(Was playing Mortal Kombat 1 earlier, did not end up becoming violent.)
Movies, music and games are some of the forms of digital media content that are created and distributed electronically, often times with the goal of providing entertainment to people. But often times, they also became the target of some serious crusade from people who do not want to have a discussion about super serious topics like the seemingly increasing case of violence we see on the daily basis. Does digital media contributes in making people violent or are people just finds them as a convenient excuse instead of solving the real cause of the issue? That's what I will try to answer in this post.
Since I was young, I've seen this argument about digital media being tossed around and I've grown up consuming a lot of digital media. I grew up watching shows like Dexter which is an American TV show about a Forensic Scientist that has a double life of being a vigilante serial killer. I have played most of the Mortal Kombat games, including MK II which is one of the games that led to the creation of the ESRB ratings. I've played metal music which for a long time, has been called the Satan's music. All of this were digital media which contains violent theme so that supposed to makes me to be in the most optimal environment to become a violent person but surprise, surprise I did not grow to become a violent person even as I continued to consume digital media with violent theme. Perhaps, the reason that I did not grow to become a violent person is because during the early stage of my life, my parents was right there enough to guide me but as we can see on today's world many parents left their children with unfiltered access on internet and mobile device. Perhaps, "if parents do proper parenting", then we will see much less violence in our society. But I guess, blaming digital media is easier than addressing negligent parenting.
Ignoring the trash of the sequel, the first Joker film has a lot of violence which gives it the rating from MSA, meaning that it requires parent accompaniment for children under 17 years of age to watch it but despite it being a billion dollar film, it did not become a trigger to make its audience violent by any means. On the other hand it opens our eyes with the underlying issue on a person's mental health which could provoke a person's violent tendencies. Perhaps, "creating bills and laws to address mental health issues" could help lessen violence in our society but do you think politicians will work on that when they can place the blame on digital media?
Other factors that can drive people to violence includes inequality, poverty, illiteracy, hunger and lack of jobs like how being poor can lead a person to commit acts of criminality so that he can provide for his basic needs. But again, place the blame on digital media instead of addressing the personal circumstances of people is easier.
Playing OG Resident Evil 4. Still not violent.
Whenever a shooting incident blows up in the social media, one of the common thing I see were some people that will try to connect the culprits behavior on games in particular like how they shooter used to play Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto before the incident. But you know what, the thing that is also common to this shooters was an "easy access to firearms". A 2019 article by Vox.com shows the top 10 countries with the highest revenue in gaming and according to the data, most of the countries in the chart have very law rate of violent gun deaths with the exception of US which is known for its non-existent firearm laws. But weapon companies will tell you that it was not because of the weapons that they made that we have an increased violence and not because of the weapons they made as they continue to lobby so that governments will further deregulate gun access.
The violent tendencies on people can be triggered by many things such as their upbringing and personal circumstances but rather than addressing this issues, society has find an easy excuse to blame this on digital media when in reality, it does not really contribute on it. On the other hand, even if the case happens that we remove violence on digital media, I don't see that the violence will reduce, rather it will only limits creativity and censors people which Hive as a platform that promotes free speech and anti- censorship, restricting creativity will be against the very things that we are trying to advocate.
Thank you for reading my post and see you on the next one!
