Are Porn and Video Games Ruining a Generation?

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/05/23/health/living-well/demise-of-guys/index.html?hpt=hp_c2

So Dr. Philip Zimbardo is stating on CNN that young men are being ruined by a non-stop diet of video games and pornography, and that effectively all of today's generation of young males are goners with no social or interactive skills of any kind. He's even going so far as to suggest the entire human species is at risk now because of this.

From the article:

"

Stories about this degeneration are rampant: In 2005, Seungseob Lee, a South Korean man, went into cardiac arrest after playing "StarCraft" for nearly 50 continuous hours. In 2009, MTV's "True Life" highlighted the story of a man named Adam whose wife kicked him out of their home -- they have four kids together -- because he couldn't stop watching porn.

Dr. Philip Zimbardo and Nikita Duncan are the authors of "The Demise of Guys."

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

Yeah, all of their supposed 'proof' stories are about people who obviously suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or some other form of mental illness. These conditions have been around long before video games or internet porn. These "researchers" are just looking for shock value in blaming the "new thing" to sell books / treatments. These people that they are referring to have real psychiatric problems that have existed for thousands of years and have been documented for at least the last 150-200 years.

It's simple mathematics... There are a lot more people around today than even 50 years ago and medical science has improved a lot in the same time period so there are a lot more documented cases then ever before. It isn't that people are getting worse it's that there is a lot more people. The percentages are still the same as they were 50 years ago or maybe even a slight increase due to advances in psychiatric diagnosis.

Bren

Yeah, they probably are...but, oh well.  Too late to do anything about it now.

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

I just found it pretty funny how both video games and porn were lumped together into one topic by them. :)

I don't know too much about logic, but I think there's a term for this kind of reasoning (dichotomy or some term, it's like a 'strawman' argument kinda, but there's a logical expression for this).

He's selling a book so what else is he going to say except a bunch of crazy crap to generate interest in a book nobody would care about unless he said a bunch of crazy crap?

Once you open the book you'll probably see that his assertions above are watered down to mean video game and porn addicts - which means you could say the same for any addiction.

Originally posted by aktalat

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

I just found it pretty funny how both video games and porn were lumped together into one topic by them. :)

I don't know too much about logic, but I think there's a term for this kind of reasoning (dichotomy or some term, it's like a 'strawman' argument kinda, but there's a logical expression for this).

 

Of course they're lumped together, young teenaged males have a strong interest in both sex and games of competition with their peers, but now it's suddenly a problem.  I guess fathers should take their teen males to a brothel like they did in ye olden days?  And perhaps teach them bare knuckle boxing too?  If you've not been to a brothel by the time you're 14 and your nose isn't disfiguired and broken - you're just not a "guy".

Originally posted by Hazelle

He's selling a book so what else is he going to say except a bunch of crazy crap to generate interest in a book nobody would care about unless he said a bunch of crazy crap?

Once you open the book you'll probably see that his assertions above are watered down to mean video game and porn addicts - which means you could say the same for any addiction.

Listen I agree with you, but these 'crazy' people peddling a book also had an entire TED Talk about this subject:

http://www.ted.com/talks/zimchallenge.html

And so many people were cheering and laughing as he was talking about it!

The answer's no

For the same reason tv didn't ruin the generation prior to mine, rock n' roll didn't ruin the generation before that, etc, etc. There will always be some idiot proclaiming that something new he/she doesn't like spells DOOOOM.

Video games? Not ruining a generation.

Porn? Also not ruining a generation.

Video Game Porn? Maaaybe.

I learned a lot of social behavior through MMO.

I learned that people are not always nice to you out of the kindness of their heart, but because they want something in return.

I learned that different countries handle groups differently. In Asia it seems more common to do things as a collective while in the EU and US we like to do things ourselves and will only do things as a collective when there is no other way, we pride ourselves on being individuals while in Asia many people consider them a part of a collective.

etc

I learned lots of stuff through MMO, it's really easy to study social behavior in MMO since you suddenly have access to thousands of individuals.

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

Translation:

My gaming and porn habits are not ruining me! Nuh-uh!

*Heal*

*Fap, Fap, Fap*

Simple answer.... nope!

Originally posted by Dekron

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

Translation:

My gaming and porn habits are not ruining me! Nuh-uh!

*Heal*

*Fap, Fap, Fap*

*gasp* Busted!  :p

In all seriousness, those "research" just makes me mad. They're pulling so many strawman arguments it's unbelievable.

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

I know what you're saying, and agree with you 100%. But Philip Zimbardo the author of this article is a legend in the psyhiatric and sociology field.

He is best known for the now-classic "Stanford Prisoner Experiment" from 1971 (from wikipedia):

"The Stanford prison experiment was a study of the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prison guard. The experiment was conducted at Stanford University from August 14 to August 20 of 1971 by a team of researchers led by psychology professor Philip Zimbardo.^[1] It was funded by the US Office of Naval Research^[2] and was of interest to both the US Navy and Marine Corps as an investigation into the causes of conflict between military guards and prisoners.

Twenty-four male students out of 75 were selected to take on randomly assigned roles of prisoners and guards in a mock prison situated in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. The participants adapted to their roles well beyond Zimbardo's expectations, as the guards enforced authoritarian measures and ultimately subjected some of the prisoners to psychological torture. Many of the prisoners passively accepted psychological abuse and, at the request of the guards, readily harassed other prisoners who attempted to prevent it. The experiment even affected Zimbardo himself, who, in his role as the superintendent, permitted the abuse to continue. Two of the prisoners quit the experiment early and the entire experiment was abruptly stopped after only six days. Certain portions of the experiment were filmed and excerpts of footage are publicly available."

So yes he has unorthodox methods, but he's probing fundamentals of human behavior. And when males are browsing porn 50+ times a week (from his TED Talk, no citation available for how he came up with that number) I guess that could leave people asking questions... 

I don't know who is more hilarious...CNN or FoxNews

I think both are equally terribad and both are hilarious.

Originally posted by aktalat

I know what you're saying, and agree with you 100%. But Philip Zimbardo the author of this article is a legend in the psyhiatric and sociology field.

He is best known for the now-classic "Stanford Prisoner Experiment" from 1971 (from wikipedia):

 

"The Stanford prison experiment was a study of the psychological effects of becoming a prisoner or prison guard. The experiment was conducted at Stanford University from August 14 to August 20 of 1971 by a team of researchers led by psychology professor Philip Zimbardo.^[1] It was funded by the US Office of Naval Research^[2] and was of interest to both the US Navy and Marine Corps as an investigation into the causes of conflict between military guards and prisoners.

Twenty-four male students out of 75 were selected to take on randomly assigned roles of prisoners and guards in a mock prison situated in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. The participants adapted to their roles well beyond Zimbardo's expectations, as the guards enforced authoritarian measures and ultimately subjected some of the prisoners to psychological torture. Many of the prisoners passively accepted psychological abuse and, at the request of the guards, readily harassed other prisoners who attempted to prevent it. The experiment even affected Zimbardo himself, who, in his role as the superintendent, permitted the abuse to continue. Two of the prisoners quit the experiment early and the entire experiment was abruptly stopped after only six days. Certain portions of the experiment were filmed and excerpts of footage are publicly available."

 

So yes he has unorthodox methods, but he's probing fundamentals of human behavior. And when males are browsing porn 50+ times a week (from his TED Talk, no citation available for how he came up with that number) I guess that could leave people asking questions... 

 

But he's still ignoring a lot of facts about the gaming industry, and then associates the Norway killer with Gamers and Porn users because they had something in common. It's like saying that all Golfers are more likely to cheat on their wife, and use Tiger Wood as an example. It's completely ridiculous. Regardless of how amazing his previous researchs are, this one has been done in an completely unprofessional way.

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

But he's still ignoring a lot of facts about the gaming industry, and then associates the Norway killer with Gamers and Porn users because they had something in common. It's like saying that all Golfers are more likely to cheat on their wife, and use Tiger Wood as an example. It's completely ridiculous. Regardless of how amazing his previous researchs are, this one has been done in an completely unprofessional way.

Yes associating video games with the Norway mass-murders is pretty messed-up. That said some of his arguments about the naricisstic nature of gmers seem fairly accurate. Every time I log into MMORPG.com it amazes me how much self-love the people here have for themselves.. myself included. It's like we're living in our magical bubble of computer technology and not developing real interactive skills with other human beings.

Maybe that's why I liked SWG so much, it was more like a MUD or MOO rather than a "I'm a Hero and I'm Great" kinda MMO game.

No, I'd say the media is.

Originally posted by aktalat

Originally posted by MadnessRealm

Just some more ridiculous bullshit written by pseudo-researchers. They are purposedly ignoring most fact (such as 40% of gamers are female), and instead write this poorly made research about how video games and porn is the downfall of humanity and turns everyone into mass-murderer because the Norway killer played WoW and CoD.

 

Absolutely ridiculous and unprofessional, but unsurprising.

I know what you're saying, and agree with you 100%. But Philip Zimbardo the author of this article is a legend in the psyhiatric and sociology field.

He is best known for the now-classic "Stanford Prisoner Experiment" from 1971 (from wikipedia):

 

The stanford prison experiment is plagued with the same criticisms people have posted above.