Changes! - Kevin LaZur

One of the biggest issues I have with our 21st century lives lies in our precious video games. People claim that these distractions are just like any other means of entertainment we can subject ourselves to. To these people, I say when was the last time you killed someone while you were reading a book or watching a movie? This violent kind of entertainment is not healthy for our society, and creates villains and murderers. We need to remove all violent content from video games.

Good people are turned into monsters just by playing these games. It isn't wrong for someone to want to occupy their time with a fun game. The crime is when the game companies take advantage of these innocent souls. One should be able to choose the game based on what they are interested in. The companies make it to where, due to the rating systems, the top rated games are the violent games, and you have to buy these games to have fun and maintain social status.

The most popular games are "shooter" games, where you have to kill people in order to progress in the game. You HAVE to kill people. The kids who play these games are going to be brainwashed into thinking that you have to kill people in real life as well! When you present this reward system in a game ( Kill = money, progression, experience), it's going to have serious psychological impact. Sooner or later we're going to have kids who think that they need to kill people to progress their own life. Teachers will lie dead in the streets, and these very children will grow up to teach Murder 101.

In summary, the makers of these monstrosities are to blame. They shouldn't be allowed to simulate real world violence under the pretense of creating an outlet for inherent violence in humans. The video game designers are manipulating our youth and making them engage in violent acts that they would have otherwise never intended to do. If we don't stop violent video games now, years of mountain dew fueled rage will reduce America to a savage playground for unprejudiced homicide.