Gaming article

[owlmoose]

Are Video Games Evil?

Nice overview of this issue from The Wilson Quarterly. Thoughtful and well-argued; comes down pretty firmly on the pro-gaming side. There's a lot here but this tidbit particularly jumped out:

In The Ultimate History of Video Games (2001), game journalist Steven Kent cites pinball as a mechanical ancestor of today’s digital games. Pinball created a panic in some quarters—no pun intended—as a new and dangerous influence on society. Foreshadowing the antics of today’s antigaming politicians was New York mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who smashed pinball machines with a sledgehammer and banned them from his city in the 1930s, a prohibition that was not lifted until the 1970s. (To be fair to La Guardia, governments have long perceived societal threats from new games. In the 1400s Scotland banned golf, now its proud national pastime, because too many young men were neglecting archery to practice their swings.)

Comments

[owlmoose.livejournal.com]

For that matter, there's probably a human tendency to oversimplify most things.

I agree with this, definitely.

Have you read Everything Bad Is Good For You by Steven Johnson? It's referenced in the article. He takes the premise that video games, television, and movies are maturing as artistic forms, getting more complex, and end up actually being good for our brains rather than rotting them. There is (surprise!) some over-simplication, but overall I think it holds up, and I recommend it.

[oswulf.livejournal.com]

I don't think I have. I did enjoy reading _Freakanomics_ about a month back.