Violence in Video Games

True story.

I was playing "Tomb Raider - A survivor is born", mostly late at night when my 1- and 3- year-olds are in bed. But the other day I fired up the game early in the evening. My 1-yo son was close to the TV when I started playing. Lara was high up on a cable-transport platform when she was attacked. Pinned to a wall and about to be nailed with an arrow, suddenly a shot came out of nowhere. The bad guy screamed and fell off the platform where he was standing.

My son suddenly burst into tears. He had been watching and was obviously traumatised by the event. I quickly stopped playing and comforted him. All the while making the mental note: Gosh, he's barely a week more than one-year old. I didn't realise how much he would comprehend the scene in the game.

Suffice to say that now, not only do I never play Tomb Raider whilst my children are around. I am now acutely aware of the need to be always vigilant about what exactly is on TV. Especially in regards to the potential for any violence

So anyway, it's just a story. I'm not trying to make a stand about violence in video games. Obviously we become quite desensitised to the level of violence when we play/watch and it took that episode to make me realise how much I need to protect my kids from that violence until they are older. I'm now much more attentive to the TV ratings when a program is starting, and to be honest, there's basically very little (mature programming) we would watch now whilst the kids are still up!

Interesting Words

adversary
n. [ad-ver-ser-ee]

1. a person, group, or force that opposes or attacks; opponent; enemy; foe
2. the Adversary, The Devil; Satan

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bonanza
n. [buh-nan-zuh]

1. a rich mass of ore, as found in mining
2. a source of great and sudden wealth or luck; a spectacular windfall: The play proved to be a bonanza for its lucky backers

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cronyism
n. cro.ny.ism [kroh-nee-iz-uhm]

1. the practise of favouring one's close friends, especially in political appointments

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git
n. [git]

1. a foolish or contemptible person

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prevaricate
v. [pre-var-i-keyt]

1. to speak falsely or misleadingly; deliberately missate or create an incorrect impression; lie

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propensity
n. [pruh-pen-si-tee]

1. a natural inclination or tendency; a propensity to drink too much
2. Obs. favorable disposition or partiality

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qintar
n [kin-tahr] (One of the few words with 'q' NOT followed by 'u')

1. a money of account of Albania, the 100th part of a lek

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ubermensch
n. [y-buh-mensch]

1. superman

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Erich Fromm

Link to Fromm on Wikipedia


Bibliography(Source: Wikipedia)

• 1941 - Escape from Freedom (US), The Fear of Freedom (UK)
• 1947 - Man for himself, an inquiry into the psychology of ethics
• 1950 - Psychoanalysis and Religion
• 1951 - The Forgotten Language; an introduction to the understanding of dreams, fairy tales, and myths
• 1955 - The Sane Society
• 1956 - The Art of Loving
• 1959 - Sigmund Freud's mission; an analysis of his personality and influence
• 1960 - Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis
• 1961 - May Man Prevail? An inquiry into the facts and fictions of foreign policy
• 1961 - Marx's Concept of Man
• 1962 - Beyond the Chains of Illusion: my encounter with Marx and Freud
• 1963 - The Dogma of Christ and Other Essays on Religion, Psychology and Culture
• 1964 - The Heart of Man, its genius for good and evil
• 1965 - Socialist Humanism
• 1966 - You Shall Be as Gods: a radical interpretation of the Old Testament and its tradition
• 1968 - The Revolution of Hope, toward a humanized technology
• 1968 - The Nature of Man
• 1970 - The Crisis of Psychoanalysis
• 1970 - Social character in a Mexican village; a sociopsychoanalytic study (Fromm & Maccoby)
• 1973 - The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness
• 1976 - To Have or to Be?
• 1979 - Greatness and Limitation of Freud's Thought
• 1981 - On Disobedience and other essays
• 1993 - The Art of Being
• 1994 - The Art of Listening
• 1997 - On Being Human

Too much anonymity

I think there's too much anonymity on the Internet at the moment. That's why I've decide to stop using a pseudonym (Delusional) on this blog. That's not to say that anonymity isnt' needed or useful - it is! But there is a time and place for it, and that time and place is not this blog.

(Anyway, I'm sure most people could have found it out with a little digging)

Life at a Low Ebb (Erich Fromm)

Today, our love of life has sunk to a low ebb. Any behaviour that does not serve a person's growth, his progress towards complete self realisation, takes it's toll. The exploiter fears the exploited. The murderer fears the isolation his deeds condemns him to. The destroyer fears his conscience. The joyless consumer fears living without being truely alive.

Erich Fromm

On Faith in Oneself (Erich Fromm)

You have to have faith in yourself, to be able to think critically, to be an independant human being, a human being and not a sheep. To achieve that, to learn "the art of living and of dying" takes a lot of effort, practise and patience. Like any other skill, it has to be learned. Anyone whose growth takes this direction will also develop the ability to know what is good - or bad - for himself and others, good or bad for him as a human being, not good or bad for his success, his acquisition of power or of goods.

Erich Fromm

On Talking (Erich Fromm)

If two people talk together and both of them remain the same people they were before, then they haven't really talked at all. They have simply engaged in an exchange of words.

Erich Fromm