Effect of Video Games on Society, Essay Example

Like any of the exploding post-electronics-revolution industries, video game manufacturers are actively carving out a spot for themselves in the American economic and pop-cultural landscape.  But it is the potential of video games to also rework the recreational and even psychological picture in our society that set this industry in the cross hairs of controversy.

Many people, including the retired colonel and professor David Grossman, have pointed out that the simulated violence found in many video games is very similar to the conditioning and desensitization which makes up a large part of current military training.  Grossman and his colleagues fear that the repetitive act of pretending to kill, even in a video game, serves to slowly break down a natural aversion towards violence.  The fear is that as a generation grows up on more and more graphic and realistic simulations of brutality, gamers become hardened to violence in much the same way a veterans returning from combat.  This theory has gained more attention since the Columbine school shootings and subsequent investigation into a possible link with video gaming.

Setting aside the psychological impacts of violence within the games, the relatively new entertainment media has other critics, too.  Many people feel that the potential for self isolation and withdrawal from society can be detrimental.  The creation of increasingly complex alternate-realities within video games create a dangerous pull that could potentially leave people less and less connected with their own real-life communities. Even with the rise in popularity of multiplayer games, particularly massive online gaming networks, the levels of human interaction are being determined by programing as opposed to people. Coupled with the ease of plugging into a video game system or switching on a computer, the stage could be setting for a dramatic overhaul of how people interact with one another.

As a generation comes of age that has grown up with home gaming systems, we may start to see the full implications of how video games are starting to shape the national psyche.  Perhaps the critics of video games will be silenced by strong evidence to the contrary, or perhaps the impact will not be as strong as some might have guessed.  But it is hard to imagine that this multimillion dollar industry, creating a product that consumes a huge chunk of time from a large (and growing) amount of the population, will not have a significant impact on our communities.