Game Over; Literally
Although video games may not be fabricated for the sole aim of teaching sexist views, but many people do not realise how attitudes can shift with practice. As human beings, our learning is not particularly an always actively conscious one, we always tend to pick up subtle cues without being fully aware of it.
Grand Theft Auto is a video game series and is action-adventure oriented. The game is basically to steal cars through journeys that are role-playing, shooting, race driving.
With the rise of GTA, it is starting to become obvious that the gaming culture is acting as political space in which major issues are reinforced and portrayed in. GTA is a game that is mainly all about men and their masculinity, people can not engage with the game without becoming involved in exclusively the unfortunate issues such as sexism, violence and racism. The game allows the player to become (virtually) a rapist and a killer only to get a car or take in money. The game playable characters are exclusively men. Women who are depicted in the game’s narrative are either victims or are killed, or sex working, or used, or saved by men. This shows that the depiction of women in this game is horrible. The game was banned in many countries, such as Australia, China, and Japan. The reason behind almost every country for banning the game is because it is either unsuitable for children, or because it shows excessive violence and it depicts cruelty.
Video games standing as training devices for teenagers to become rapists, killers and sexists.
In the world of gaming, game designers should be very aware of the content they are producing and consider every single detail because just like any other media form, people are not passive creatures; they reflect, relate and portray what the mass media is giving them. This mass-media is giving in a mass-thought outcome.
For instance, in this part of the game the player is asked to torture the victim , the level of violence here is truly shocking, and makes us think; is the player happy/enjoying this part of the game? Is he casually smiling while doing this part? On another note, the graphics are depicted realistically that people, mainly children might think what they are “playing” is not merely a virtual game, it is real. Who knows, they might take this action outside the game and think that in this way they are winning.
Taking the ethical issue into a more theoretical one. In terms of the “common good” perspective, the effects that video games have on people should be very well studies. From the virtue perspective, we should think of how video games are shaping people, maybe it has two different arguments- does playing violent video games make you a violent person and/or does it make you immune to violence and desensitise it?
The video game landscape is not only full of experiences but also with a lot of concerns that are related to physically and psychologically .
The responsibility in this case falls under the shoulders of game designers because games in general are mainly targeted for children, and children take every detail and reflect on it. What was once created for the sole aim of entertainment can easily because a product that is dangerous.
In a study that took place at Ohio State University, called “Acting like a Tough Guy: Violent-Sexist Video Games, Identification with Game Characters, Masculine Beliefs, & Empathy for Female Violence Victims” an evaluation of games that are deemed to be sexist and violent and games that were not as suck and a third group of violent but not sexist games, has found that there is no direct link found between games and the behaviour of participants however there is a correlation between a lack of reaction to abusive scenes and those have previously played GTA.
The study’s conclusion reads: “One of the best predictors of aggression against girls and women is lack of empathy. The present research shows that violent-sexist video games such as GTA reduce empathy for female violence victims, at least in the short-term.(Skipper, 2016)
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