Video Game Killers

2 Pages 598 Words

Video Game Killers



In John Leo’s essay “When Life Imitates Video,” he describes how

violent video games affect children’s views on killing. Leo also points out how these

types of games desensitize children and make it easier for them to kill.

According to John Leo, “We are now a society in which the chief form of play for

millions of youngsters is making large numbers of people die ”(360). Millions of children

are addicted to playing violent video games. Children know the difference between reality

and fantasy; however there are a few unstable children who get a hold of these violent

video games. It is the neglected, beaten, picked on and made fun of children who begin to

imagine these violent games as more than they really are(360). “Adolescent feelings of

resentment, powerlessness, and revenge poor into the killing games. In these children, the
games can become a dress rehearsal for the real thing ”(360).
Leo cites psychologist David Grossman of Arkansas State University, a retired Army officer, to help support his views on violent video games. “During World War II only 15 to 20 percent of all American soldiers fired their weapons in battle. Shooting games in which the target is a man-shaped outline, the Army found, made recruits more willing to make killing a reflex action”(360). Leo notes that the United States Marine Corps is using a version of the game Doom as a simulator, and a game played by one of the boys involved in the Littleton, Colorado massacres(360). Dylan Kleybold and Eric Harris also played another game called Postal. The boys laughed and shouted with each kill as if they were sitting at home, on the couch playing one of these morbid video games(359). “And they ended their spree by shooting themselves in the head, the final scene of the game Postal, and, in fact, the only way to end it”(359). Grossman states “pilots train on flight simulators,...