martxyz -> RE: Video Games and Aggressive Behavior (12/4/2006 10:53:56 PM)
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Hi Robert, I agree about the way these games often portray women, and also concerns about some output of the manga genre. I'm uncertain what this does to the behaviour of kids or adults that get into it. I'm more worried that these companies are happy to put out this rubbish. These games reflect something unpleasant, though I doubt that they cause it. I really get racked off when people go an about "manga babes". I just loved the film Akira, so I'm not against the genre, but people ought to face up to the fact that "manga babes" are, for some dubious reason, given the facial features of babies and children (these features are so powerfully ancestral that the young of many mammals have almost identical trigger facial features) but they put these faces on sexually explosive bodies. Paedophile - enter stage right! Sorry - it's a pet hate. Spent too long with people who justify their abuse of children on all sorts of spurious grounds, "other cultures" being number one on their list. Sorry I've deviated a bit from the subject, but on the question of how videogames influence behaviour, there are a number of ways of influencing people. If you take, for instance, the paedophilia example, people who are not disposed to it, won't become paedophile by playing Final Fantasy, but what they will do, for paedophiles, is reinforce their own rationalisations, enhance the disinhibition that they already have, provide them with a ready excuse, and give them a reassuring false sense that what they do is just what others think, but don't do. It also helps when they are painstakingly grooming potential victims. I suspect the image presented of women, also reinforces stereotypical behaviour in people who are already bigoted or misogynist. This isn't a feminist nicety, but a substantial problem. As regards the violence, I simply think that if you have a semi-automatic rifle in your house, or believe that others should be allowed to have them, then you've no right commenting on videogame violence. As regards, in the US context, the claim that citizens have a constitutional right to bear arms, I'd say bugger the constitution. Now where did I put the largactil?
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