href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&func=display&ceid=287"> alt="Mercurial Thoughts"
src="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/files/gallery/albums/site_images/header_thoughts.jpg"
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 500px; height: 75px;" align="top">

style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Video Games Kill

And Other Media-Generated Myths

by Mercurie

---

<!-- if (!document.phpAds_used) document.phpAds_used = ','; phpAds_random = new String (Math.random()); phpAds_random = phpAds_random.substring(2,11); document.write ("<" + "script language='JavaScript' type='text/javascript' src='"); document.write ("http://ads.tentonhammer.com/adjs.php?n=" + phpAds_random); document.write ("&amp;what=zone:93"); document.write ("&amp;exclude=" + document.phpAds_used); if (document.referrer) document.write ("&amp;referer=" + escape(document.referrer)); document.write ("'><" + "/script>"); //-->

Any gamer who has kept track of
the mainstream media's coverage of
MMORPGS  know that it has not always been favorable. Most gamers
have
probably read multiple articles on MMOs in the mainstream article in
which they emphasize the possibility of becoming addicted to the games.
Often when addressing the possibility of href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/index.php?module=ContentExpress&func=display&ceid=311&meid=-1">MMO
addiction,
the mainstream media has made reference to relationships breaking up
because of obsessively playing a given MMO. In at least one instance,
even a
suicide was linked to an MMO, in this case EverQuest.



On Thanksgiving in 2002, 21 year old href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/10/17/48hours/main525965.shtml">Shawn
Woolley from Wisconsin shot himself while EverQuest was on his
computer screen.
According to his mother, Woolley became addicted to the game. She also
felt that while he had other problems in his life, it was playing
EverQuest which ultimately resulted in his suicide. I think every gamer
can agree that Woolley's death was a tragedy. And I think nearly all of
us were saddened by his death. But it seems to me that most gamers were
also struck by the media's rather one sided coverage of his suicide. In
nearly every story on Woolley's death in the mainstream media they
emphasized the EverQuest angle over any other problems Woolley had. I
myself cannot remember any news outlets that looked for anything else
that may have led to his suicide. And while nearly every single news
outlet spoke to Sony about Woolley's death, I can't recall too many
instances in which they spoke to any of the thousands of gamers leading
healthy and productive lives. To many gamers it must have seemed that
the mainstream media had tried and convicted EverQuest of Woolley's
death based on far too little evidence.



All of this leads to a question that I am sure many gamers have asked
themselves over the years, particularly following Woolley's death: Why
does the mainstream media so often wish to portray MMOs in a bad light?
I am also sure that many of us have come to the same conclusion--plain
old fashioned sensationalism. Even before William Randolph Hearst and
Joseph Pulitzer turned it into an art form, publishers had learned that
sensationalism was a useful tool in selling papers. All too often, by
emphasizing that which is controversial, unusual, or beyond the norm,
publishers could increase their readership. Many of us today would like
to think that the mainstream media is above such outdated practices as
sensationalism, but all too often it seems that they are not.



Of course, it seems to me that there could be other reasons for the
media's sometimes less than favorable coverage of MMOs. Having long
studied entertainment and pop culture, I have observed that throughout
history, every time a new medium or entertainment technology has been
developed, it has come under attack by various moral watchdogs not long
after its development. While motion pictures were still in their
infancy, there were concerns about immorality in the medium. Eventually
these concerns would lead to the establishment of the target="_blank" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hays_Office">Production
Code.



href="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/modules.php?set_albumName=article-illustrations&id=Mae_West&op=modload&name=Gallery&file=index&include=view_photo.php"> alt="Mae West"
src="http://vanguard.tentonhammer.com/files/gallery/albums/article-illustrations/Mae_West.thumb.jpg"
style="border: 0px solid ; width: 121px; height: 150px;" align="left"
hspace="4" vspace="2">In the Thirties, decency groups sometimes
expressed concerns over the
content of radio programs. All of this came to a head after Mae West's
guest appearance on The Chase and Sanborn Hour (featuring Edgar Bergen
and Charlie McCarthy), a broadcast of the Eugene O'Neil play Beyond the
Horizon, and Orson Welles' notorious War of the Worlds broadcast.
Newspapers had a field day attacking radio following each of these
incidents.




Comic books had been frowned upon in some quarters since their early
years, but it was in the late Forties and early Fifties that the outcry
of various moral watchdogs became louder than ever. Their foremost
critic was psychiatrist Dr. Frederic Wertham, whose book on the
subject, Seduction of the Innocent, may have resulted in the creation
of the href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority">Comics Code
Authority (the comic book industry's self censorship
organization).



Very early in the history of network broadcast television, the medium
was already coming under attack for what many perceived to be violent
content. The first of many congressional hearings on television
violence was held in 1952. There would be more href="http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/C/htmlC/childrenand/childrenand.htm">hearings
on the subject
in 1954 and 1964.
By the Nineties concerns about television violence were great enough
that the industry created what they called TV Parental Guidelines,
essentially a rating system for TV shows.



Of course, I assume most gamers are familiar with the concerns
expressed over various role playing games, video games, and computer
games (including MMOs) over the years. To be fair, I must say that in
some cases the concerns of various moral watchdogs regarding various
media were not entirely misplaced. Although considered classics today,
I doubt very many parents even now would let their children read the
majority of href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EC_Comics">EC Comics published
in the early Fifties. I must admit that I can understand the
objections many may have had to them. And I very seriously doubt many
of us would allow young children to play a game like Grand Theft Auto.
That having been said, there are other instances in which the
objections raised by various decency groups and moral watchdogs seem a
bit ridiculous. As an aficionado of classic television, I can think of
only a very few TV shows prior to the Nineties that could be considered
exceedingly violent. And as a fan of old time radio, I found nothing
really objectionable about the skits Mae West performed with Charlie
McCarthy on The Chase and Sanborn Hour. In these instances, one has to
wonder why there were any real objections at all.



My own thought is that the reason that newly developed media and
entertainment technologies have come under attack by moral watchdogs
and even the mainstream media is simple: human beings often fear that
which is new or recently invented. While we take automobiles for
granted today, upon their introduction they had their fair share of
critics. I am sure many of us older gamers can remember individuals who
were very reluctant to give up their typewriters for personal
computers. It seems to be a part of human nature to fear that which is
novel, particularly if it is something unusual. MMOs have only been
around for a relatively short period of time. What’s more, the majority
of people have little to no familiarity with MMOs. For that reason
MMORPGs are sometimes going to come under attack in the mainstream
media. Quite simply, the mainstream media is only reflecting the fears
and discomfort that the majority of the population has about something
new and unusual, in this case MMOs.



The good news is that I don’t think it will always be this way. In most
instances there comes a point where a new medium or entertainment
technology becomes accepted and any concerns over that medium or
entertainment technology become minimal at best. True, there are still
sometimes concerns expressed over the content of movies and television,
but those concerns are not nearly so common when those media were
young. Quite simply, movies and television are no longer new or
unusual, but simply two established media in our cultural landscape. I
suspect that the same thing will happen with MMOs. Eventually they will
cease to be new or unusual and, when that occurs, stories about MMOs in
the mainstream media will become more favorable. I think I can speak
for most gamers when I say that time cannot come soon enough.

---