Hmm, and you both have had these experiences with your sons and both are keen to suggest that games lead to aggression. Might we equally, perhaps, wonder if this might be about attempting to justify the aggressive behavior of your own offspring by "blaming games"? I guess no parent wants to believe that their little boy is just aggressive and easily frustrated by nature :shrug:.

The thing is though, the aggression you're noticing is almost certainly whilst playing competitive online games like Call of Duty or FIFA. And yes - many teenage boys DO get... Overenthusiastic... When engaging in competitive activities. The only real difference is that they're in the house playing games so you can see and hear them, rather than out at the park playing football and swearing / scrapping with their friends. It's "normal teen behaviour".

Reminds me of when my son had a friend around and we were all playing monopoly and the friend said his Mom had lobbed the monopoly board :joker: and she is quite a mild mannered woman

Some people just don't take losing well at all. My daughter doesn't get angry but she does get really upset about losing, to the extent that she just won't willingly engage in anything competitive. I guess if you don't compete, you can't lose? Haha. But it's basically anything... She can't play board games or video games, and even if she's with a friend and they're like "race ya to the next lamp post!" she's just straight up like "NOPE I'm not racing" and actually slows down :joker:.

Even things where there's no skill involved like deciding something with a coin toss. Just won't do it :shrug:.

Yeah, I do think it's a problem with competitive attitudes rather than with the games themselves. When you fail in single player games, it's no one's fault but your own but when people lose in competitive games against other people they can place the blame at someone else's door.

That's not exclusive to video games, nor is it a problem that video games have created.

Irrelevant... in what context?

I can handle being uninformed I never professed to being a gaming aficionado... But irrel?... Why not go the extra mile and throw a gurl bai in there? :joker:

Well... Irrelevant to gamers, game publishers, retailers and to regulators responsible for giving age ratings to games content / allowing them to go to market. So, I guess in this context... Irrelevant to anyone who actually matters? :shrug:

I grew up watching horror movies and playing violent video games, my older step brother had me watching things like Evil Dead, Scream and Halloween and playing Grand Theft Auto and Resident Evil with him.

I am now studying to be a nurse and I go and vaulenteer at an animal sanctuary when I can as well as owning my own well looked after dog and horse. I could never hurt a person or animal intentionally and I grew up watching the weirdest most violent ****.

If you are capeable of harming others then you just are, a movie or video game doesn't create killers.

]There's also a lot of taunting / goading / name calling that goes on over the headsets... That's where a lot of the frustration comes from :shrug:. But it's literally the exact same crap that was going on in the playground when people were playing sports and other playground games. Except actual fights started then. But no one was getting up in arms about it.

Just when I think you couldn't get any higher on that soapbox... you surpass yourself.

Anyone can have an opinion on anything

Just because your arrogance prevents you from accepting that people who are not gamers can and do have opinions on games it does not follow that they are 'irrelevant' in any debate.
AsI stated previously I could trawl this forum and find 101 topics that you have not and could not have any experience in of of and yet you participate as is your right ... Why then am I not afforded the same courtesy?

You actually appear affronted that someone over 40 and female has the audacity to comment at all on the subject.

And at what age marsh do you think they know the difference ?

Well very young kids have no real concept of most things and by the time they're old enough to understand they know the difference. Sometimes more than adults.

Kids aren't as stupid as they are usually thought of imo.

The reason I asked you that marsh is when those two 10 year olds killed James Bulger,there were some that said they didn't know what they were doing they were only 10,do you believe that train of thought? as it was said they had got ideas from the movie Chucky,so were they influenced or not ? and were they old enough to understand,I have my own views but would like yours. By the way no one likes gaming more than me,especially the Tombraider games,but even I have been known to throw the control and call her a stupid cow,LOL,so they do get in your head.

Pretty sure it was proved Jon Venables had never seen Child's Play. Those two are just sick in the head, you could have put them infront of My Little Pony and they would have still been evil.

I know you're asking Marsh but my opinion on this is that it's utter BS that they didn't know what they were doing was wrong. I know that I have a just turned 8 year old who doesn't care at all about violence on screen but would never dream of hurting another child - much less a child younger than her - and I'm fairly confident that all of her friends the same age are exact the same. Of course they know the difference and the idea that they did it because of watching "Chucky" is just as ridiculous as the notion that a violent game can be the cause of a child or teenager turning to real violence. When it comes to Mrs right down to the very basics of that case... From what I've read I believe that Thompson quite probably had (has) some sort of psychopathy or at least extreme sociopathy and that was essentially what lead to that horrific crime. Most people seem to think of Venables as the ringleader but if you look into their behaviour immediately after the crime and accounts of how they were in the years afterwards, I highly doubt that is the case.

But yes, anyway, no it wasn't a film that caused them to do what they did, it all scapegoating, the same as with gaming. Healthy, well adjusted people know the difference, know it early (I would say aged 5 or 6, max) and can't be turned to violence by stories and games.

Well... To be fair... I've listened in on my youngest with her My Little Pony toys and I have concluded that PinkiePie is in fact an avatar of Satan himself. She seems to believe so, anyway. The sheer disdain she has for that specific pony :umm2:...

Oh I agree ,of course they knew what they were doing,I know the Bulger family via my mom,and some about this case I know that the video WAS brought up in court, one of the judges deemed there was a connection,I cant say too much,but there were some similarities in the case so yes I think media can put things in peoples heads but most dont act upon it but to those who are prone to violence I don't think they can be helpful,but you have to blame parents also for letting kids play adult games,I dont think they make people violent in themselves,but with the graphics being as they are today they are very life like and some are a bit over the top for violence imo.

The killers of Jamie Bulger would have committed the act regardless of whether or not they played a game or watched a film. They had the potential for killing long before they apparently watched Chucky.

If gaming truly could make someone violent then we would have seen a noticeable pattern emerge by now given that it's been over twenty years since violent video games came to prominence but not such pattern exists. Games (and anything else in the world) can act as a trigger for a disturbed individual but they don't create them. Blaming a trigger is pointless.

There is no blanket, 'yes it can affect a child' or 'no it can't affect a child'.

We know, for example, that a child who regularly witnesses violence within their family can become desensitized to violence. Its the same for adults. Morbid facination can start quite innocently but when a person keeps looking for violent content on places like YouTube, its usually because they are searching for an emotion but the more they watch, the less they feel because they are desensitizing themselves.

We know children learn from observing the things around them. We also know that the make believe is an important part of childhood development. If a child plays with a doll and pretends to be a mother they are using their imagination to be that mother. Therefore, that Childs reality whilst playing that game is that of a mother and not a child. Although most children start to move away from imaginary play fairly early, children with ADHD and children who lack emotional maturity can carry on playing alternative reality games up to and around the age of 10. For these children, computer games can be a real asset, so long as we monitor what the content is. No 10 year old should be playing computer games above the rating for that age because its content has been deemed not suitable.
A child who does play adult content games may be absolutely fine but that could depend on their environment, the context, the guidance they receive from their parents and it could depend on the emotional maturity of that child.

Oh piss off, there is a lot more in that link than the factt that that game, aids kids because they can correct the wrong.......especially when the game in question is not available to kids....twisty misty

I think some people in the thread don't realise that not helping the victim of violence in the game would contribute to getting a less than satisfactory ending to a game. The game wants you to make the right choices so all the good characters make it out of the situation in a good state.

I agree to a certain extent,what I am saying is they CAN have an influence on certain kids, it's not black and white,there are shades of grey here,didn't the killers in Columbine copy something they had seen ? of course normal people can play them with no effect but not everyone is 'normal' I think that is what it alludes to,the similarities in the Bulger case was the train track,the blue paint and the batteries.but I agree in the fact they would have killed video or not in this case.

Not to state the obvious, but you would have to be mentally unwell to be influenced into murder by anyone or anything, that goes for children and adults.

Several millions have watched Chuckie and played GTA. Its mathematically impossible to claim that this is the reason for any murder. I think people just feel more comfortable when theres something to physically blame.

I do believe it's nature over nurture if someone turns out to be evil, that said I don't thing members can point to themselves as evidence of children not being influenced, as it is a very individual thing

I' going to use that word.... trigger.

With psychopathy there has to be an event or series of events that turns on this part of the brain within the psychopath.

Could these games do it?

Does there? I wouldn't have thought so really. I would say its always there. Some chose to act on it (maybe for superficial reasons..most common seems to be rejection by a romantic partner) and some don't. I genuinely cannot imagine how playing a violent videogame could be a 'trigger'

I am apparently a sociopath. Which means (according to the internet and searches I have done since having this revealed to me) I could have psychopathic tendencies. But I watch endless gory films and such and have never felt the urge to hurt someone badly. I know I could hurt someone badly and feel no guilt (I have hurt people 'not badly' and felt no guilt, I have done some very bad things and not felt guilt too, I am very manipulative also when I want to be and never feel bad for that) as I have thought about it a lot and how I would actually take it and have come to the conclusion that I could actually kill someone and not care at all. All I would care about is the possibility of getting caught and going to prison. But still, as I said I watch a ridiculous amount of gory films, I watch real beheadings and such on the net, and still never this 'trigger' has happened to me. Hmm. Though it does concern me a lot that I have thought enough into it to come to the conclusion that I could kill without regret.