The NZ Herald reports: “Violent Xbox video games are being fingered by a top police officer as a possible cause of rising violence among young people.
“Superintendent Bill Harrison, national manager of police youth services, says youth violence rates have jumped in the past two or three years throughout the Western world, coinciding with the rise of new products such as the Xbox.”
See full story: Video violence beyond a game: top cop
Wednesday November 28, 2007. By Simon Collins
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10478781&ref=rss
Its not the violent video games and nothing else but the poor and un-updated gun control laws in this country, this goes the same with pitbull owners, once you have no control over these issues, the citizens pay the price because the laws are outdated and not changed to fit the 20th century, if not changed, the 21st century will be worst.
Neither SPCS nor Superintendent Bill Harrison, to our knowledge, has ever claimed that “video games and nothing else” might have a link (i.e. be a causal factor) in youth crime. Repeated exposure to gratuitous violence in computer games might be one causal link among many others.
Hmm, Xbox360’s and the games aren’t exactley cheap.
From what I’ve read of the Superintendent’s dealings with youth these are the “lower socio-economic” groups.
Maybe if these groups had access to a more socially acceptable way of dealing with their violent tendancies (eg. not stabbing each other), say team deathmatch in Halo 3, then we would see a reduction in youth violence.
Guns, like TVs, are not a problem in and of themselves. It is people who cause the problems. Advertisers know that some people will buy, buy, buy if they are told often enough in advertisements. So what do you expect to happen to some kids if they are playing kill, kill, kill in the context of fun.
Not only that, but the young have rapidly developing minds and are at an influential time of their lives. They should be being taught how to become responsible adults, not how to glorify killing.