which will help them remain popular relevant and ultimately in power.
You would think that this would mean to follow the wishes of the
majority but often unfortunately this is not the case. A lot of
decisions can be made based on the wants of a small loud minority, if a
small minority of people see something as a problem and can whip it up
into enough of a storm then politicians might either decide to take a
look at the issue in question or look at how they can use it for their
own gains.
In
1954, Dr. Fredric Wertham published a tome called Seduction of the
Innocent, this claimed that horror, crime and other comics were a direct
cause of juvenile delinquency. Wertham asserted, largely based on
undocumented anecdotes, that reading violent comic books encouraged
violent behaviour in children. He really painted the publishers of these
comics as some kind of evil cult using these comics to corrupt children
and this situation as an evil that had to be stood up to. It was not
just violence he was concerned with though he was also convinced that
comics stimulated deviant sexual behaviour. He noted female breasts in
comics protruded in a provocative way and special attention was lavished
upon the female genital region. This wasn’t everything though he also
felt that comics promoted homosexuality. Famously he claimed that the
Batman–Robin relationship was a homosexual wish dream of two men living
together. You can see this sort of thinking echoed in the way that
certain groups and institutions have chosen to focus on how the female
form is depicted in Video Games.
So
there we have it certain people believed that horror comics were going
to turn all of the children of that time in to violent blood thirsty
sexual deviants who also felt that being homosexual was an acceptable
choice. The issue of horror comics was far more largely an American
problem though. In the post-World War II period, horror comics arrived
in Britain, largely based on reprints of American material. This led to
protests similar to those in the States though. The response to these
comics here was the introduction in 1955 of the Children and Young
Persons (Harmful Publications) Act.
From
here we spring boarded into the whole Idea that the swinging music of
the 60’s would cause us all to descend in to beasts who were only
interested in there carnal cravings. Then we take another step forward
and find ourselves met with the whole 1980’s Video nasties situation in
which the government thought that explicit horror movies where the cause
of all the evil in our world. I guess what this comes down to is the
fact that next time someone goes on and on about the evil of gaming just
remember we have been here before, something else used to be the loud
minority’s whipping boy just like video games are now.
One
day Video Game sex and violence will become less of a concern as people
begin to worry about the next big thing which is floating on the
horizon of existence. So what can you do about this as a gamer? The main
answer is not a lot really. You can talk about your hobby in a
sophisticated way and prove through your own life and success that not
everyone who is a gamer is a blood thirsty savage but I guess the real
big step is to make sure that as you slowly grow older and have children
of your own, as you watch new fads come in and out you remember what
people used to say about the things you were interested in. S0 when you
find yourself with a child who won’t get of their hologram view screen
9000 and wash the darn pots, and when the news tries to tell you that
this is because there new device, there new hobby and past time is the
work of the devil before you jump on the bandwagon and blame everything
on this or that you stop and take time and talk to your child. You try
the things they are into with an open mind instead of taking the easy
route and blaming something else.
kerr9000
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