I actually had this discussion with my brother the other day. We were watching Casino, but turned it off because the end of the movie gets so brutal. That's when we realized that video game violence doesn't really bother us the way "real" violence does. I can't stand watching those viral videos of people getting into bloody fights. I have to look away when I see those videos of people breaking their arms and legs and stuff. It grosses me the hell out!
But, video game violence doesn't bother me in the least. In fact, I revel in video game violence! Dismembering your enemies in Mortal Kombat, blasting the legs off terrorists in Soldier of Fortune, gibbing your opponent in Quake. I loooove that! Why? Because it's not real. I'm not dismembering a real person, I'm dismembering a piece of code. Sure, the image on screen is clearly a human, and it looks pretty damn real - but at the same time, it doesn't! It's so far from reality that my brain doesn't register an "Eww" factor.
I think part of what's going on here is the American ideal that "My standards and ethics are the best ones, so everyone else should live by them too." What I mean by that is: the American people tend to be a bit 'high and mighty' reguarding what they think otherpeople should and shouldn't enjoy. Just because they don't enjoy watching a particular subject matter, doesn't mean everyone else shouldn't like it either.
For example, how many times have you heard someone complain about a type of music they don't like? "Ugh! God! How can anyone listen to this crap?! It's aweful! They shouldn't play such bad music on the radio! People who listen to this kind of music are degenerate thugs." Just because this person doesn't like this type of music, it means that everyone who enjoys it is a degernate thug.
For someone to lable another person "sick" or a "sadist" because they enjoy violent video games is naive, selfish, and just plain silly. Millions upon millions of people pay tons of money to watch movies like Hostel and Saw. But nobody lables those movie-goers as "sick" or "dimented." So what if a violent game appeals to sadist in some of us? Who has the right to tell us what we should and shouldn't want to see? In my personal opinion, I think the person who pays $20 to go see someone tortured on the silver-screen for two and a half hours is far more sadistic then the average gamer.
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