Violence and Instant Gratification’

This is what Kym said she learned. However, some advocates say that the violent games merely teach you to defend or protect. “Rather than blowing up at my history teacher, I can take it out on Asteroids,” argued a 16-year-old. Some adults, like 40-year-old Gary, even claim, “It’s like good training for life. You gotta learn how to dodge and learn when to shoot.”

But note in the accompanying box the themes of the most popular games. Are these really “good training” for life? Will they help you get along better with others? Or could they encourage the kind of thinking displayed by an 11-year-old girl charged with stabbing a 14-year-old boy to death in an argument? He had interrupted her while she was playing a video game.

“He that is slow to anger is better than a mighty man, and he that is controlling his spirit than the one capturing a city,” says Proverbs 16:32. Will you learn this lesson from violent video games? On the contrary, could your heart gradually begin to ‘love violence’ to your detriment?​—Psalm 11:5.

“With the game I would either get blown up or get instant gratification. But the outside world is not like that. I became very impatient,” reported Kym. This desire for quick payoffs hurt Kym’s grades for she did light preparation for schoolwork that required much more time and thought. But to become an effective adult, sustained attention to many long-term activities is needed.

[Box on page 18]

Themes of the Most Popular Video Games

● “Eat others before you are eaten”

● “Destroy the alien hordes or they will smother you”

● ‘Dodge certain large rocks or blast them’

● Protect six cities by destroying any missiles with missiles of your own

● Kill a jewel-bright centipede or a spider that jumps across the screen before it lands on you

● You must shoot your way out of a “maze world littered with homicidal robots”

● You are in a giant tank on a three-dimensional battlefield and must shoot down all your enemies