speech on video games are not evil

Regular visitors of  With a Terrible Fate  may recall that, last February, I delivered a speech as part of the Lowell House Speech Series at Harvard University. In it, I discussed my decision to pursue the study of video game philosophy instead of medicine. This year, on 1.26.16, I delivered another speech as part of that same Speech Series; in it, I discuss why video games are worth playing and studying at any age.

I offer the transcript below, in full:

What are video games good for? I study the stories of video games, so I worry about that question a lot. I want to share one way I think the special stories of video games, and the way we engage them, teach gamers to learn from one another.

We often try to communicate with one another by referencing our experiences. We argue about aspects of society that offend us; we talk about aspects of our identities that other people lack direct knowledge of – if you are a woman and feel that your employer treats female employees worse than men, you might want me to understand what that is like, although I am a man. We want to convey to others what it is like to be us – but how can we, when others have no way of standing in our shoes?

Video games can help us share who we are. Let me explain why.

When I was in high school, I played a little-known video game called “ Nier .” The game tells the story of a man, Nier, who will stop at nothing to save his daughter, Yonah, from a deadly plague. The emotional depth and complexity of this game were what first motivated me to study and analyze video games in school. If you haven’t yet, you owe it to yourself to play it some day.

At the same time that I dove into analyzing Nier , I also felt compelled to share the game with two of my closest high school friends, Dan and Nate. Just as I wanted everyone I knew to read The Catcher in the Rye after I first encountered the classic in middle school, I now wanted Dan and Nate to experience this game. One after the other, I passed my copy of the game along to Dan and then Nate in the hall between classes.

But when I spoke with them both after they handed the game back to me, I discovered something I hadn’t expected: although they had played the same game as I had, we each made different choices in the game—something that couldn’t have happened if we’d all seen the same movie or read the same book. I had focused on exploring the secrets of the game’s world, digging through virtual basements for classified government records to learn what had caused the apocalypse. Dan focused instead on exploring the relationship between Nier—the player’s character—and Yonah. He completed quests collecting food for Yonah, and she surprised him by making him a cake to thank him. Nate found the desolate wasteland of the game depressing, so he completed it once and moved on.

As I discussed Nier with my friends over lunches and in between classes, I learned about my friends and myself through the choices that we each made. We talked about how a single story prompted us to act differently from one another, and we accounted for our actions. Through these conversations, I learned how much Dan valued the intimacy fathers share with their daughters; I learned that Nate wanted to be excited about the environments of video game worlds, so that he could jump at the opportunity to explore them. Through these conversations, I began to articulate to my friends my desire to unravel mysteries.

Video games allow players to share their experiences with one another by grounding them in a common story. Games invite players to enter a single world, chart their own course through it, and compare their journeys with their friends. By giving us a special position in an artistic world, our choices become part of the work of art—something we can discuss and make meaning out of with others.

When I think about video games’ practical value, I always reflect on the degree to which they can unify people and allow them to understand and share their way of being. This invitation to share ourselves with others is the hidden utility of the engaging, epic stories waiting in the many worlds of video games.

But be warned, it can take a lot of work to get to know someone else—so you may just need to spend many hours playing video games.

Aaron Suduiko - Founder and Chief Video Game Analyst

Aaron Suduiko is the founder of With a Terrible Fate and a philosopher of video-game storytelling. He specializes in the impact of player-avatar relations on game stories.  Learn more here.

With a Terrible Fate is dedicated to developing the best video game analysis anywhere, without any ads or sponsored content. If you liked what you just read, please consider supporting us by leaving a one-time tip or becoming a contributor on Patreon.

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Ben Hur · February 6, 2023 at 4:54 pm

Hello, i came across this website while searching online for themes and philosophy in FF IX (article of Necron). Just wanna say you guys did a wonderful work here! It’s nice to read so many interesting insights about games that were part of my history! And this article, in particular, summarize why i Will always stand by The idea that videogames can be art! Thanks by

Aaron Suduiko · February 8, 2023 at 1:39 pm

Thank you for your kind words, Ben! We strive to offer a different standard of video-game-story studies here, and I’m so glad that our work resonates with your history and passion. I hope that you’ll continue to follow our work, and that you’ll share it with like-minded gamers!

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Gaming may not be as bad as you think – Oxford research

Conventional wisdom has it that too many cooks spoil the broth. But such judiciousness is not usually considered the basis for scientific pronouncements or international rulings on the need to limit the number of people in kitchens. But, when it comes to video games, conventional wisdom, not science, forms the basis for our thinking and even pronouncements from global authorities, according to Professor Andy Przybylski , Director of Research at the Oxford Internet Institute .

The World Health Organisation, no less, weighed into the debate over gaming, pronouncing that ‘Gaming disorder’ is an addictive behaviour and has classified gaming addiction as a disease. Yet, according to Professor Przybylski, there has been no scientific study which takes account of industry data and sentiment – until now. The professor has just completed a formal scientific study into the impact on players of video gaming – Video game play is positively correlated with well-being . And it has some surprising results, which suggest the old wives were wrong, yet again.

The study suggests that experiences of competence and social connection with others through play may contribute to people’s well-being. Indeed, those who derived enjoyment from playing were more likely to report experiencing positive well-being.

The study suggests that experiences of competence and social connection with others through play may contribute to people’s well-being. Indeed, those who derived enjoyment from playing were more likely to report experiencing positive well-being

According to the research, ‘We found a small positive relation between game time and well-being for players of both games. We did not find evidence that this relation was moderated by need satisfactions and motivations. Overall,  our  findings  suggest  that regulating video games,  on  the  basis  of time, might not  bring  the benefits  many  might  expect,  though  the correlational nature of the data limits that conclusion.’

So, stopping gamers from gaming is not necessarily a good thing. But the research is not a universal thumbs up, or perhaps down would be more correct, for a gaming analogy. Professor Przybylski emphasises the team looked at just two games and 3,000 adult players. But the study suggests there is a need to find out if the ‘moral panic’ over gaming is just that.

‘It’s fine to have an opinion about video games,’ says Professor Przybylski. ‘But, without research, you cannot know if this is a real thing or just your own ‘facts’. You can have your own opinion but you cannot have your own facts.’

It’s fine to have an opinion about video games...But, without research, you cannot know if this is a real thing or just your own ‘facts’. You can have your own opinion but you cannot have your own facts Professor Andy Przybylski

Although games have been with us for the best part of four decades, the Oxford expert says this is the first study of its type, because it draws on data only available to the gaming industry.  According to the report, ‘Policymakers urgently  require reliable,  robust, and credible evidence that illuminates the influences video game may have on global mental health. However, the most important source of data, the objective behaviours of players, are not used in scientific research.’

Contrary to conventional wisdom, using this method, Professor Przybylski’s study shows that the players involved in his study believed they benefitted to some extent from enhanced mental well-being as a result of lengthy games sessions on two specific games, Plants vs. Zombies: Battle for Neighborville and Animal Crossing: New Horizons .

Both are online ‘social’ games, where players engage with others at remote locations, and neither are in the 18+ ‘violent’ category.

 Working with ‘blind’ data of gaming time provided by the games manufacturers, Electronic Arts and Nintendo of America, Professor Przybylski’s team surveyed the game players and ‘explored the  association  between objective  game  time  and  well-being,  delivering  a  much-needed exploration of the relation between directly measured play behaviour and subjective mental health’.

 The study does not mean, he says, that all video games are ‘good for you’ or that ‘all players benefit’. But, he maintains, his research should be a first step in carrying out a proper scientific study of the impact of gaming on players and their effects over time; he is keen to see more studies follow.

What worries Professor Przybylski is that, earlier this year, in an extraordinary volte face, the WHO’s US ambassador, suggested that young men be given video games, to ensure they stay indoors and comply with the lockdown, thereby limiting the spread of COVID. Wouldn’t this be another leap of logic, to add to the last one? If gaming really is an addition, as the WHO claimed, wouldn’t that be like giving an alcoholic a bottle?

‘This was a serious suggestion....But it’s an unlabelled bottle,’ says Professor Przybylski. ‘We don’t know what’s in it.’

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Christopher J. Ferguson, The Conversation Christopher J. Ferguson, The Conversation

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Analysis: Why it’s time to stop blaming video games for real-world violence

In the wake of the El Paso shooting on Aug. 3 that left 21 dead and dozens injured, a familiar trope has reemerged: Often, when a young man is the shooter, people try to blame the tragedy on violent video games and other forms of media.

This time around, Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick placed some of the blame on a video game industry that “ teaches young people to kill .” Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California went on to condemn video games that “dehumanize individuals” as a “problem for future generations.” And President Trump pointed to society’s “glorification of violence,” including “ gruesome and grisly video games .”

These are the same connections a Florida lawmaker made after the Parkland shooting in February 2018, suggesting that the gunman in that case “was prepared to pick off students like it’s a video game .”

Kevin McCarthy, the GOP House minority leader, also tells Fox News that video games are the problem following the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton. pic.twitter.com/w7DmlJ9O1K — John Whitehouse (@existentialfish) August 4, 2019

But, speaking as a researcher who has studied violent video games for almost 15 years, I can state that there is no evidence to support these claims that violent media and real-world violence are connected. As far back as 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that research did not find a clear connection between violent video games and aggressive behavior.

Criminologists who study mass shootings specifically refer to those sorts of connections as a “ myth .” And in 2017, the Media Psychology and Technology division of the American Psychological Association released a statement I helped craft, suggesting reporters and policymakers cease linking mass shootings to violent media, given the lack of evidence for a link.

A history of a moral panic

So why are so many policymakers inclined to blame violent video games for violence? There are two main reasons.

The first is the psychological research community’s efforts to market itself as strictly scientific. This led to a replication crisis instead, with researchers often unable to repeat the results of their studies. Now, psychology researchers are reassessing their analyses of a wide range of issues – not just violent video games, but implicit racism , power poses and more.

The other part of the answer lies in the troubled history of violent video game research specifically.

An attendee dressed as a Fortnite character poses for a picture in a costume at Comic Con International in San Diego, California, U.S., July 19, 2019. Photo by REUTERS/Mike Blake

Beginning in the early 2000s, some scholars, anti-media advocates and professional groups like the APA began working to connect a methodologically messy and often contradictory set of results to public health concerns about violence. This echoed historical patterns of moral panic, such as 1950s concerns about comic books and Tipper Gore’s efforts to blame pop and rock music in the 1980s for violence, sex and satanism.

Particularly in the early 2000s, dubious evidence regarding violent video games was uncritically promoted . But over the years, confidence among scholars that violent video games influence aggression or violence has crumbled .

Reviewing all the scholarly literature

My own research has examined the degree to which violent video games can – or can’t – predict youth aggression and violence. In a 2015 meta-analysis , I examined 101 studies on the subject and found that violent video games had little impact on kids’ aggression, mood, helping behavior or grades.

Two years later, I found evidence that scholarly journals’ editorial biases had distorted the scientific record on violent video games. Experimental studies that found effects were more likely to be published than studies that had found none. This was consistent with others’ findings . As the Supreme Court noted, any impacts due to video games are nearly impossible to distinguish from the effects of other media, like cartoons and movies.

Any claims that there is consistent evidence that violent video games encourage aggression are simply false.

Spikes in violent video games’ popularity are well-known to correlate with substantial declines in youth violence – not increases. These correlations are very strong, stronger than most seen in behavioral research. More recent research suggests that the releases of highly popular violent video games are associated with immediate declines in violent crime, hinting that the releases may cause the drop-off.

The role of professional groups

With so little evidence, why are people like Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin still trying to blame violent video games for mass shootings by young men? Can groups like the National Rifle Association seriously blame imaginary guns for gun violence?

A key element of that problem is the willingness of professional guild organizations such as the APA to promote false beliefs about violent video games. (I’m a fellow of the APA.) These groups mainly exist to promote a profession among news media, the public and policymakers, influencing licensing and insurance laws . They also make it easier to get grants and newspaper headlines. Psychologists and psychology researchers like myself pay them yearly dues to increase the public profile of psychology. But there is a risk the general public may mistake promotional positions for objective science.

In 2005 the APA released its first policy statement linking violent video games to aggression. However, my recent analysis of internal APA documents with criminologist Allen Copenhaver found that the APA ignored inconsistencies and methodological problems in the research data.

The APA updated its statement in 2015, but that sparked controversy immediately: More than 230 scholars wrote to the group asking it to stop releasing policy statements altogether. I and others objected to perceived conflicts of interest and lack of transparency tainting the process.

It’s bad enough that these statements misrepresent the actual scholarly research and misinform the public. But it’s worse when those falsehoods give advocacy groups like the NRA cover to shift blame for violence onto non-issues like video games. The resulting misunderstanding hinders efforts to address mental illness and other issues, such as the need for gun control, that are actually related to gun violence.

This article was originally published in The Conversation. Read the original article . This story was updated from an earlier version to reflect the events surrounding the El Paso and Dayton shootings.

Christopher J. Ferguson is a professor of psychology at Stetson University. He's coauthor of " Moral Combat: Why the War on Violent Video Games is Wrong ."

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El Paso shooting is domestic terrorism, investigators say

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Study shows video games can improve mental wellbeing – but you can have too much of a good thing

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A study of almost 100,000 people in Japan aged 10 to 69 found playing video games – or even owning a console – can be good for mental health. But playing too much each day can harm wellbeing.

Video games and other forms of online media consumption are an everyday part of life .

Surveys have shown playing video games can have positive effects on stress levels and creativity . But concern remains about the potential negative effects on, for example, general wellbeing, aggressive behaviour and social development, especially for young people.

The World Health Organization lists gaming disorder as a mental health condition, and a severe social withdrawal condition called hikikomori has been described in Japan.

The new survey showed links between gaming and wellbeing and researchers found a way to show cause and effect – that even owning a gaming console improved wellbeing.

What the study found

The research was conducted between 2020 and 2022 – during the COVID pandemic. The researchers used measures of psychological distress and life satisfaction and asked 97,602 people in Japan about their gaming use.

The survey coincided with supply chain shortages. These led retailers to use a lottery system for the purchase of two consoles: Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 5. Of the overall survey group, 8,192 participated in the lottery.

Researchers compared the 2,323 lottery winners against those who did not win the opportunity to purchase one of the new consoles (over five rounds of surveys). They found those who won the lottery had improved distress scores and better life satisfaction.

The results were not all positive. Over time, the scores indicated drops in wellbeing for those who played more than three hours a day. Scores continued to drop for each additional time increment measured.

The study had some limitations.

Firstly, the survey was conducted when the COVID pandemic presented a particularly challenging time for mental health. It also brought changes in social, occupational and lifestyle behaviours.

The study focused mainly on general gaming habits without distinguishing between different types of games, which could have varying impacts on mental health.

Further, participants chose whether to enter the lottery, so it was not a random sample. And the study could not specifically attribute findings to the effects of playing video games versus the effects of winning the lottery.

Finally, we know self-reported studies are not always reliable .

Gaming pros and cons

We know from other surveys video games can be useful stress relievers and aid social connection (albeit online). We also know some games can improve particular cognitive skills such as visuo-spatial navigation and problem solving .

Games and technologies can also specifically target mental health issues , such as social anxiety or phobias, address ADHD symptoms and enhance motivation and performance.

Yet, concerns remain about possible long-term consequences, particularly in terms of reductions in “real-life” socialisation , participation in physical activity, school performance and other health consequences , including sleep and eating behaviours.

3 tips for positive gaming

While video games can offer some benefits, it’s important to maintain a balanced approach to gaming. Here are a few tips to help manage gaming habits and promote overall wellbeing:

1. Set time limits

Encourage moderate gaming by setting clear time limits to ensure it doesn’t interfere with sleep, physical activity or other important daily activities. The Australian institute of Family Studies recommends creating a media plan that includes limits on screen time and balances gaming with other activities.

2. Choose games wisely

Opt for games that are age-appropriate and consider their content. Some games can promote problem-solving skills and creativity , but it’s important to be mindful of those that might encourage aggression or excessive competition.

3. Monitor eating and sleeping habits

Pay attention to eating patterns and ensure meals are not skipped in favour of gaming. Encourage regular sleep patterns and avoid gaming close to bedtime to prevent disruptions in sleep .

While the new study provides promising insights into the potential positive effects of video games on mental wellbeing, these findings should be approached with caution due to the limits of the survey.

While the potential benefits are encouraging, it is essential to adopt a balanced approach to gaming and pursue further research to fully understand its long-term impact on mental health.

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The Discoverer

No, Video Games Don’t Cause Violence

Miguel Restrepo , Discover Staff Writer | August 30, 2020

Miguel Restrepo

A report by the Oxford Internet Institute and the University of Oxford (2019) which is one of the most definitive to date, found no relationship between aggressive behavior in teenagers and the amount of time spent playing violent video games.

The idea that video games make people more violent has spread and grown throughout the world over the past 30 years, regardless of the numerous studies that show the opposite. This proposition has been proven erroneous or non-relevant several times. Violence is caused by many other things like abuse, domestic violence, or access to weapons.

Nearly 85% of teenagers use video games, so the fact that some people who commit violent acts also play games should not be surprising, nor does it imply a causal relationship.

‘The idea that violent video games drive real-world aggression is a popular one, but it hasn’t tested very well over time,” lead research Professor Andrew Przybylski, Director of Research at the Oxford Internet Institute, said.

Additionally, a peer-reviewed study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health found that children play video games as a means of managing their emotions. 61.9% of boys played to help them relax, 47.8% because it helps them forget their problems, and 45.4% because it helps them get their anger out.

People who play violent video games have to know the difference between virtual violence in the context of a game and appropriate behavior in real life. Violent video games provide opportunities for children to explore the consequences of violent actions and to develop their moral compasses virtually. They also allow people to release their stress and anger in the game, which leads to less real-world aggression.

Video games can help many people feel comfortable and happy rather than worsen their violent character.

The debate over whether video games create violent tendencies in people has emerged again due to the mass shootings in recent years in the United States.

According to the University of Villanova, “In the first seven months of 2019, there have been 22 shootings at schools in which someone has been injured or killed. In many instances, violent video games are attributed as the root cause, even though research and analysis prove otherwise. The University also stated that, “A report by the US Secret Service and US Department of Education examined incidents of targeted school violence between 1974 and 2000. Of the 41 attackers studied none were found to have a relationship between playing violent video games and the school shootings.”

“Video games made them do it” is what parents around the world have put to blame as a cause of school shootings, while they should be worried about mental health problems, abuse, bullying, revenge, and other situations. There have been dozens of studies that have found no correlation between playing video games and aggressive behavior in teenagers. Focusing on violent video games as the cause of mass shootings distracts government officials from the need to deal with more fundamental causes.

Even though children can play violent video games, it does not mean they are more likely to cause a school shooting due to no correlation found between violent actions and video games.

Violence has always existed, but now it’s being blamed on video games.

In 2011 the US Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that California could not ban the sale of violent video games to minors. They argued that studies purporting to show a connection between violent video games and harmful effects on children have been rejected by every court.

The Court’s majority opinion read, “Large analyses of violent crime and video violent game use find no evidence that increased sales of violent video games lead to a spike in violent crimes. Researchers make the case that if violent games directly led to violent behavior, the data would show increases in violent crime on a large-scale as more people played violent games. ”

Multiple studies have been conducted around the world to try and resolve this dispute once and for all. During this process, it has been found that more important, life-threatening causes of violence should be the priority for parents and doctors.

Video games have not yet been proven as the cause of violent behavior. Nevertheless, some may argue that violent video games increase the access that someone has to violent thoughts or that it causes more aggression, bullying, and fighting. In 2014, a study published in Psychology of Popular Media Culture found that 90% of pediatricians and 67% of parents agreed that violent video games can increase aggressive behavior among children but can’t be fully blamed for it. It is important to keep in mind that excessive violent video game exposure could be a risk factor to many other problems.

By blaming video games instead of digging deeper into the root causes of violence, we are looking for easy answers instead of facing hard truths. The question about whether violent games inspire violent behavior “in real life” is a subject that is strongly divided by opinion.

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Video Games and Violence: An Ongoing Debate

Written by Yunah Elsner

With the increase of popularity in violent video games and the rise of mass shootings throughout the United States in the last decade, many could suspect a correlation between the two. Debates on whether or not violent video games cause violence has become a large societal and political issue. In 2011, the state of California tried to ban violent video games, and last August after the shootings in Dayton, Ohio and El Paso, Texas, President Trump gave a speech, encouraging people to stand against violent video games as they are the cause of mass violence and are the “glorification and celebration of violence.” Due to claims of video games causing violence, gaming industries were put under fire and fought back. 

“ For video game fans, many of whom have endured a lifetime of defending a hobby that is seen, at best, as a harmless waste of time or, at worst, unsightly onanism enjoyed by the socially bereft, it was the inevitable buckshot of political blame r,” wrote Time Magazine .

 Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association, Renee Gittens, commented on Trump’s speech on violent video games saying, “Blaming video games distracts from the broader issues at hand.” 

 As Christians, is it okay to be playing violent video games? Should Christians be supporting and encouraging these games? This question has been researched and debated on for over fifty years, yet we have no definitive answer. So, what is the answer and why has  it not been found yet? 

Games Are to Blame

“Playing violent video games is to an adolescent’s violent behavior what smoking tobacco is to lung cancer,” said Senator Hilary Clinton in 2005. Senator Joseph Lieberman referred to violent video games as “digital poison.”  

As different studies and experiments were conducted throughout the years, those claims have turned into a national debate.  A seven year study published in 2018 of 17,000 adolescents, ages nine to 19, found that the playing of violent video games led to more physical aggression over time. Even with a study like this, it is difficult to say that video games cause violence.  Stephanie Chan, a sociology professor at Biola University, briefly studied the correlation between video games and violence . 

“There are studies that argue that violent video games contribute to more aggressive behavior, but researchers have a hard time saying it is more than a contributing factor, because there are multiple factors,” said Chan. “It is also unclear which way the arrow goes. Are video games causing children to be more aggressive, or are violent children attracted to those kinds of games?”

Multiple Factors

 Ian Godlesky, a sophomore journalism major at Biola University, plays games of different genres from Rocket League to Call of Duty.  

“I don’t think video games directly cause violence,” Godlesky said. “When it comes to violence and people try to tie it into video games, I think it comes from someone else’s background prior to playing the video games.” 

A report published in 2016 conducted a cross-sectional experiment that found a correlation between violent video games and aggressive behavior in children. The study looked at a group of children, 49% male and 51% female, and also looked at other contributing factors, such as ethnic background, parental enforcement, parental attachment and other variables. Researchers found that children who played violent video games were more likely to act violently. However, the study also showed that contributing factors added to this aggressive behavior. A correlation between these variables and attraction to violent video games were found as a result. Researchers who conducted this study concluded that social and family variables had more of an influence on a child’s aggressive behavior than a violent video game did. 

Christians and Violent Video Games

Is it bad for Christians to play violent video games? There is no ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer to this question. Philippians 4:8 says, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” We are called to guard our hearts as well as our thoughts. 

“I think the fact that we are Christians doesn’t have a whole lot to do with it, because for the most part, video games are neutral,” said sophomore business major and vice president of Biola University’s eSports club Mark Gieser. “In terms of how we use them, that’s the part that matters.”

 Just like technology, a person cannot say all technology is good or bad. In the end, it is up to an individual whether playing a violent video game will affect you positively or negatively. 

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The frustrating, enduring debate over video games, violence, and guns

We asked players, parents, developers, and experts to weigh in on how to change the conversation around gaming.

by Aja Romano

In the wake of two mass shootings earlier this month in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, the societal role of video games grabbed a familiar media spotlight. The El Paso shooter briefly referenced Call of Duty , a wildly popular game in which players assume the roles of soldiers during historical and fictional wartime, in his “manifesto.” And just this small mention of the video game seemed to have prompted President Donald Trump to return to a theme he’s emphasized before when looking to assign greater blame for violent incidents.

“We must stop the glorification of violence in our society,” he said in an August 5 press conference. “This includes the gruesome and grisly video games that are now commonplace. It is too easy today for troubled youth to surround themselves with a culture that celebrates violence.”

Trump’s statement suggesting a link between video games and real-world violence echoed sentiments shared by other lawmakers following the back-to-back mass shootings. It’s a response that major media outlets and retailers have also adopted of late; ESPN recently chose to delay broadcasting an esports tournament because of the shootings — a decision that seems to imply the network believes in a link between gaming and real-world violence. And Walmart made a controversial decision to temporarily remove all video game displays from its stores, even as it continues to openly sell guns.

But many members of the public, as well as researchers and some politicians, have counterargued that blaming video games sidesteps the real issue at the root of America’s mass shooting problem: a need for stronger gun control . The frenzied debate over video games within the larger conversation around gun violence underscores both how intense the fight over gun control has become and how easily games can become mired in political rhetoric.

But this isn’t a new development; blaming video games for real-world violence — any kind of real-world violence — is a longstanding cultural and political habit whose origins date back to the 1970s. It’s also arguably part of a larger recurring wave of concern over any pop culture that’s been perceived as morally deviant, from rock ’n’ roll to the occult , depending on the era. But as mass shootings continue to occur nationwide and attempts to stop them by enacting gun control legislature remain divisive, video games have again become an easy target.

The most recent clamor arose from a clash among several familiar foes. In one corner: politicians like Trump who cite video games as evidence of immoral and violent media’s negative societal impact. In another: people who play video games and resist this reading, while also trying to lodge separate critiques of violence within gaming. In another: scientists at odds over whether there are factual and causal links between video games and real-world violence. And in still another: members of the general public who, upon receiving alarmist messages about games from politicians and the news media, react with yet more alarm.

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What is new, however, is that recent criticism of the narrative that video games lead to real-world violence seems particularly intensified, and it’s coming not just from gamers but also from scientists , some media outlets , even mass shooting survivors: David Hogg, who became a gun control advocate after surviving the 2018 mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, unveiled a new March for Our Lives gun control initiative in August, pointedly stating in his announcement on Twitter, “We know video games aren’t to blame.”

And on all sides is a sense that frustration is growing because so little has changed since the last time we had this debate — and since the time before that and the time before that.

There’s no science proving a link between video games and real-world violence. But that hasn’t quelled a debate that’s raged for decades.

Historically, video games have played a verifiable role in a handful of mass shootings, but the science linking video games to gun violence is murky . A vast body of psychology research, most of it conducted before 2015, argues strenuously that video games can contribute to increases in aggression . Yet much of this research has been contested by newer, contradictory findings from both psychologists and scholars in different academic fields. For example, Nickie Phillips , a criminologist whose research deals with violence in popular media, told me that “most criminologists are dismissive of a causal link between media and crime,” and that they’re instead interested in questions of violence as a social construct and how that contributes to political discourse.

That type of research, she stressed, is likely to be less flashy and headline-grabbing than psychology studies, which are more focused on pointing to direct behaviors and their causes. “Social meanings of crime are in transition,” Phillips said. “There’s not a single variable. As a public, we want a single concrete explanation as to why people commit atrocities, when the answers can be very complex.”

The debate over the science is easy to wade into, but it obscures just how preoccupied America is with dangerous media. The oldest moral panic over a video game may be the controversy over a 1976 game called Death Race , which awarded players points for driving over fleeing pedestrians dubbed “gremlins.” The game became mired in controversy, even sparking a segment on 60 Minutes . Interestingly, other games of the era that framed their mechanics through wartime violence, like the 1974 military game Tank , failed to cause as much public concern.

In his 2017 book Moral Combat: Why the War on Violent Video Games Is Wrong , psychologist Patrick Markey points out that before concerned citizens fixated on video games, many of them were worried about arcades — not because of the games they contained, but because they were licentious hangouts for teens. (Insert “ Ya Got Trouble ” here.) By the 1980s, “Arcades were being shut down across the nation by activist parents intent on protecting their children from the dangerous influences lurking within these neon-drenched dungeons,” Markey writes.

Then came the franchise that evolved arcade panic into gameplay panic: Midway Games’ Mortal Kombat , infamous for its gory “fatality” moves . With its 1992 arcade debut, Mortal Kombat sparked hysteria among concerned adults that led to a 1993 congressional hearing and the creation of the Entertainment Software Rating Board, or ESRB . The fighting game franchise still incites debate with every new release.

“Like people were really going to go out and rip people’s spines out,” Cypheroftyr , a gaming critic who typically goes by her internet handle, told me over the phone regarding the mainstream anxiety around Mortal Kombat in the 1990s. Cypheroftyr is an avid player of shooter games and other action games and the founder of the nonprofit I Need Diverse Games .

“I’m old enough to remember the whole Jack Thompson era of trying to say video games are violent and they should be banned,” she said, referencing the infamous disbarred obscenity lawyer known for a strident crusade against games and other media that has spanned decades .

Cypheroftyr pointed out that after the Columbine shooting in April 1999, politicians “were trying to blame both video games and Marilyn Manson. It just feels like this is too easy a scapegoat.”

Politicians have long seized on the idea that recreational fantasy and fictional media have an influence on real-world evil. In 2007, for example, Sen. Mitt Romney (R–UT) blamed “music and movies and TV and video games” for being full of “pornography and violence,” which he argued had influenced the Columbine shooters and, later, the 2007 Virginia Tech shooter.

Video games seem especially prone to garnering political attention in the wake of a tragedy — especially first-person shooters like Call of Duty. A stereotype of a mass shooter, isolated and perpetually consuming graphic violent content, seems to linger in the public’s consciousness. A neighbor of the 2018 Parkland shooter, for instance, told the Miami Herald that the shooter would play video games for up to 12 to 15 hours a day — and although that anecdotal report was unverified, it was still widely circulated.

A 2015 Pew study of 2,000 US adults found that even though 49 percent of adult Americans play video games, 40 percent of Americans also believe in a link between games and violence — specifically, that “people who play violent video games are more likely to be violent themselves.” Additionally, 32 percent of the people who told Pew they play video games also said they believe gaming contributes to an increase in aggression, even though their own experience as, presumably, nonviolent gamers would offer at least some evidence to the contrary.

“I find it more plausible that America’s long-standing culture of gun violence has affected video games ... than the other way around” —game developer Naomi Clark

One person who sees a correlation between violent games and a propensity for real-world violence is Tim Winter . Winter is the president of the Parents Television Council , a nonpartisan advocacy group that lobbies the entertainment industry against marketing graphic violence to children. He spent several years overseeing MGM’s former video game publishing division, MGM Interactive, and moved into advocacy when he became a parent. Growing up, his children played all kinds of video games, except for those he considered too graphic or violent.

In a phone interview, Winter told me his view aligns with the research supporting links between games and aggression.

“Anyone who uses the term ‘moral panic’ in my view is trying to diminish a bona fide conversation that needs to take place,” Winter said. “It’s a simple PR move to refute something that might actually have some value in the broader conversation.”

During our conversation, he compared the connection between violent media and harmful real-world effects to that between cigarettes and lung cancer. If you consume in moderation, he argues, you’ll probably be fine; but, over time, exposure to violent media can have “a cumulative negative effect.” (In fact, studies of infrequent smokers have shown that their risk of coronary disease is roughly equal to that of frequent smokers, and their risk of cancer is still significantly higher than that of nonsmokers.)

“What I believe to be true is that the media we consume has a very powerful impact on shaping our belief structure, our cognitive development, our values, and our opinions,” he said.

He added that it would be foolish to point to any one act of violence and say it was caused by any one video game — that, he argued, “would be like saying lung cancer was caused by that one specific cigarette I smoked.”

“But if you are likely to smoke packs a day over the course of many years, it has a cumulative negative effect on your health,” he continued. “I believe based on the research on both sides that that’s the prevailing truth.”

The debate endures because gun control isn’t being addressed — and games are an easy target

Like many people I spoke with for this story, Winter believes that the debate about gun violence has remained largely at a standstill since Columbine, while the number of mass shootings nationwide has continued to increase.

“If you look at the broader issue of gun violence in America, you have a number of organizations and constituencies pointing at different causes,” he said. “When you look back at what those arguments are, it’s the same arguments that have been made going back to Columbine. Whether it’s gun control, whether it’s mental illness, whether it’s violence in media culture — whatever the debate is about those three root causes, very little progress has been made on any of them.”

The glorification of violence is so culturally embedded in American media through TV, film, games, books, and practically every other available medium that there seems to be very little impetus to change anything about America’s gun culture. We can define “ gun culture ” here as the addition of an embrace of gun ownership and a nationwide oversupply of guns to what Phillips described as “ a culture of violence ” — one in which violence “becomes our go-to way of solving problems — whether that’s individual violence, police violence, state violence.”

“There’s a commodification of violence,” she said, “and we have to understand what that means.”

Naomi Clark , an independent game developer and co-chair of New York University’s Game Center program, agreed. “I find it more plausible that America’s long-standing culture of gun violence has affected video games, as a form of culture, than the other way around,” she told me in an email. “After all, this nation’s cultural traditions and attachments around guns are far older than video games.”

In light of incidents like Walmart’s removal of video game displays after the recent mass shootings while continuing to advertise guns, the connection between the shootings and America’s continued valorization of guns feels extremely stark. “We could ban video games tomorrow and mass shootings would still happen,” Cypheroftyr told me.

“What’s new about the current debate is that the scapegoat of videogaming has never been more nakedly exposed for what it is,” gaming sociologist Katherine Cross wrote in an email, “with Republicans and conservatives manifestly fearful of blaming systematic white supremacism, Trump’s rhetoric, or our nation’s permissive and freewheeling gun culture for the recent rash of terrorism.”

Because of the sensitivity around the issue of gun control, it’s easy for politicians to score points with constituents by focusing a conversation on games and sidestepping other action. “Politicians often blame video games because they are a safe target,” Moral Combat author Markey told me in an email. “There isn’t a giant video game lobby like other potential causes of mass shootings (like the NRA [National Rifle Association]). So [by targeting games], a politician can make it appear they are doing something without risking losing any votes.”

And the general public is often susceptible to this rhetoric, both because it’s emotional and because it may feed what they think they already know about games — even if that’s not a lot. “The narrative that violence in video games contributes to the gun violence in America is, I think, a good example of a bad idea that seems right to people who don’t look too closely at the facts,” Zak Garriss , a video game writer and designer who’s worked on a wide range of games, told me in an email.

“Video games are a global industry, dwarfing other entertainment industries in revenue in markets comprised of gamers from the UK, Germany, France, Japan, the US, and basically anywhere there’s electricity. Yet the spree shooting phenomenon seems to be seriously and uniquely a US issue right now. It’s also worth noting that the ratings systems across these countries vary, and in the case of Europe, are often more liberal in many regards than the US system,” Garriss said.

He also pointed out that this conversation frequently overshadows the important, innovative work that many games are engaged in. “Games like Stardew Valley , Minecraft , or Journey craft experiences that help people relax, detox after a day, bond with friends,” he said. “Games like Papers, Please , That Dragon Cancer , or Life Is Strange interrogate the harder and the darker elements of the human experience like love, grief, loneliness, and death.”

In other words, a conversation that focuses on games and guns alone dismisses the vital cultural role that video games play as art. “Play video games and you can jump on giant mushrooms, shoot a wizard on the moon, grow a farm, fall in love, experience nearly infinite worlds really,” Garriss told me. “If games have a unifying organizing principle, I’d say it’s to delight. The pursuit of fun.”

He continued: “To me, the tragedy, if there is one, in the current discourse around video games and violence, lies in failing to see the magic happening in the play. As devs, it’s a magic we’re chasing with every game. And as players, I think it’s a magic that has not just the potential but the actual power to bring people together, to aid mental health, to make us think, to help us heal. And to experience delight.”

But for some members of the public, games’ recreational, relaxational, and artistic values might be another thing that make them suspect. “If they don’t play games or ‘aged out of it,’ they might see them as frivolous or a waste of time,” Cypheroftyr says. “It’s easy to go, ‘Oh, you’re still playing video games? Why are you wasting your life?’”

That idea — that video games are a waste of time — is another longstanding element of cultural assumptions around games of all kinds, Clark, the game developer, told me. “Games have been an easy target in every era because there’s something inherently unproductive or even anti-productive about them, and so there’s also a long history of game designers trying to rehabilitate games and make them ‘do work’ or provide instruction.”

All of this makes it incredibly easy to fixate on video games instead of addressing difficult but more relevant targets, like NRA funding and easy access to guns. And that, in turn, makes it a complicated proposition to extricate video games from conversations about gun violence, let alone limit the conversation around violent games to people who might actually be in a position to create change, like the people who make the games in the first place.

Yet what’s striking when you drill down into the community around gaming is how many gamers agree with many of the arguments politicians are making. As a fan of shooter games, Cypheroftyr told me she routinely plays violent games like Call of Duty and the military action role-playing game (RPG) The Division . “I’m not out here trying to murder people,” she stressed. But like the Parents Television Council’s Winter, Cypheroftyr and many of the other people I spoke with agree that the gaming industry needs to do a lot more to examine the at times shocking imagery it perpetuates.

Many members of the gaming community are already discussing game violence

Multiple people I spoke with expressed frustration that the conversation about video games’ role in mass shootings is obscuring another, very important conversation to be had within the gaming community about violent games.

Clark told me that the public’s lack of nuance and an insistence on a binary reading of the issue is part of the problem. “Most people are capable of understanding that causes are complex,” she said, “that you can’t just point to one thing and say, ‘This is mostly or entirely to blame!’”

But she also cautioned that the gaming community’s reactionary defensiveness to this lack of nuance also prevents many video game fans from acknowledging that games do play a role within a violent culture. “That complexity cuts both ways,” she told me. “Even though it’s silly to say that ‘games cause violence,’ it’s also just as silly to say that games have nothing to do with a culture that has a violence problem.”

“Even though it’s silly to say that ‘games cause violence,’ it’s also just as silly to say that games have nothing to do with a culture that has a violence problem” —game developer Naomi Clark

That culture is endemic to the gaming industry, added Justin Carter, a freelance journalist whose work focuses on video games and culture.

“The industry does have a fetishization of guns and violence,” Carter said. “You look at games like Borderlands or Destiny and one of the selling points is how many guns there are.” The upcoming first-person shooter game Borderlands 3 , he pointed out, boasts “over a billion” different guns from its 12 fictional weapons manufacturers , all of which tout special perks to get players to try their guns. These perks serve as marketing both inside and outside the game; the game’s publisher, 2K Games, invites players to exult in violence using language that speaks for itself :

Deliver devastating critical hits to enemies’ soft-and-sensitives, then joy-puke as your bullets ricochet towards other targets. ... Step 1: Hit your enemies with tracker tags. Step 2: Unleash a hail of Smart Bullets that track towards your targets. Step 3: Loot! Deal guaranteed elemental damage with your finger glued to the trigger ...

“There are very few [action/adventure] games that give you options other than murdering people,” Cypheroftyr said. “Games don’t do enough to show the other side of it. You shoot someone, you die, they die, you reset, you reload, and nothing happens.”

“I know that if I shoot people in a game it’s not real,” she added. “99.9 percent of people don’t need to be told that. I’m not playing out a power fantasy or anything, but I’ve become more aware of how most games [that] use violence [do so] to solve problems.”

An insistence from game developers on blithely ignoring the potential political messages of their games is another frustration for her. “All these game makers are like, there’s no politics in the game. There’s no message. And I’m like ... did you just send me through a war museum and you’re telling me this?!”

The game Cypheroftyr is referencing is The Division 2 , which features a section where players can engage in enemy combat during a walkthrough of a Vietnam War memorial museum. While she loves the game, she told me the fact that players use weapons from the Vietnam War era while in a war museum belies game developers’ frequent arguments that such games are apolitical.

Another game Cypheroftyr has found disturbing in its attempt to background politics without any real self-reflection is the popular adventure game Detroit Become Human , which displays pacifist Martin Luther King Jr. quotes alongside gameplay that allows players to choose extreme violence as an option. “You can take a more pacifistic approach, but you may not get the ending you want,” she explained.

She noted, too, that the military uses video games for training as part of what’s been dubbed the “ military-entertainment complex ,” with tactics involving shooter games that some ex-soldiers have referred to as “more like brainwashing than anything.” The US Army began exploring virtual training in 1999 and began developing its first tactics game a year later. The result, Full Spectrum Command , was a military-only version of 2003’s Full Spectrum Warrior . Since then, the military has used video games to teach soldiers everything from how to deal with combat scenarios to how to interact with Iraqi civilians .

The close connection between games and sanctioned real-world violence, i.e., war, is hard to deny with any plausibility. “When someone insists that these two parts of culture have absolutely nothing to do with each other,” Clark said, “it smacks of denial, and many game developers are asking themselves, ‘Do I want to be part of this landscape?’ even if they have zero belief that video games are causing violence.”

For all the gaming industry’s faults when it comes to frankly addressing gaming’s role in a violent culture, however, many people are quick to point out that critiques of in-game violence can also come from the video games themselves. In Batman: Arkham Asylum , for example, researchers Christina Fawcett and Steven Kohm recently found that the game “directly implicate[s] the player in violence enacted upon the bodies of criminals and patients alike.” Other games shift the focus away from the perpetrators to the victims — for example, This War of Mine is a survival game inspired by the Bosnian War that focuses not on soldiers but on civilians dealing with the costs of wartime violence.

But acknowledging that critiques of violent games are coming from within the gaming community doesn’t play well as part of the gun control debate. “It’s far too easy to scapegoat video games as low-hanging fruit instead of addressing the real issues,” Cypheroftyr said, “like the ease with which we can get weapons in this country, and why we don’t do more to punish the perpetrators [of gun violence].” She also cites the cultural tendency to excuse masculine aggression early on with a “b“boys will be boys” mentality — which can breed the kind of entitlement that leads to more violence later on.

All these factors combine to make the conversation around violent video games inherently political and part of a larger ongoing debate that ultimately centers on which media messages are the most responsible for fueling real-world violence.

The conversation surrounding violent games implicates violent gaming culture itself — which, in turn, implicates politicians who rail against games

Games journalist Carter told me he feels the gaming community needs to, in essence, reject the whole debate entirely because at this point in its life cycle, it’s disingenuous.

“We’ve been through enough shootings that you know the playbook, and it’s annoying that gamers and people in the industry will take this as a position that needs defending,” he told me. “It’s not a conversation worth having anymore solely on post-traumatic terms.”

Discussions about video game violence need to be held mainly within the games community, Carter said, and held “with people who are actually interested in figuring out a solution instead of politicians looking to pass off the blame for their ineptitude and greed.”

But some gamers told me they don’t trust the gaming community to frame the conversation with appropriate nuance. All of them cited Gamergate’ s violent male entitlement and the effect that its subsequent bleed into the larger alt-right movement’s misogyny and white supremacy have had on mainstream culture at large.

“The framing of that rhetoric that began in Gamergate as part of the ‘low’ culture of niche internet forums became part of the mainstream political discourse,” criminologist Phillips pointed out. “The expression of their misogyny and the notion of being pushed out of their white male-dominated space was a microcosm of what was to come. We’re talking about 8chan now, but [the growth of the alt-right] was fueled by gaming culture.” She points to Gamergate as an example of the complicated interplay between gaming culture, online communities full of toxic, violent rhetoric, and the rise of online extremism that’s increasingly moving offline.

Gaming sociologist Cross agreed. “At this moment, there is urgent need to shine a light on video game culture , the fan spaces that have been infiltrated by white supremacists looking to recruit that minority of gamers who rage against ‘political correctness,’” she told me.

“We treat video games as unreal, as unserious play, and that creates a shadow over gaming forums and fan communities that has allowed toxicity to take root. It’s also allowed neo-Nazis to operate mostly unseen. That is what needs to change.”

The resulting shadow over gaming has spread far and wide — and found violent echoes in the rhetoric of Trump himself . “Look at what the person in the very highest office of the US is cultivating,” Cypheroftyr said. “Toxic masculinity, this idea that men, especially white men, have been fed that they’re losing ‘their’ country.”

“While video games do not influence us in a monkey-see-monkey-do manner, they do, like all media, shape how we see the world,” Cross argues. “Republicans, in broaching that possibility, open themselves up to the critique that their leader, who makes frequent use of both old media and social media, might also be influential in a toxic way.”

And this, ultimately, may be why the current debate around video games and violence feels particularly intense: The extremes of toxic gaming culture are fueling the attitudes of toxic alt-right culture , which in turn fuels the rhetoric of President Trump and many other right-wing politicians — the same rhetoric that many white supremacist mass shooters are using to justify their atrocities.

So when Trump rails against violence in video games, as he’s now done multiple times , he’s protesting a fictionalized version of the real-life violence that his own rhetoric seems to tacitly encourage. If we are to accept the argument that media violence as represented by games is capable of bringing about real-world violence, then surely no media influence is more powerful or full of dangerous potential than that wielded by the president of the United States.

In 2018, Vice’s gaming vertical Waypoint devoted a week to “ guns and games ”; in a moving piece outlining the intent of the project, editor Austin Walker observed that unlike real-world violence, “in big-budget action games, and especially games that give the player guns and plentiful ammunition, violence is cheap and endlessly repeatable.”

Yet now, barely a year later, mass shootings and other incidents of real-world violence have also begun to seem endlessly repeatable. Perhaps that is why, at last, the urgency of shifting our cultural focus from fixing violence in games to fixing violence in the real world feels like it is finally outstripping the incessant debate.

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Op-Ed Contributor

The Real Problem With Video Games

By Seth Schiesel

• March 13, 2018

Donald Trump has long claimed that exposure to simulated violence in video games begets violent tendencies in real life. “Video game violence and glorification must be stopped — it is creating monsters!” he tweeted in 2012.

In the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., as the nation debated gun control, Mr. Trump returned to that theme. “We have to look at the internet because a lot of bad things are happening to young kids and young minds, and their minds are being formed,” he said. He went on to implicate video games in particular: “I’m hearing more and more people say the level of violence on video games is really shaping young people’s thoughts.”

On Thursday, President Trump summoned video game executives to the White House to castigate them for the violence depicted in their products. The executives were joined by Republican members of Congress and by activists who have campaigned against violence in media.

The White House meeting did not, however, include any social scientists who have studied the effects of video games. That would have been too problematic. Decades of research, after all, have failed to find any significant relationship between playing violent video games and behaving violently in real life.

If anything, there may be a stronger connection between school violence and the sort of creative writing educators seek to foster. When the United States Secret Service and the Department of Education studied violence in schools , they found that 37 percent of attackers “exhibited an interest in violence in their own writings, such as poems, essays, or journal entries,” while only 12 percent exhibited an interest in violent video games.

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