Just take a moment to read something quite shocking.
Several weeks ago (I planned to write this much earlier) a child, girl aged 4, was found in her own bedroom, hanged. By a hairband
While a lot of ignorant people will continue to blame video games for their dead, maimed, or emotionally scarred children, I feel this incident underlines a very poignant fact.
Children are influenced by what they see. Of course they are, it takes a total moron to deny this fact.
Yet people deny this fact continually, both inside and outside of the gaming community. Outside it tends to be parents complaining that the gaming industry is purposefully targeting their children with media that will turn them into suicidal maniacs. Whereas inside the gaming community, equally ignorant viewpoints are thrown around, claiming that video games do not influence children, and that parental guidance, or lack thereof is what influences them.
While both of these sides may be well meaning, those arguments are flat out wrong. It is a stone cold fact that children will imitate what they see, it's their sole purpose in life, to learn so that when they reach an appropriatte age, they have learned all the appropriatte social and physical skills to progress in life.
Unfortunately, with parents attention turning more and more towards careers, or other things, educating and caring for their children takes a back seat a lot of the time. So children, who innocently, know no better, will imitate what they see.
In this case, a girl hangs herself, because she saw it on a cartoon. Her grandmother told her not to do it. Which was a moronic thing to do. Drawing attention to something, whether positive or negative, makes it more interesting. Not explaining WHY you shouldn't do it leads the child to wonder, and to imitate, to learn. She learned she had rubbish parents.
What does this mean?
In my mind, this is cold hard proof, that parents are more to blame than ever for their childrens behavioural problems. However, never one to see a problem in just one light, i feel this also highlights the blame that IS to be put on the industry. Not the developers, but the sales end of the stick. Age ratings should be enforced. Unconstitutional? I dont care. Do it. It's for the children, but it has to work both ways, parents need to spend more time with children, and to educate them with common sense.
Otherwise, anyone who's seen the film Idiocracy will know what's coming.