Veteran Gamers

This week we’re pleased to host a guest opinion piece from Burr Salem, AKA Seth McNitt. Although he and I live in the same city, we haven’t met yet, because school is crazy and get off my back. Anyway, enjoy his piece. -Duke

Last week a promotional article for a newly published book was posted on CNN.com entitled ‘The Demise of Guys’: how video games and porn are ruining a generation. Yowza! That’s an attention getter. Ruining a generation? Games and porn? Games and… porn?

I refer to the article as promotional in nature because it turns out to have been penned by the book’s very authors, Dr. Philip G. Zimbardo (famous for his Stanford Prisoner Experiment in the early 70′s) and Nikita Duncan, in promotion of the less sensationally titled The Demise of Guys: Why Boys Are Struggling and What We Can Do About It. Having sufficiently piqued the reader’s interest, they go on to expand on their basic premise: “The excessive use of video games and online porn in pursuit of the next thing is creating a generation of risk-averse guys who are unable (and unwilling) to navigate the complexities and risks inherent to real-life relationships, school and employment.” Double yowza! Turns out video games and porn (as opposed to board games and rock & roll for example, or peanut butter and jelly for how closely they tie them) create “arousal addictions” in the young male’s mind, “where the attraction is in the novelty, the variety or the surprise factor of the content.” Okay. Following so far.

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