Alex Britton takes a hard look at ITV’s recent televised debate on computer game violence.
As a society, we are bombarded by advice from all directions and it is becoming increasingly difficult to seek out the pearls of wisdom from the downright baseless. With increasing frequency, we see various personalities climb onto a soapbox and appoint themselves bastions of morality, condemning all sorts of ‘illicit’ deeds on mawkish daytime chat shows. The latest heinous action which is causing a decline in the moral-o-meter and will ultimately lead to us all becoming savages, as dictated by former gardener Alan Titchmarsh, is playing computer games.
To help Titchmarsh on his moral crusade to rid the world of everything that could corrupt or harm anyone ever, the panel consisted of computer games expert, Tim Ingham, self-appointed sex-pert Julie Peasgood, and Kelvin McKenzie, a man who made wildly disparaging comments about the conduct of Liverpudlians after the Hillsborough disaster and revelled in the deaths of 323 Argentine conscripts in the sinking of the Belgrano. A panel well placed to make moralistic judgements, I’m sure you’ll agree.
It was quite apparent from the start which side of the fence three of the panel sat, with Tim Ingham forced to try and cut through a tirade of ill-informed opinion and over-exaggerated outrage. Speaking of ill-informed opinion, the notion that it is somehow easier to gain access to an 18-rated computer game than a similarly rated DVD is fairly symptomatic of the levels of general ineptitude present in this ‘debate’.
We can argue until we’re blue in the face as to whether computer games turn people into deranged psychopaths or not, with various studies playing metaphorical ping-pong, constantly suggesting that there is and isn’t a link. But the facts remain that if you take any art form and concentrate on the most shocking examples within these boundaries, you could argue that these too have the potential to warp minds. Is it argued that Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange led to a spate of ultra-violent gang assaults? No. So why should computer games be any different?
It seems that many people have difficulty seeing that computer games don’t warp sane people, but can have the potential to further destabilise already deeply unsettled people. However, it’s all too easy for the moral bastions of this world to play the ‘computer games cause violence’ tune and many will sing along, because, after all, video games cannot defend themselves and on occasions where a platform is offered for games to be defended, these voices are forced to defend ridiculous claims and moralistic grandstanding.
One of the most salient points made during this debate was when Ingham stated that “violent games should not be getting into the hands of children” which was conveniently ignored to continue down the “isn’t all the violence corrupting our children?” line of questioning. The question of whether violent computer games damage children would be moot if the classifications were adhered to, therefore the finger of blame ought not to be pointed at the games but rather the parents, who decide that Call of Duty is the perfect way to pacify their 10-year-old child.
Ingham put on a valiant effort in trying to stand up for computer games, but just as he tried to steer the conversation towards more family-friendly games, the violence card was dealt again, and he found himself on the back foot once more. Ingham was fighting a losing battle; popular opinion dictates that computer games cause violence, but, then again, we also used to think the world was flat…
Alex Britton
Tags: alan titchmarsh, moral panic, tim ingham, video nasties, violence
