“Murder Simulators”; or at least that is the term Lt. Col. David Grossman uses to describe first-person shooters. The former West Point psychology professor and author of several books on the subject of violence in the media, argues that these games are having a detrimental affect on our children. Not only are these young and impressionable minds being educated in the use of weapons, more worryingly, they are being desensitized to the act of murder. Most critics believe that the violence found in video games is more harmful to our children’s emotional well-being then the violence found in TV or film. This is because the player is actually controlling the violence through the characters point of view. One of the most publicized incidents that highlighted the correlation between first-person shooter games and real life violence is the Columbine Massacre. In a video recorded before the shootings, the two shooters mention how they looked forward to using their shotguns just as they had used them playing Doom. Their have been in upwards of two hundreds separate studies published on the effects of violence in the media, including some which focused wholly on video games. Some of these studies have indicated that children who do play these violent games have a leaning towards aggressive behavior. One of the fears of course, is that such behaviors may continue into adulthood, populating our society with aggressive and possibly violent people. Yet another criticism is that video games isolate children socially. They spend more time alone, interacting solely with their computers or consoles, than they do with their peers.

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