As stated earlier, it is clearly obvious that video games can be hazardous towards kids, whether it’s distracting them from remaining focussed on certain tasks or making them more aggressive, one such negative aspect of playing violent games extensively is that your child can be subjected to sexual harassment or insult other’s sexually themselves. And this harassment can greatly affect teens who play games. A 2013 study from Ohio University showed that when a female player in Halo 3 greeted other players with an innocuous phrase like “Hi Everyone”, she faced insults like “Shut up you whore!” Consequently, a rallying cry of “alright team let’s do this” earned her the response, “Shut up you slut.” Furthermore, this type of harassment not only exists in Halo 3; there are countless other games where I myself have seen teens torment fellow gamers with extremely vulgar language. For example, Call of Duty games allow teammates to communicate with each other so that they have a better chance to win the game. Some may say that this actually helps adolescents to collaborate and convey their thoughts to others which is a really important skill for any human being to learn, but in actuality, group chats like these are in the end mostly used to tyrannise other teammates. Take Jenny Haniver for instance, who is an avid Call of Duty player. She uses her free time after college classes to play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. But how can someone enjoy a game when they’re repeatedly faced with negative comments such as "Get back in the kitchen and take your goddamn hands off a video game controller." Another especially revolting memory of Jenny’s was when an enemy player backed out of the middle of the match just to send Jenny a voice message about how he hoped she would be raped and she and her family killed. Amazingly, situations like these aren’t uncommon at all. Fatuglyorslutty.com is a website that depicts hundreds of similar horrendous messages from video gamers online. You can go check out the website yourself and you too will be revolted by the posts you witness. But all in all, it is obvious that sexual harassment in video games is an enormous crisis that needs to be fixed.
Another imminent problem due to addictive gaming is the low level of school achievement that correlates to it. According to one study done on 1500 American adolescents, aged 10 to 19, teens who played video games compared to teens who didn’t, spent 32% less time doing homework and other education related activities (Cummings & Vandewater 2007). From this study, it is indisputable that there is a strong correlation between addictive gaming and neglect of school responsibilities. This result is most probably due to students getting used to the fast pace of violent games and consequently, when they try and focus on slow paced activities like reading and homework, they are unable to concentrate on them due to their addiction. Another explanation for the correlation could simply because of a student’s addiction’s. Once they put down the game, reality literally slaps them in the face and they don't feel like doing anything but delving into more games, I’m sure many of your son’s or daughter’s have experienced. On the contrary, it could be reasonably contended that video games are in fact helpful to students as they can be a major stress reliever. However, even if video games are a major stress reliever for them, students who play them can lose track of their sense of time easily due to their addiction as video games are like a sponge except instead of water, they suck up time, time that could’ve been used for more useful and urgent things.
The final problem I want to address to you parents today is that video games can cause your teenagers to make unreasonable choices just to feed their addiction. For instance, take a look at Guy Martin’s article, “High-Jinks: Shoot Out”. It elucidates the game ,“Killer”, which is the “last-man-standing game of water-pistol ambush(Martin, 1)”, has become an important end-of-year ritual in multiple New York City high schools. At St. Ann’s, a private school in Brooklyn Heights, the game is taken tremendously seriously. So seriously, that some competitors bribe cab drivers and stalk other people and camp outside their house just because they wanted a better chance to receive the winner’s jackpot. Furthermore, even though Killer isn’t a video game, the same moral can be taken from it and applied to popular first person shooters or role playing games. I’m sure that many of your children have made imbecilic choices just to feed their addiction of video games, heck, I actually know people in 8JRa that have lied to their parents about money and thrown it away on video games solely for getting an “achievement” or a legendary champion skin. And if you realise how grave this situation is, I’m talking about one of your sons or daughters who’s in this room right now! And don’t give me any rubbish on how spending on video games help adolescents boost their cognitive skills because there’s no benefit in playing video games to increase analysing and reaction skills if the teens who play them are stealing from their parents, lying about money and in all, making stupid choices!
Now, how can you fix this? I’m sure you all agree that there’s no point in me informing you of these problem’s if I’m not telling you how you can fix them. For a start, You can try to find alternative activities that compliment your child’s personality and his interests. In addition you can set a limit on how much time your child can spend on electronics per day. Many health care professionals and development specialists recommend that the time children spend in front of a television or computer screen be no more than 2 hours per day so take this into account when setting a time for them. In addition, I propose to you that you set up your child’s video game system in a family room where your child is always supervised when playing their video game so that you can make sure that your teenager doesn’t exceed their time limit. Finally, I suggest you all to familiarise yourself with the warning signs of video game addiction in children, these include noticing your child sneaking in extra playing time after the time limit or that he is lying to you about playing when he is not supposed to as therefore, you can tell if your child is getting addicted and contact a health care professional if you notice any troublesome symptoms as we can all agree, excessive video gaming is harmful for kids.
Thank you for your time.
By Harit
Another imminent problem due to addictive gaming is the low level of school achievement that correlates to it. According to one study done on 1500 American adolescents, aged 10 to 19, teens who played video games compared to teens who didn’t, spent 32% less time doing homework and other education related activities (Cummings & Vandewater 2007). From this study, it is indisputable that there is a strong correlation between addictive gaming and neglect of school responsibilities. This result is most probably due to students getting used to the fast pace of violent games and consequently, when they try and focus on slow paced activities like reading and homework, they are unable to concentrate on them due to their addiction. Another explanation for the correlation could simply because of a student’s addiction’s. Once they put down the game, reality literally slaps them in the face and they don't feel like doing anything but delving into more games, I’m sure many of your son’s or daughter’s have experienced. On the contrary, it could be reasonably contended that video games are in fact helpful to students as they can be a major stress reliever. However, even if video games are a major stress reliever for them, students who play them can lose track of their sense of time easily due to their addiction as video games are like a sponge except instead of water, they suck up time, time that could’ve been used for more useful and urgent things.
The final problem I want to address to you parents today is that video games can cause your teenagers to make unreasonable choices just to feed their addiction. For instance, take a look at Guy Martin’s article, “High-Jinks: Shoot Out”. It elucidates the game ,“Killer”, which is the “last-man-standing game of water-pistol ambush(Martin, 1)”, has become an important end-of-year ritual in multiple New York City high schools. At St. Ann’s, a private school in Brooklyn Heights, the game is taken tremendously seriously. So seriously, that some competitors bribe cab drivers and stalk other people and camp outside their house just because they wanted a better chance to receive the winner’s jackpot. Furthermore, even though Killer isn’t a video game, the same moral can be taken from it and applied to popular first person shooters or role playing games. I’m sure that many of your children have made imbecilic choices just to feed their addiction of video games, heck, I actually know people in 8JRa that have lied to their parents about money and thrown it away on video games solely for getting an “achievement” or a legendary champion skin. And if you realise how grave this situation is, I’m talking about one of your sons or daughters who’s in this room right now! And don’t give me any rubbish on how spending on video games help adolescents boost their cognitive skills because there’s no benefit in playing video games to increase analysing and reaction skills if the teens who play them are stealing from their parents, lying about money and in all, making stupid choices!
Now, how can you fix this? I’m sure you all agree that there’s no point in me informing you of these problem’s if I’m not telling you how you can fix them. For a start, You can try to find alternative activities that compliment your child’s personality and his interests. In addition you can set a limit on how much time your child can spend on electronics per day. Many health care professionals and development specialists recommend that the time children spend in front of a television or computer screen be no more than 2 hours per day so take this into account when setting a time for them. In addition, I propose to you that you set up your child’s video game system in a family room where your child is always supervised when playing their video game so that you can make sure that your teenager doesn’t exceed their time limit. Finally, I suggest you all to familiarise yourself with the warning signs of video game addiction in children, these include noticing your child sneaking in extra playing time after the time limit or that he is lying to you about playing when he is not supposed to as therefore, you can tell if your child is getting addicted and contact a health care professional if you notice any troublesome symptoms as we can all agree, excessive video gaming is harmful for kids.
Thank you for your time.
By Harit
Great info! I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have.
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