L.A. Times: Violent Movies Don’t Cause Violence, but Guns Do
Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times penned an op/ed claiming that violent movies don’t make people violent, but instead are a “positive force.” Her diatribe highlights the mental disturbance that’s the result of hoplophobia. Here’s some analysis of her points.
“A good deal of movie violence is designed as a way for us to experience it vicariously.”
Why does she need to “vicariously” experience violence? If she were writing about XXX-rated movies, we would call it pornography, which purportedly offers viewers vicarious stimulation, too. According to a Psychology Today author: “pornography not only arouses, it tutors our imagination.” In this way, pornography “shapes male expectations” and “splits men’s consciousness,” destroying their ability to relate to real women.
Now we’re supposed to believe that violence-pornography doesn’t affect people’s minds, while sex-pornography does. Welcome to the split consciousness at the LA Times.
Here’s more evidence of a “split consciousness.” Sharkey acknowledges violence “has been with us since the dawn of mankind.” Violence preceded guns, too. Imagine a woman with a stick facing off with a large male. Now replace that stick with a pistol. It’s no wonder that rape increased in Britain and Australia after they enacted massive gun bans.
Another point of Sharkey’s is just as revealing: The thought of filmmakers making their movies “less gruesome” is, to her, “the scariest proposition of all.”
Why shouldn’t this be considered addiction? Addicts live in fear of losing access to their drug(s) of choice, upon which they’ve come to depend. The Medical Dictionary notes: “Using drugs repeatedly over time changes brain structure and function in fundamental and long-lasting ways.” [emphasis added]
Evidence suggests that those long-lasting brain changes are responsible for the distortions of cognitive and emotional functioning that characterize addicts, particularly the compulsion to use drugs.
Why shouldn’t watching violent movies cause similar results? This concept is widely accepted by researchers. Here’s the conclusion from a group of authors representing the Universities of Arizona, California, Iowa State, Michigan, North Carolina, Texas, and Wisconsin:
Research on violent television and films, video games, and music reveals unequivocal evidence that media violence increases the likelihood of aggressive and violent behavior in both immediate and long-term contexts.
I’m not a psychologist, nor am I diagnosing anybody here. But responsible journalists should always reflect on how to best serve society, considering the power we’ve been given to influence public discourse.
In that vein, we must ponder: If an author is addicted to the vicarious thrills she experiences from watching violence-pornography, then her brain function may have altered to the point that whatever she avers as truth must be examined. Furthermore, if such mental illness exists, then it’s socially irresponsible for the Times to continue allowing her to publicly praise violence-pornography as a “positive force,” because such enabling behavior not only damages the author’s chances of recovery, but it fosters an environment wherein more get led into addiction. If a major media organization says it’s okay, such rationalization can convince an impressionable person balanced between conscience and social pressure.
Left/liberals influence people with a “narrative” in order to get their way but don’t believe violent movies/tv do the same thing (although they admit that porn does). Ah, it’s all about evil guns they want to ban… because us annoying peasants needn’t be armed.
Anon is correct to identify a narrative that accounts for violence in real life, but there is more than one. I tried to describe them here: http://clarespark.com/2013/02/14/is-there-a-culture-of-violence/.
Rod Blagojevich: How could I be guilty of selling, if Jesse Jackson Jr. was not guilty of buying?
http://illinoispaytoplay.com/2013/02/16/rod-blagojevich-how-could-i-be-guilty-of-selling-if-jesse-jackson-jr-was-not-guilty-of-buying/
Guns are dangerous, lethal, almost exclusively owned and used by the mentally unstable and criminal types. Their only purpose is to be used as a tool in the commission of crimes of violence and murder. Our children must be protected from them and the only legitimate possessors should be law enforcement. No one, except ignorant rednecks, enjoys guns and the only reason anyone ever picks one up is to kill someone. Sensibly behaving and thinking people do not own guns and would never permit them in their home or participate in any activity that involves the horribly dangerous things. America is a killing field of gun violence.
I know all of the above to be true because that is what constitutes the explicit or implied storyline every hour of every day of much of TV and the movies as well as video games. It must be a valuable message because we allow our kids to be fed a steady diet of it in the name of “entertainment“. And sensitive soccer moms know to cower in the corner at the mere sight of grandpa’s deer rifle because they have gotten the message, too. So have thoughtful politicians like Feinstein and Biden.
Thank the Lord for the wholesome message that the entertainment industry has brought to America and especially to our children. These must be caring folks.
Now I’m going to turn on my TV to see who is getting their head blown off tonight by one of those horrible and scary-looking guns. Shouldn’t have to wait long. It’s great stuff! Let me go get the kids. We’ve got to get them thinking correctly about guns. I hope their minds are never exposed to anything said or done by that damnable NRA. Those loons will poison your kids’ minds.
You forgot the storyline where the threatened person – the victim of a stalker, the witness to a killing who gets the killer going after him, the shopkeeper in a neighborhood where there have been several violent robberies – goes and buys a gun against the recommendation of the heroes (police, FBI agents, whatever) who tell him to leave the matter to them, and then gets killed anyway, or sometimes ends up shooting some innocent bystander or family member when he gets spooked. I don’t watch television or movies much nowadays, but I don’t think I remember one single story where the idea of the victim or intended victim getting armed was shown as a good idea, except in a few cases where the character was some sort of ex-military or ex-cop or something along those lines and, usually, also turned out to be the hero of the story.
You must not be looking very hard. There are daily stories being told about ordinary men and women stopping a crime before anything gets started solely because they have a gun. Don’t you remember the guy in a shopping mall in Washington (or was it Oregon?) that stopped a mass shooter after the shooter shot 2 people. As soon as he saw the shopper with a gun, he turned and fled. That story was all over the news. You have to read something besides the NYT or watch something besides MSNBC.
yooper, it means nothing you that hammers have killed more people then guns? Guns are just tools no more no less. I’m not claiming that a guns function is benign. If you wish to protect your children, you may want to protect them from someone other then the NRA.
Let me give you a truism: Every Communist must grasp the truth: Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun. – Mao Zedong
Paging Mr. tmuir, paging Mr. tmuir, please report to the nearest service facility. Your sarcasm detector is in need of calibration.
“LA Times: Violent Movies Don’t Cause Violence, but Guns Do”
Of course not. L.A. is protecting its own turf.
So, I guess the only movie to cause violence was that stupid video, that nobody saw, except for those who did and were confused, and then 4 Americans were dead in Benghazi. Okay, right. What a bunch of total ratshit the lefties are.
Over 30 years of medical research says otherwise.
There is a a very clear connection between violent media and increased aggression. Congressional testimony post-Columbine stated that violent media was a factor in up to half of all homicides, a staggering number.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/get-psyched/201201/do-violent-video-games-increase-aggression
http://www2.aap.org/advocacy/releases/mediaviolencetestimony.pdf
http://www.pediatricsdigest.mobi/content/122/2/306.full
There is some evidence that violent video games help inspire aggression.
There is NO real evidence that violence in the movies inspires aggression.
Movies are a totally different experience than video games. Movies have a “fourth wall”; you’re a passive observer. In video games, you’re actively participating in a simulation.
This may be something of a “chicken and egg” argument. Couldn’t it be said that a person attracted to violence would also be attracted to violent games? Don’t many millions of people play and enjoy these same games without acting out the violence portrayed therein? I don’t think that we are so fragile that fantasy entertainment can cause a murderous rampage absent some other preexisting problem, anymore than the simple presence of a gun can cause an otherwise sane person to become a killer.
In another area that has gotten some attention lately, many (all?) of these mass killers have been on psychotropic drugs. Are they crazy because they’re on drugs…or are they on drugs because they’re crazy?
I believe that there may indeed be an influence on those who are already prone to violence but ultimately the individual is responsible for his acts.
They are also all Democrats!
Who cares if there’s evidence… if it saves just one child’s life, then it’s worth doing.
Isn’t that the go-to argument here?
Can’t expect the Obama media to do any fact based google research. Commies.
Ok, explain to me if violence on TV or in movies does not cause people to be violent (or less sensitive to it) then why to the networks charge so much for companies to advertise if what people see on TV won’t affect them. Why do movie producers encourage companies to place their products in movies if the appearance of the product does not encourage people to buy them (look at what happened to Reeses Pieces in ET The Extra-Terrestrial)? These Hollywood people are really full of something if they believe violence doesn’t have some effect.
Violence on TV doesn’t cause violent people or less sensitive to it, because its a personal choice to kill and we all make it. 99.9999% make the right choice.
Don’t forget they also want film makers to stop showing characters smoking – because people will want to smoke like the movie stars on the screen!
Oh, but they’re not influenced by the violence. Not one bit.
Art doesn’t cause people to act a certain way. Musicians hardest hit.
Just as John Philips Sousa and Peter Seeger.
I don’t think violent movies or games cause violence. I sure as hell don’t think that guns cause violence either. It comes down to a personal choice. If a person wants to kill someone they may find release in violent games. To get out their anger and release it in a healthy way. And law abiding gun owners have never been temped to shoot someone for no reason. They may not even want to shoot someone in self defense if they don’t have to.
Now if you look at the recent mass murders you see that its not the gun that caused it or even made it easier to kill all the people. In fact the AR-15 that was used in Aurora, Co. jammed. So it may even seem that it helped by pausing the shooting. Unless they are well taken care of and well oiled with good ammunition they are unreliable at best. A accident waiting to happen.
So its not the guns because there are millions owned by millions of other people and the guns and their owners are not shooting up the place. They are not waiting to either. They are working and raising families and living their lives.
Its the person that made a choice to kill people because they are mentally unstable and most likely knew that the news would make them infamous if they killed a lot of people. And they did. But background checks and gun bans from ever other person that had nothing to do with it didn’t work to prevent the crimes. In fact making gun free zones made it easier because it lured people into the slaughter by thinking it couldn’t happen there. In fact it made them easy targets and a greater body count for the news to use against gun owners and even inanimate objects like guns themselves. Its stupid and weird unless you want to do it on purpose to blame these things without proof.
If people had a way to defend themselves you would see that these things would be a thing of the past. The person would get shut down before he could get a high murder count people could keep living without fear. And after a while no one would even try it because they could look back and see that its not going to be a shooting gallery but a suicide mission where they will be stopped before they start and soon forgotten. And if they don’t then they are stupid and those types are usually removed from the planet early on.
Maybe they will just save everyone time and mis use the gun on themselves first.
Any what do sexual deviants do? How do they get that out of their system? What kind of movies should we make available to them?
Just asking?
I would love to ask the author of the L.A. Times article what she thinks about Joe Camel in cigarette advertising. If she actually believes what she says, we should be able to put cartoons selling cigarettes in every school in America without complaint. Somehow I bet she would not agree with that…
Very well put.
And of course psychiatrists or psychologists advancing an ideological position would never lie or falsify data about something like that.
http://news.illinois.edu/news/13/0211comics_CarolTilley.html
“Carol Tilley, a professor of library and information science, has found evidence that an anti-comics crusading psychiatrist in the 1950s “played fast and loose with the data.”"
Oh . . . never mind.
And don’t forget, of course, that the extermination of 50 million or so lives in utero has had absolutely no negative effect on anything either.
The Joe Camel vs. movie violence comparison is telling. Generally speaking, progressive liberals don’t have prinicples; they can’t. If they adopted binding principles their worldview would fall apart.
What liberals have instead of principles is a fragmented worldview that has no philosophical or intellectual core. So, liberals are forced to gerrymander and lasso facts and put square pegs in round holes. Doing this, liberal thought is unable to make simple comparisons. Liberals talk about people being equal but it’s just that – talk; they must have windmills to tilt at so they create dragons when in fact they already have one in the mirror.
Liberals live in perceptual traps where a website that says “Find Black Singles Near You” is totally kosher but if a white culture website existed that did the exact same thing, they’d be labeled as neo-Nazis in a heartbeat, and perhaps rightly so. The real problem is in the idea that an equivalent that is plainly self-evident is shot down simply by virtue of having black skin.
Unflinching Orwellian hypocrisy and reverse logic is the order of the day on the Left. No group in America is more guilty of censorship and racism than the anti-racist, pro-free speech nutcases on the political Left.
Choose Your Own Crime Stats
An interesting look at Crime Stats in the United States using data from the FBI that doesn’t seem to be getting much discussion from either the press or politicians. There has been a 50% reduction in the violent crime rate in the last twenty years and neither political party is taking credit for this? I thought politicians always wanted to take credit for good things? Perhaps they don’t want to draw attention to the fact that higher crime rates seem to correspond with inner cities? The great thing about living in the United States is you’re Free To Choose, at least for now, so feel free to Choose Your Own Crime Stats if you don’t like these.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooa98FHuaU0&feature=player_embedded
Rate of Killings Rises 38 Percent in Chicago in 2012
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/us/rate-of-killings-rises-38-percent-in-chicago-in-12.html?pagewanted=all
These are the results of making self defense illegal!
I’ve enjoyed some violent movies an video games and never became violent. Right, it’s a personal choice, and perhaps having to grow up without a father in one of those hell-hole public housing projects. Who knows? Sometimes evil just happens. But I don’t like the trend to deflect the anti-gun hysteria by creating a new hysteria aimed at regulating or banning violent entertainment. Jeez, as Philip Wilie wrote a long time ago, “The only book that truly shocked me was the Bible!” Yes, there’s a lot of crappy, stupid, violent movies out there but please don’t get the liberals going on a new crusade to ban what should be protected by the First Amendment.
This column wasn’t about censorship. It was about the double standard that exists. Since the LA Times chose to promote certain criteria, they opened the door to this comparison. If people don’t like violent movies, don’t spend money on them. If they become consistent losses, free market pressures will force producers to exploit other markets. (Assuming Prez O doesn’t do the GM bailout routine and stop his buddies from suffering consequences for their chosing to ignore the market.)
Without this silly Times op/ed begging for examination, this column never would have been written. If the liberals decide to crusade against violent movies, that’s on the LA Times for opening the door on this discussion.
I appreciate your point, hypocrisy is a liberal’s middle name. I think that the violent games and movies have a much lesser effect on youth violence than bad parenting, or no parenting. The hellish conditions we find in the urban ghettos are a direct result of liberal indulgence and regulation of the minority poor, and as you know, those areas are breeding grounds for violence. Just catch an episode or 2 of “The First 48.” The problem with the liberal mind is that any time it seizes on a problem the only solution they can think of is big government. In the 50s it was the comic books that the liberals were after. No, I don’t think that your pointing out that Hollywood liberals are hypocrites will start them on a crusade. I’m just anxious about the fact that to the liberals EVERYTHING is a crusade.
Personally, I think a lot of it is a consequence of boys raising each other and trying to figure out how men should behave.
Liberals like to try to make us think that the genders are inconsquential and interchangeable, but that’s just not so. Children do best when they have the example of both genders in their lives from the word go. They look to both men and women to see how they should behave in society. In the inner cities, there aren’t enough long-term male role models shaping boys into men. The gangs and gang culture are a natural reaction to that lack.
And that father vacuum is filled by…. what?
Violent “music”, violent video games, violent movies.
And we think there’s no cause and effect going on here…. why?
As we have learned from the Global Warming debate, we must follow the money.
The LAT directly benefits from the sale of advertising to promote violent movies. Thus this “editorial” is a form of special pleading designed to promote their selfish self-interests above those of society.
While individuals must always bear responsibility for our actions, we should not allow special interest voices to confuse the issue. The LA Times, as a beneficiary of Big Cinema, does not deserve a respectful attention paid their clearly self-interested argument.
Excellent point. Highlights further hypocrisy, considering they stigmatize us as the “gun lobby,” conveniently forgetting that the NRA and other organizations wouldn’t exist but for educated, involved voters who are members. But millions of gun owning citizens are easier to ignore if you paint them over with a faceless enemy called the “gun lobby.” Say, isn’t dehumanizing large demographic groups a favorite socialist tactic? Worked on all those Jews in Germany, France, and USSR. Made Stalin’s and Mao’s lives easier as they implemented policies leading to the death of tens of millions. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Companies sure spend a G_d awful lot of money on advertizing if they don’t think seeing and hearing things influences behavior in that direction.
Favorite split-mind dodge: “But that’s different.” No discussion or explanation. It’s true because they uttered those magic words. If that doesn’t work, “we’ll just agree to disagree.” Then comes the smug smirk, as if they’re proud of not being able to reason.
One of my favorite split-minders are the so-called “black culture” websites where all faces are black, ads and content. These are the same people who complain that white folks reserve a de facto social space, movies, TV, jobs, etc, only for white people and that there is not a sufficient black presence.
On black sites, it’s common to see ads saying “Find black people to date near you.” White people don’t want such sites and couldn’t have one if they did let alone ones that said “Find white people to date near you.” Not without dragging Adolph Hitler into it.
Hell, J. Crew can’t even pose models with Balinese kids without the racial crying towel coming out.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/24/j-crew-bali-catalog-style-guide_n_1541864.html
You have to read that article to believe some of the stuff in it. We’re talking about people who truly have mental problems. I’ve spent over 6 months in Bali on three different occasions and never once did race even cross my mind.
If you’re going to shoot in Bali, the point would be to use the locals, right? But if they’d found white folks to pose with and there were no Balinese in the photos, these same people would’ve found racism there too. “What, you couldn’t find no Balinese to pose with in Bali?”
Many of them are.
Many more of them have no concept of it.
I tend to agree that violent media isn’t much more likely than having a gun to cause violent behavior. I think at best, they’re both symptoms rather than causes. Society can try to treat the symptoms all it wants in this case, but we won’t be curing the disease.
My AR15 tried to assault me last night. I had to lock it up and take all its ammo away.
We’ve got to stop guns from making movies……
Nemorov. This article is poorly considered rubbish.
1. porn triggers a response due to most people having a reasonable expectation of being laid. Males will often display a physical response.
2. gun violence doesn’t give normal people woodies, and normal people don’t expect to battle aliens, nazis, stage robbers, or the mob any time soon.
3. violent films are not limited to US distribition. Any study claiming any link between film and violence will need to show that e.g. rural tibetan filmgoers are likewise more prone to commit violence. Somehow the notion that claimed “long lasting changes to brain structure” are common only in north american teens is vaguely humourous.
4. assume for a moment that such a link actually existed. The proposal is what, exactly? The far right inhabitants of this place itching to take their country back (whatever that means) would start with hollywood and use powers of the state to impose their morals, this time New! Improved! Backed by Science! Does anyone really think that the far right freedom lovers would back hollywood’s first amendment rights? Of course not.
I have a new troll policy: If you want to engage in a reasoned discussion, sign back in with your real name and supply some citations to back up your claims. Otherwise, you’re publicly displaying the very reason why this column is valid.
By the way, for those of you wondering about it: Many European countries are more violent than the U.S. I’ve seen movies that were European releases, and they were gorier than the U.S. versions. (History of Violence comes to mind.)
http://pjmedia.com/blog/gun-control-fails-say-statistics-from-gun-control-advocates/2/
So assuming my argument is that violent movies affect only Americans is specious. That was an intentional misinterpretation in order to create an Argumentum Ad Hominem, plus a Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc and Red Herring.
Nemerov
Take your troll policy and stuff it. You’re making claims, not me, and the onus is on you to prove them. Nobody said your argument was that movies only affected americans. You can’t read. What was said was that you showed zero claims of studies showing humans across the board being affected, as in “international,” as in something other than cultural artifact. My daughter the anthropologist would chew you to shreds on this one. Of course, she’s an actual scientist, and you’re a mouthpiece for the NRA. You want to cite science, then bring actual science.
You are still not showing citations proving a link between media violence and real life violence. Sure there are studies in the soft sciences that demonstrate correlation between any set of variables you care to name, meaning that for every claim of a study supporting your position there will be an equally valid counterclaim.
It’s rather humourous — the business of claiming causation due to correlation in the field of climate science is rightfully slammed by the right wing, but the same loose correlation applied to social science theory served up by NRA operatives is proven science? And if anyone questions it, why obviously, they’re a troll. You crack me up.
As a right wing moderate and gun rights supporter my view is that I simply don’t really give a give a damn if they outlaw guns. If I need one, then I, like anyone else with more than 2 neurons, will simply make what I need. Guns are a technology that is over 800 years old. It ain’t rocket science.
Your daughter the anthropologist? You’re kidding, right? Unbelievable! Where do I even begin? What a whole lotta yada yada!
This comment right here reminds me all over again why I stopped participating in online threads a long time ago (and why, after tonight, I will recommit myself to that vow of abstention). Most of the people who go out of their way to engage on these forums have nothing better to do with their time, and use the medium as a transparent vehicle for self-aggrandizement. I mean, get a life!
I’ve known Howard a long time and can tell you for a FACT that he is no NRA plant or frontman. He arrived at his opinions honestly, over time; and not only are they intellectually well-thought-out — they are buttressed by countless hours of research. Your tiresome internal debate about real science vs. pseudo-science is just so much JUNK, frankly, and is of no more interest to most people reading this than are the mental gymnastics of a … well, an anthropologist (a “faux” social scientist, if ever there was one)!
Yep, I’d say you’re a troll, all right — an arrogant defensive one! I mean, first of all, you can’t be a right-wing moderate: that is a patent contradiction in terms. And secondly, what right-wing gun supporter does anyone know who doesn’t care if 2A is trammelled upon?
And “stuff it”? Tell it to your son the proctologist! (Good grief.)
Someone already used rocket scientist.
Your daughter the anthropologist? You’re kidding, right? Unbelievable! Where do I even begin? What a whole lotta yada yada!
This comment right here reminds me all over again why I stopped participating in online threads a long time ago (and why, after tonight, I will recommit myself to that vow of abstention). Most of the people who go out of their way to engage on these forums have nothing better to do with their time, and use the medium as a transparent vehicle for self-aggrandizement. I mean, get a life!
I’ve known Howard a long time and can tell you for a FACT that he is no NRA plant or frontman. He arrived at his opinions honestly, over time; and not only are they intellectually well-thought-out — they are buttressed by countless hours of research. Your tiresome internal debate about real science vs. pseudo-science is just so much JUNK, frankly, and is of no more interest to most people reading this than are the mental gymnastics of a … well, an anthropologist (a “faux” social scientist, if ever there was one)!
Yep, I’d say you’re a troll, all right — an arrogant defensive one! I mean, first of all, you can’t be a right-wing moderate: that is a patent contradiction in terms. And secondly, what right-wing gun supporter does anyone know who doesn’t care if 2A is trammelled upon?
And “stuff it”? Tell it to your son the proctologist! (Good grief.)
Why should we? If our civil right to self-defense can be infringed on no evidence, why not infringe on your civil rights? You have no appeal left to law or reason; the only questions left are who has the most guns, and the greater will to use them.
If what you say is true than tell us all why cigarette ads have been banned from television.
Always easy to sound like a Leftist (even a so-called serious one like a Professor). Take what you want to be true and then go through the mental contortions to make it sound true. Hate guns but love how Hollywood is liberal? Then cite studies, find statistics, cherry-pick a few arguments and then sound angry and concerned. Voila! A Leftist masterpiece.
Try this exercise at home…..you hate Israel but love the Oscars…. now write a Tom Friedman column.
I don’t blame guns OR film. I blame gun free zone laws, urban criminal culture (gangs), and bad wiring in the brain (in the case of mass killers). The only film violence I’ve seen that could lead to irresponsibly violent action on the part of viewers would be if children were exposed to the violence of Loony Tunes or The Three Stooges, without a parent there to tell the child that you can’t really drop an anvil on someone’s head without killing them. In action movies, people die. That is consequence. Sex movies, on the other hand…. Who ever gets pregnant, gets an STD, has to start making a relationship work, gets branded a slut, or any other of the actual consequences of casual sex in these movies? KIDS is the only film I’ve seen that actually says, “maybe you kids shouldn’t be doing this”, by way of everyone in the movie likely ending up with HIV.
Anything…….anything….anything that goes into the mind affects it. PERIOD.
This.
Or, to put it another way, garbage in, garbage out.
Better yet, to quote some timeless words of Truth, “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”
How ironic that the general tone of this PJM article and most of the responses is the same as Betsy Sharkey’s fatuous LA Times article. Yes, it’s facile to discount the dreadful, corrosive effect of violence in the cinema, let alone foul video games. Only the bien-pensant left or an academic could come up with the kind of drivel on display from Ms Sharkey – that movie violence is a “positive force”. Was it Orwell who said (paraphrasing here) that some ideas are so presposterous that only an academic could come up with them?
Yet the line here is precisely the same: the free availability of guns doesn’t contribute to violence, but violent movies do! The people who push that line have abandoned commonsense just as thoroughly as Ms Sharkey.
Because you cannot have violence unless you have a gun. How about you join randomretard and his/her/its daughter the monkey semen collector on the as moron.
There is a vast difference between a carefully crafted MESSAGE, and an inanimate object.
Free? The gun I bought wasn’t free, let alone readily available! But movies are, all day long on the boob tube. I think what is truly glib (and facile) is speciously comparing the tone — let alone the content and intention — of this article to the L.A. Times’ self-serving fluff. Mr. Nemerov’s commentary merely uses the author’s own fallacious style of “reasoning” to point up the hypocrisy of her “argument.” As usual, his logic is impeccable, and buttressed by FACTS. Large, sweeping statements of opinion are not his style.
The “bien-pensant” left? Nothing “commonsense” about that word (which, incidentally, when used as a noun, should be “common sense”)! Are you sure YOU aren’t an academic troll?
Nice try — decent aim and all, Johnny — but you missed! The only thing I gleaned from your comment is that you either have a very impressive French-to English vocabulary or plenty of time on your hands to raid the online thesaurus.
How dare a conservative not think like me on gun control, is that your message?
You seem irritated about “bien-pensant”. It means “do-gooder” as a noun, not “common sense”. Well, I think it’s a wonderful term to describe the chattering classes, and the fact that it’s french lightly rubs their noses in their own pretensions.
I think the prime authority on this issue is Dave Grossman, Army psychologist who has studied the psychology and physiology of violence in detail, and is the author of two volumes, titled “On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society” and “On Combat, The Psychology and Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and in Peace”, both of which superbly written and ultimately informative.
It is certainly true that the vast majority of normal persons suffer no serious harm from viewing violent movies, and worse yet, playing violent video games in which they become an active participant. The process in question is not addiction to violence, as much as it is desensitization to violence. Dr. Grossman points out that our armed forces have used videogame-like training aids, to achieve close to 100% active violence in soldiers, versus the less than 50% rate observed by SLA Marshall in troops during WWII.
Grossman believes that children are desensitized to violence particularly by violent video games, and notes that unlike the military, they have no command control or rules of engagement to provide control.
I think the prime authority on this issue is Dave Grossman… Grossman believes that children are desensitized to violence particularly by violent video games [snip]
OK, so you’re invoking authority. Grossman can believe whatever he likes. So what.
Proving it is a different matter. What can you PROVE?
I’d be careful about citing SLA Marshall. He had no actual statistics to back up his argument, but no one questioned him on it.
You Know You’re a GUN CONTROL HYPOCRITE IF….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6-FtsnIFsc&feature=player_embedded
I clearly see the link! This as well as government schools have given all of U.S. these results! If somebody cannot see the connection they are simply lying. That would be like me peeing on your leg and tell you it is raining, and you believe me!
Over 30 years of medical research says: There is a a very clear connection between violent media and increased aggression. Congressional testimony post-Columbine stated that violent media was a factor in up to half of all homicides, a staggering number.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/get-psyched/201201/do-violent-video-games-increase-aggression
http://www.pediatricsdigest.mobi/content/122/2/306.full
The LA Slimes is heavily dependent on advertising from Hollywood. Even an idiot reporter knows not to bite the hand that feeds them.
Wrong as usual. The first sin committed on the face of this earth was a woman looking at something she should not have looked at (Gen 3) and then opening her mouth. Go think about that for 3 years.
Furthermore, God told you to remove all those pictures and those images and those idols (Ezek 8:12). You didn’t do it.
And, the light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness.
The LA Times writer is preaching for Satan. He is telling you “Yea, hath God said?” He is doing this by erecting multiple authorities so YOU or HE can be final authority and NOT the words that God spoke. Its the oldest trick in the Book. Its a shame most Christians dont know this. They listen to their pastors, and priests and anything else but the WORDS God magnified above His own name.
If you follow the logic about movies and video games ‘causing’ violent behavior, I guess that history up to about 1910 or so was an idyllic paradise, where there was no violence. Violence shot up once movies showing train robberies and other violent acts became accessible to the public. There was also a large increase in violent behavior around 1990 or so, when the PC and game consoles became available to many consumers, providing violence-rich gaming experiences.
No? Oops.
Never Mind.
What a stupid and ignorant comment.
Nice argument but wrongly applied. The fact is that prior to the invention of firearms, violence was unknown in human society. There were no wars, nobody was assaulted or raped or murdered, no bands of organized criminals terrorized society, everybody lived a peaceful and idyllic existence.
It wasn’t until gunpowder arrived in Europe around the 13th century that the NRA was formed and immediately began shooting cute little kids and their puppies.
Liberal problem solving:
Observation – some people are breaking the law
Solution – write more laws
Suppose that three hundred million dollars were made available (by Congress, public subscription, the Koch brothers, what have you) to any major American movie studio willing to make a movie in which bright and attractive young people amuse themselves by murdering major American movie studio executives in entertaining ways – and get away with it.
I have a feeling that the $300M would remain untouched for a long time.
I’m so relieved to hear that movies don’t influence thinking. We won’t have to watch wonderful gay relationship movies anymore, we’re finished with Morgan Freeman grandfatherly black characters, no more selfish-dad-learns-learns-children-and-family-are-most-important-things-in-life movies, no more noble primitive cultures, no more noble homeless person, no more Hollywood moralizing! They admit it has no effect on anybody.
All that time and energy spent in promoting positive images: All a waste! Replaying Martin Luther King speeches: A waste of time; No effect on anybody. Good heroes, evil heroes, it makes no difference!
Oh, but if somebody even glimpses a gun! That is what will destroy any moral character they have.
Best news of all: we can do away with advertising since it has no effect! Manufacturers save money so maybe prices can go down, and hour long TV programs will run nearly the entire hour!
Hey. I have a question: What happened to cigarettes in the flicks? I can’t remember the last time I saw a character smoking on screen. Is the ban on smokes because glamorizing coffin nails might …? (h/t jdkchem & fhk22553)