I do agree that we need to reflect on how violent our games have gotten. It’s just just FPS games, it’s also some adventure/RPG games as well. I think the world in general has gotten more violent or at least the media has made it seem that way. I think it’s started with the news and them only caring about ratings and would put on any violent thing just to boost ratings. I think the world in general has gotten more violent or at least the media has made it seem that way. I think it’s started with the news and them only caring about ratings and would put on any violent thing just to boost ratings. While I do think games have gotten a little to extreme I also think parents just don’t care enough to learn about the games before buying them for the kids. Also I think the massive amount of information that is available now that never used to be is a big problem. Like the older generations that truly believed In the mainstream news media and whatever was printed in the newspaper as facts got hurt when they found out it was all mostly lies and used for propaganda or to hide something. I think it’s made people bitter, scared and violent.

While media does influence culture, the kind of mass shootings that the US has been under almost all are tied to domestic terrorism and the majority are tied to ultra right wing movements or, in a few cases, Trump’s rhetoric directly-as in quotes and pictures from his rallies and promotional materials.

If your political leader says these people are villains, they’re awful and a blight, what unthinking patriot wouldn’t try to help him rid their beautiful country of these “vermin”?

Video games are typically anti racism, anti discrimination and you’re usually a good guy fighting for moral reasons. If you’re a bad guy-you *know* you’re a bad guy and what you’re doing is wrong.

There’s not a lot of grey area games that are set in the modern world (quite a few fantasy and sci fi ones though). Those that are tend to explore morality, rather than telling people to do specific things-and they usually show you the consequences via gameplay. Unlike real life.

If we really start on the media and violence angle, the first thing to be censored should be all news. Because in the news, the violence, the bodies and the ravaged landscape are REAL.

If we aren’t going to tell the news they can’t show actual clips of actual violence, then why are we saying we can’t show fake stuff, but real stuff is A-okay?

There’s a lot of politics going on with this one, and you got part of it, because video games are a big industry. THey’re also a faceless industry with no unifying voice, so it won’t speak out. It also doesn’t pay for lobbyists like fuels and military hardware, but largely, it’s a new medium.

There were the same complaints about literacy and the written word, later the same complaints about radio, then film, then TV. Every medium gets demonized when it comes into being. The internet is still recovering from it’s span of being blamed for everything now.

Media will change a culture, but it is slow and pervasive. Not sudden shootings erupting. It’s what leads to things like changes in basic economic structures of countries and ranking by caste/class/etc, and other stuff like that.

If you want to blame anything for violence, we should all probably blame the people who are actually inciting and promoting violence, rather than the new media of the day.

Its about time.