1A car whizzes through rush-hour traffic with the ferocity of an uncaged lion, barreling around pedestrians like a student driver knocks around traffic cones. Following this car is a steadily growing armada of police cars. The driver of the car makes a series of sharp turns at a pace that would make a NASCAR racer jealous, knocking cars aside like tumbleweeds in the road. More and more police join the fray, and on the horizon, they have set up a roadblock to put an end to this rampage. The driver of the car tries to double back, but he is soon caught in a storm of twisted metal. He takes off in any direction he can go at lightning speed and hits an oncoming car with an extreme force. The police surround the car, and it is not long before the game ends and the perpetrator is shot dead.

2This scene is not from a car chase on the news but from a video game. Depending on your perspective, this is either compelling entertainment or a frightening depiction of murder and crime. A debate has raged for over a decade now, with some claiming that video games like this have a detrimental effect on the development of children. Others believe that games are not behavior-altering and are an acceptable form of entertainment. Although they have different perspectives on how violent games affect people, both sides of this issue agree on the need for a strong ratings system and parental responsibility.

3Video-game violence came to the forefront of the news after the shooting at Columbine High School in 1999. When the perpetrators of this horrible crime were discovered to have been fans of the first-person shooter Doom, a violent science-fiction game with blood and gore, many were concerned that this game caused the massacre. While both shooters had a variety of psychological issues, the fact that they were avid video-game players stuck in the minds of many. Concerned parents believed there had to be a correlation between playing violent games like Doom and committing real-life violence. When Grand Theft Auto III was released in 2001, the issue got even more attention. Set in a fictional New York City, the game allowed players the freedom to kill civilians and police officers. Taking video-game violence from a science-fiction setting like Doom into a reality-based setting like Grand Theft Auto made parents’ concerns even stronger.

4The idea that video games are dangerous and cause violence, however, may be a misconception. According to a study from Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia, only children who were already more predisposed to aggression reacted in a negative manner to video games (“Most Kids ‘Unaffected’ by Violent Games”). The researchers studied the behavior of 120 children age 11 to 15 after exposure to the violent game Quake II and did not see adequate evidence that video games are a major factor in affecting behavior (“Most Kids”). In fact, as Professor Grant Devilly said, hyperactive children actually became less aggressive while playing violent games, and most children showed no negative or positive effects from the video games at all (“Most Kids”). In regard to the notion that video games cause violence, Devilly notes “It’s the only message parents have ever received and it’s just not accurate” (“Most Kids”).

5Other studies have conflicted with this one, though. Research by Iowa State University psychologists showed that violence in the media, specifically video games, had a behavioral effect on children (“ISU Psychologists Publish Three New Studies on Violent Video Game Effects on Youths”). They tested 161 nine-to twelve-year-olds as well as 354 college students and found that even depictions of cartoon violence could cause negative effects on brain development (“ISU Psychologists”). They concluded that the act of intentionally harming another character in a game could affect behavior in the real world as well (“ISU Psychologists”). Although movies have long shown graphic violence, the participant role that video games give players can affect their behavior in a way that movies and music do not. This study supports the notion that young children can become more aggressive in real life due to excessive video-game playing. However, research has not completely proven that video games make young people more violent.

6The video game depicted in the introduction of this essay is Grand Theft Auto IV, released in 2008 by Rockstar Games for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC. Games in the Grand Theft Auto series are “sandbox games,” games that let players roam the virtual world and complete missions and objectives in any order that they choose. Players can do missions for a variety of people throughout the massive in-game city and do side quests (missions not essential to the main story) such as street races and vigilante hunts. Unfortunately, giving players this much freedom in a game where violence is necessary to complete missions also allows them to commit heinous crimes against innocent in-game bystanders. The series is acclaimed by video game players and critics, but this acclaim has not come without controversy.

7The Grand Theft Auto series has long been the target of scorn from a range of critics, from concerned parents to current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. In Clinton’s 2005 speech to the Kaiser Family Foundation, she bemoaned the “demeaning messages about women” in games like Grand Theft Auto and said that the game “encourages violent imagination and activities.” Clinton was concerned that the omnipresence of the media is detrimentally affecting children. Their “steady diet” of violent material is desensitizing them to violence. She does not single out video games, however, also criticizing the Internet for giving children easy access to violent and pornographic material. She acknowledges that parental responsibility is an important solution to this problem but claims that parents cannot do everything by themselves: “Parental responsibility is crucial but we also need to be sure that parents have the tools that they need to keep up with this multi-dimensional problem” (Clinton).

8David Trend, a professor at the University of California, Irvine, does not see a correlation between fictional and real-life violence. Trend, author of The Myth of Media Violence, explains that exposure to violence is nothing new. Violence is “deeply ingrained in our culture” and is an important part of storytelling in everything from television shows to religious texts like the Bible and the Koran (Trend 3). Video-game violence is no different from the violence that is a central part of human history. Trend believes that eliminating forms of violent entertainment is not a feasible plan: “Getting rid of offerings like Fear Factor and The Amityville Horror on the basis of violence alone would also rule out important films like Saving Private Ryan, Schindler’s List, or Hotel Rwanda” (4). Saving Private Ryan is a movie that shows intense violence, but it is also mostly historically accurate and conveys an important message about war and sacrifice. Would it be right to shield people from a movie that many agree is a classic just because it shows us the unfortunate truth of war?

9This argument can be applied to video games as well. The Call of Duty series is a good example of this. The series explores conflicts beginning with World War II all the way up to the current unrest in the Middle East. It gives players an in-depth look at the horrors of war, and that includes graphic violence. Although violent, games like this are often surprisingly historically accurate and can be a learning experience for the player.

10Although both sides of this issue seem to be set in their opinions, they both see the need for parents to be informed about the video games that their children play. Both sides support the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB), which provides ratings for video games that are much like the ratings for movies. Retailers like Target and Wal-Mart, who are on the ESRB Retail Council, have a strict policy against selling Mature-rated games (the equivalent to an R-rated movie) to people under seventeen years old without a parent present (“ESRB Retail Council”). This policy is not required by law but is widely supported because it gives parents a way to monitor the games that their children are playing at home.

11Parental responsibility is an important part of the issue of video game violence. While some people act like violent games like Grand Theft Auto and Halo just fall out of the sky into the hands of children, it is ultimately up to parents to decide what is and is not allowed. If parents believe that their child is not mature enough to play violent games, it should not be the game developer or government’s job to keep the game out of the house. Instead, the parents should closely monitor the games they are buying for their family. Every game has a rating on the front and back of the box, as well as descriptions of exactly why the game got this rating. For example, the Mature-rated game Gears of War 2 is rated M for “Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, and Strong Language.” Parents can see this just by looking at the box, allowing them to easily decide if the game is right for their family.

12Both sides of this contentious issue acknowledge that parental responsibility is important, and the ESRB ratings system makes things easier on parents. Since research has not proven either way whether video games are harmful to children, it is still a judgment call for parents. The more information is readily available about video games, the fewer misconceptions there will be about their effects. More resources for parents might make video games less of a scapegoat in the future and satisfy people on both sides of this issue.