Can we teach kids to use tools like the Xbox, television and video games to learn rather than to become hateful with images of sex and violence? We all realize that as the action heats up for the most challenging, graphic and appealing video games that many gaming companies are turning up the heat on violence and inserting sexual connotations to improve sales. It also seems readily apparent that this tactic at least from a popularity standpoint is working well for sales. Can we use these venues such as video games and the Xbox as platforms so that gamming companies can use them to teach history, science and math? Can we use these technologies to show a brighter future thru writing of future history? If we did that would turn the violence and sex in video games into a good thing and if it sells, then that is a great thing. Perhaps we can balance out the negative potential impact on young human minds with a positive? We know in the future that such games will become virtual reality and these types of platforms will be used as simulators for learning skills, so why not start now and produce more teaching tools, rather than only producing the action attack genres because they sell the best? Now then that is not to say that the competition for the visual sense of the mind will not be won over by the Jerry Springer Shows of the World or the vindictiveness of Reality TV on shows like Youre Fired with Donald Trump. And indeed the most popular games are the action games and therefore the money flows are moving this way, due to military simulation and the current cartoons available. Even the not so horrific killer cartoons are pushing the envelope of morality for instance Family Guy yet it is hard to deny they do not absolutely nail the human side of life like a nail on the head. We need to use these magnificent technological advances as tools for learning and good to balance out the normal tendencies and monetary flows in the market place due to the insatiable appetite of the human species for sex and violence. We just really need some more balance here you see? Think on this in 2006. |
