I am 29 years old. I am a geek. I am a gamer. I’ve been following the anti-video game rhetoric for the vast majority of my life. Gratuitous violence in video games, questionable content, ‘Hot Coffee’, and Jack Thompson.
Every popular form of media seems to be afflicted with this process each generation. Growing up it was cartoons and movies. As I got older and it became chic to be a geek, video games caught the majority of the press. The ESA, or Entertainment Software Association was formed to help police the medium. The ESRB was formed to act much like the MPAA does in assigning ratings to video games.
Much like movies I have watched parents bypass these age restrictions and put games like Grand Theft Auto in the hands of their eight year olds. I have seen Senator Clinton stand beside Joe Lieberman and say that these violent video games are corrupting the youth of our nation.
The state of Illinois has recently tried to pass a ban on all violent video games in the state. In the courts this was found unconstitutional by way of the Free Speech ammendment. Video games represent an art form much like movies and what I term ‘higher art’ such as paintings, sculpture and poetry.
The state knew that this would be found unconstitutional before it went into the hearing and wasted tax payer dollars in the attempt to bleed the ESA, which is a non-profit organization, dry. The ESA has recently filed a petition to sue the state for over $645 thousand dollars to help recoup the costs of court fees in the state’s attempt to prove a point.
Games are indeed getting increasingly violent due to the market share that games such as Halo and Grand Theft auto garner. But the problem is not the video games themselves. The game industry also isn’t directly to blame, as much like an insurance company or any other corporation, they’re in it to make money.
However I don’t think the gaming community is taken seriously by most politicians. They want the youth vote yet they ostrasize and demonize gamers. The statistics point to the fact that a form of ‘electronic interactive entertainment’ exists in one in four homes.
We’re described as degenerates and layabouts. We don’t count as a percentage. But they fail to realize that the core demographic for video games has shifted from the 10-18 crowd to the 18-32 age group. These gamers have property, children, and money. We volunteer to the community.
A popular video game themed web comic called Penny Arcade holds an event every Christmas called “Child’s Play” where they accept donations such as money, games, and video game systems which will be given to children in children’s hospitals to brighten their days. Gamers last year donated in excess of $1 million dollars in physical donations and cash to this event.
And yet we’re not counted. Jack Thompson, famed for his crusade against violent video games offered up $10 thousand of his own money to the company that produced his concept for a video game; a man that fought back against the video game industry. The man would kill company execs over the loss of his son who died because of video games.
The gamer community spoke up and made many games. Mr. Thompson later retracted his offer stating that it was simply ‘satire’. Again Penny Arcade stood up and donated the money to Doug Lowenstein, director of the ESA to be donated to the charity of his choice.
And yet we’re still demons, gun crazed lunatics, and shiftless potheads. The point I’ve tried to demonstrate is that the gamer community and the video game industry perhaps is not to blame. The state of Illinois, Jack Thompson, and the others who have hopped on the bandwagon against one of the fastest growing entertainment mediums of our generation, have resorted to dirtier tricks and lies than the most battle crazed gamer sitting in his basement. And if the Democrats wish to win any kind of leverage in any of the branches of government they must appeal to us as well. We’re not the MTV generation. We’re not Generation X, or Y or whatever letter you assign to it. We are the Video Game Generation. We sit in seats of power during the day and frag your children in Halo and Half-Life by night. We fix your sinks. We prepare your food. We drive your children to school. We are socially responsible as a whole and deserve to be counted as well.
