Bad Video Game Behavior Makes You A Better Person

Here's more ammunition to use against the "video games are murder simulators" crowd.

New evidence suggests heinous behavior played out in a virtual environment can lead to players' increased sensitivity toward the moral codes they violated. The current study found such guilt can lead players to be more sensitive to the moral issues they violated during game play. Other studies have established that in real life scenarios, guilt evoked by immoral behavior in the "real-world" elicits pro-social behaviors in most people.

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so your telling me, that the racist nazi biggot screaming obscenities over the mic in game is actually a caring sensitive and tender hearted individual in real life?

Not quite true:

Grizzard explains that in life and in game, specific definitions of moral behavior in each domain will vary from culture to culture and situation to situation.
"For instance," he says, "an American who played a violent game 'as a terrorist' would likely consider his avatar's unjust and violent behavior -- violations of the fairness/reciprocity and harm/care domains -- to be more immoral than when he or she performed the same acts in the role of a 'UN peacekeeper.'"

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So apparently if you're running around as a UN peacekeeper/insert good guy, mowing down innocent civilians lets you go to bed peacefully at night. However, change Officer Gallant into a brown-skinned dude in a headscarf, and all of a sudden you don't feel quite so moral.

Murder simulating video games are murder simulators. There's no ambiguity. One of my favorite stupidities is people who get angry if you swear in first person shooters. "No foul language in my murder simulator, please."

After Doom came out in 1993 violent crime started to decline.

So keep in mind that the well behaved, polite and model citizen in your average MMOG is most likely a serial killer as he feels guilty for all the real world stuff he did.

chaos4u said:

so your telling me, that the racist nazi biggot screaming obscenities over the mic in game is actually a caring sensitive and tender hearted individual in real life?

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Oh hi. Breakfast in bed and foot rub tomorrow sunshine? Looking forward to it after a quick game.

I always play good guys in games. Oh crap.

The people that react violently to video games make up a very small percentage of the population. Based on evidence from mass school shootings I would say your chances are increased if you are taking SSRI type medication. It isn't just video games though. Pretty much anything on the TV will influence your behavior. TV ads for instance are already pretty good at manipulating peoples behavior. That is why they spend so much on Super Bowl ads. A small percentage of the population is extremely sensitive to the power of suggestion. Add to that the psychotropic effects of SSRI medication and you potentially have a bad situation on your hands. This doesn't mean we need to censor. It means doctors need to be much more careful when prescribing SSRI medication.

I think all violent video games did for me was desensitize the shit out of me.

If that's true, I must be one of the best people alive today. Thank you GTA, DOOM, Quake, Wolfenstein etc etc big name games.