Violent TV Video Games! News at 11!

Just finished watching CSI: Miami.

Why is it that every Cop/Robber show has to show video game violence in the most extremely worst possible circumstances?

I know of 4 shows on TV that have gone with the whole violent video game angle.

Now I’m all for making sure that violent video games are kept out of the hands of kids. Children have NO need to have that type of violence in their young lives.  It’s stupid, moronic, and completely irresponsible of retailers and parents if they let them get into a child’s hand.

The Columbine tragedy had links to Doom and Doom II (supposedly the two teenagers that were responsible created a mapfile that was a duplicate of the Columbine School), and there are other cases where video games have been linked to violence.  But I think that what a lot of people (including the media and the parents involved) are overlooking, is the fact that these kids have been bullied, rejected, outcast, or they might have had a chemical imbalance that was present BEFORE the introduction of the violent video games into their psyche.  Did the game trigger it?  Possibly.  There’s no proof  that they cause violence, but wouldn’t you think that if your kid was depressed, bullied, beat up, or outcast that those items are MORE prevalent in the kid’s life than the video game?

People are so quick to judge, and want to point finger so quickly that they don’t get all the information they need before making an informed decision.  Look at ESRB ratings.  Find a demo of the game and play it before you get it for you kids, and THEN make the decision whether or not your child is mature enough to play the game/

When programs like CSI and Law and Order portray video games as violent and they CAUSE kids to become violent, I truly believe it does a great disservice to the video game community.  And the community does things other than just make video games.  The US Army uses videogames to train their soldiers to fight, and they use a modified version of the game Full Spectrum Warrior to train their officers to lead those troops. The guys over at Penny Arcade have a Non-Profit organization called Child’s Play.  They collect games (of all types) to give to kids in the hospital that have terminal illnesses.  Microsoft (as a company) does lots of charity work.  I think it would be great to see a cop show go the CRAZY route and show video games in a better light.

And almost ALL of the developers want to make sure that violent videogames are kept out of kids hands.

I love Doom 3. Quake 4 is fantastic, and I think that the Grand Theft Auto series of games are some of the most innovative games to see the light of day.  But I’m not a violent person.  I put the game into context.  They are GAMES.  It’s fantasy. I might run over a pedestrian in Carmageddon, but I know if I do that in REAL LIFE, I’m going to prison for a long time.

So… are some video games violent?  Absolutely.  Do they cause people to become violent? No.  Bottom line – keep them out of kids hands, and wait until they hare mentally capable of knowing the difference between fantasy and reality.

Scrabble again - and other stuff

Well had another Scrabble meeting tonight – and it looks like I’m the only one that’s going to try to get to the Boston Regionals as a Newcomer this year.

I’m hoping to be able to head down at the end of next month on Saturday, and play 6 games in the day and then head back up.  I want to have enough to buy some Protiles and a bag for them.

Also joined the ISC – Internet Scrabble Club, and played a couple games tonight.  

Through them I found a TON of Scrabble websites devoted to wordlists, stems, hooks, and just about every statistic know to Scrabble.

I hope I can do well in the tournament.  I’m still learning my 2’s and my 2 to make 3’s as well.

I need to learn my Bingo prone tiles as well.  I’m pretty good at balancing my rack, but I need to work on my playing speed.

Hopefully I’ll be able to print out some helpers at work next week.

Speaking of work – I finally got my raise – up to $10.20 and hour, and I had an excellent review.  Marlene and Teri are looking into the 7 weeks of retro pay that the bank owes me from my merit promotion.

So thing are going well here in Maine – It’ll be nice when summer hits too (