It's No Contest: Boys Will Be Men, and They'll Still Choose Video Games

[fgoodwin]

It's No Contest: Boys Will Be Men, and They'll Still Choose Video Games

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A34784-2004Dec4.html

 

By Patrick Welsh

 

Sunday, December 5, 2004; Page B01

 

Jake Stephens, a senior in my AP English class at T.C. Williams High School, is hooked. "The narrative is so exciting you lose all track of time," he said to me last week. "Three hours can go by and it seems like 15 minutes. Once I'm into it, it's hard to think of anything else; all my focus is on finishing the story line."

 

Was Jake talking about "All the Pretty Horses," the novel I'm currently having my students read? I wish. Personally, I find Cormac McCarthy's coming-of-age cowboy tale enthralling, with its tragic love story, graphic violence and lyrical writing. But Jake probably thinks it's pretty tame. He's seduced by a different kind of narrative -- the car-stealing frenzy of one of his favorite video games, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

 

I've known for a long time that a lot of the boys in my English classes are more interested in connecting with their Xboxes in the evening than with the next three chapters of Toni Morrison's "Song of Solomon." But ever since I observed their mounting hysteria over last month's "premiere" of Halo 2, the new combat game from Microsoft, I've been trying to find out what's behind the lure of video games. As the boys I teach have endeavored to enlighten me, I haven't known whether to laugh, cry, or go find a new job. What they told me has me wondering how what I teach can possibly compete with the fast-paced razzle-dazzle of this ever-evolving entertainment form and worrying about the young guys who spend so much time divorced from reality and the life of the mind as they zap away the hours before their video screens.

 

I had to chuckle at the image of otherwise reasonable boys keeping a vigil outside the Best Buy store in Potomac Yards until the doors opened at midnight on Nov. 9, when they could charge in to be the first to snap up Halo 2, which added $125 million to Bill Gates's company fortune on its debut day alone. But I didn't think it was so funny when some guys skipped school that day to stay home and try to beat the game. Senior Steve Penn (who wasn't one of the skippers) told me that the following weekend, he played for six hours straight (minus bathroom breaks) at a friend's house. When he got home at 1 a.m. on Sunday, he went at it for two more hours, fell asleep, got up at 7 and fired up the game again. "My mother had to remind me to change my clothes and take a shower," he said.

 

Steve, like Jake, is a good student; he even finished "All the Pretty Horses" (which he said he appreciated because it "wasn't sappy") a week before it was due. I'm not especially worried about the boys who manage to balance their passion for video games with their responsibilities to school and to themselves. But I have to wonder what effect this widespread, intense obsession with the games is bound to have on the boys who can't, or don't, manage that balance, the boys whose time and concentration the games suck away. And suck them away they do.

 

I'm not the only one to see it happening. T.C. girls have told me that at parties they are often totally ignored as the guys gather around TV screens, entranced by one video game or another. "Girls sit around watching the guys play until they get fed up and drive off looking for something else to do," says junior Sarah Kell, for whom the games range from "stupid and boring" to "disgusting." (Most girls tell me they find the games silly.) "We try to tell them they're wasting their time, but they just keep going. Some guys stay up playing until 3 in the morning on school nights, and then they try to do their homework."

 

I figured I would finally discover what all the excitement was about when I went to a Halo 2 party at a friend's Internet company recently. But as I wandered among the four offices where teams of three to four guys -- bright, highly educated guys in their mid-twenties and early thirties -- were competing, I kept asking myself: "Is this all there is to it?" I'm not sure what I was expecting, but certainly it was something more than a game where you shoot at moving objects until you get 50 "kills."

 

I know that Halo 2 aficionados will say that's a gross oversimplification. And as one who gave up video games after several failed attempts at Pac-Man in the early '70s, I may be the last person who should be commenting on them. Like many others, though, I find the rampant violence, misogyny and sexual and racial stereotyping of some games beyond offensive, and wonder about the negative messages they're sending to young people.

 

But my more immediate concern is how to get books back on the playing field. I became an English teacher because I love literature and wanted to share it with students. Literature, however, demands that we enter into an imaginative world slowly, through the written word. It forces us to re-create this world in our minds, through the power of our imaginations. When my students finish "All the Pretty Horses," I'll show them some scenes from the 2000 movie. I know that the students who really got into the reading will say, as kids in previous years have said, that the world the movie creates -- even enhanced by the star power of Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz -- can in no way compare to the richness of the world the book allows them to evoke for themselves.

 

But I also know that many of the boys won't care one way or the other. They won't have engaged with the novel on the level that really makes an imagined story come alive. Entering the fictional world of a novel takes a different set of skills from getting to the "next level" in a video game -- as I found out during my pathetic attempt to steal a car when I played Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas last week.

 

As much as I love "All The Pretty Horses," I admit it can't compel the focus or generate the kind of excitement that guys find in Halo 2, Madden '05, Grand Theft Auto or any of the other new generation of games. Whatever vicarious experience a novel or even a movie can offer, "gamers" say it can't approach a video game's intensity of experience.

 

"A video game is like a novel -- it has a plot, a setting and a theme. But it's the interaction that a novel doesn't have that makes the video games so intriguing," said Steve Penn, in a patient effort to enlighten me. "With a video game you're seeing the action happen in front of you; you have some control, which creates an illusion that you're in the game."

 

Jake Stephens feels the same way. "It's like reading an exciting book, except you feel you are in the book," he says. "Once I start a game like San Andreas, I am so into it that I sit in class thinking about how I can get to the next level when I get home."

 

I have to confess that when I was in high school, reading novels wasn't too high on my list of priorities, either. So maybe, you say, I shouldn't worry about my students. They'll come around to literature later. But the video craze apparently isn't something that wears off with adolescence. In fact, it seems to intensify in college.

 

Old Dominion University freshman Nick Pratt said that as soon as Halo 2 came out, some guys skipped classes for three straight days to play the game in the dorms. Duke freshman Sarah Ball told me she can walk down the hall of a male-only floor in her dorm and hear video games going in every room. "Lately they've been having Halo 2 tournaments," she reports. "There will be wall-to-wall bodies in a room, the lights are off for that video game ambience. I stuck my head in once to ask a friend a question and got death stares."

 

Video games have taken over the lives of some guys in her dorm, says University of Virginia freshman Remy Kauffmann. "I've never seen anything like it. It's hard to have a conversation with these guys. If they're not playing, they want to start up a game."

 

"One of the reasons so many kids bomb out of college in their first year," says Silver Spring educational psychologist Bill Stixrud, "is that without parents to set some boundaries, they can't control the video games and other electronic entertainment available to them." How often do you think that happens with a good novel?

 

T.C. Williams senior L.J. Harbin has played his share of video games, especially the ones involving cars, like Gran Turismo. He agrees that the games take time away both from studies and from the development of physical abilities. "There are more and more couch potatoes -- guys who are 30 to 40 years old and organize tournaments. Some work just to pay for their addiction," L.J. says. "I know two guys who are Halo fanatics and both chose the game over their girlfriends. They would rather be sitting on their butts pushing buttons than doing something with their girlfriends."

 

T.C. Williams football coach Greg Sullivan says that he sees fewer and fewer kids playing outside when he drives around Northern Virginia. "They are inside playing video games," he says. "More kids are finding real sports too demanding."

 

I know we all need entertainment and downtime, and I've certainly thrown away a few hours in my life myself. I would love to have back all the time I've wasted watching professional football games. And I take a little solace from the predictions of cyberspace gurus at places like MIT, who say that video games are creating a new art form -- the interactive narrative -- as revolutionary as the printing press or the invention of movies. Interactive narratives will put us right in the story and allow us, at the push of a button, to choose from many plot lines, they promise.

 

But while we're waiting for the next Orson Welles or Francis Ford Coppola to come out of Silicon Valley or MIT, I see a whole generation of boys being manipulated by mercenary video game designers who aren't terribly interested in creating high art. I worry that video games are contributing to the growing gap I see in the academic achievement of boys and girls and to the disproportionate number of boys being labeled LD and being put on Ritalin.

 

A recent Japanese study compared the brain activity of children adding single-digit numbers to that of children playing Nintendo games. It found that the Nintendo games stimulated only the temporal lobes, which regulate basic sensory activity, while doing the simple math problems stimulated not only the temporal but also the frontal lobe, which governs impulse control, goal-directed behavior and memory. "Young brains grow on a 'use it or lose it' principle," says Stixrud, who fears that video games may be stunting the brain development of young children. He sees kids in his practice who have developed sleep disorders because they spend three or four hours a night playing electronic games.

 

Tomorrow, I will give my first-period class a test on the final section of "All the Pretty Horses." There are some great boys in that class, and I hope they've been able to take the time and find the solitude to give themselves a chance to get into the novel. If they don't like it after a solid effort, so be it. I won't argue over questions of taste.

 

But I will be royally bothered if they've been cheated out of a chance to experience the beauty and power of the book because a marathon of video game-playing dissipated their time and blunted their sensibilities.

 

Author's e-mail: May6dog@aol.com

 

Pat Welsh has taught English at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria for more than 30 years.

[kraut-60]

I see gaming as little more than an electronic drug addiction. I really believe that the manufacturers are engineering these games to lead people to play them for hours on end and have seen recently where speculation suggested that the levels of dopamine in the brain are higher due to the stimulation these games cause their players to experience.

 

I feel the gaming craze is also taking its toll on Scouts as I have seen the effects of game-withdrawl on scouts out at a camp-out, ie; they talk of games and not about the present activity.

 

These damn games are truly an electronic cancer for the youth and weak-minded adults who indulge in playing them, I wish they had never been brought into existance( the games and game sysytems, not the people who are addicted to them).

 

I am sure I'll hear some flak from some who support this foolishness, flame away....

[funscout]

I agree that current video and computer games are addictive. Pac-man type games were fun, but certainly not something you'd spend hours playing.

 

We were the last hold-outs of my older son's friends to finally buy a Play Station. The only good thing I can say about it is that it's a wonderful incentive for our boys to behave, get homework done, etc. They HATE to lose their video privileges!

 

One time I decided to try out one of my boys' favorite computer games to see why they had such a hard time getting off it when we said their time was up. I put in the CD for Zoo Tycoon, and THREE hours later I was absolutely stunned to see how much time had gone by! I was stiff from sitting so long, and finally understood how addictive these games can be. Needless to say, I was way behind with housework that day. Imagine my embarrassment when I explained to my husband why the laundry wasn't done!

[Fuzzy Bear]

My parents read to me very little and I had just a few books as a child. The two that I remember were Mother Goose and H. C. Anderson's Fairy tales; both the stories and the pictures made me sick. As I learned to read, it was and remained a school chore until the nineth grade. During that fateful year, a young lady lured me into the library to become an aide so that I could get out of study hall. She was cute and funny so we worked side by side, usually hiding far back in the shelving units to talk and laugh while pretending to put books away.

 

One day it happened. You know what I mean. We were getting close to each other and I accidently put my hand on the wrong thing. It was bound to happen with that much contact. I had finally put my hand on a book; one about the sea and I began to read. I was carried away into another world of adventure. I read it twice. It was so good that that I actually believed that someone had put the book into the library by mistake or had done so as a wicked act. I was never sure which it was but it certainly did the trick.

 

I didn't change overnight because I had been jaded by this cruel and unusual act. Once I had been exposed through "literacy knowledge", I knew that a person could actually write something that was exciting. Nobody asked me to write a book report on it but I could have done that and/or put on a three act play in front of the class, if only the requirements and the opportunity had connected. There was so much more to high school than sports, social activities, running around and visiting with my many, many friends. I also learned to put in the minimum amount of study time and only then when forced by a deadline.

 

I graduated in the bottom third of my class, which made my parents so proud of me and, of course, put the colleges scouts into an absolute frenzy. I sent off the results of my Entrance Exam to three colleges and the one with the lowest entrance standards won the day. They sent me a letter proclaiming that I could enter on a probationary status. So, for the next two years, I struggled against all odds to live up to my reputation. As my study habits began paying the expected dividends, I found myself out on the street.

 

After working at a couple of entry level jobs over the next two years, I discoverd that there was more to me than met the eye. I returned with renewed interest. I had somehow learned to study. I sat near the front of the class. I read my assignments. I wrote my papers. I was on time. I studied. I finished several degrees and certifications. I have several book shelves full of books and once per year haul off several boxes. My sons have their own library of books and we go regualrly to the library and read books every evening. They have books stored in their closet so that as their ability increases in reading and have more difficult questions, we can move up the level.

 

I agree that Video games are addictive and the pay-off for the time spent is noteworthy. Most people that attend college fail because they find other things to do with their lives like working minimum wage entry level jobs. This allows them plenty of time to move up to the next level in the video game of their choice. Books helped me find a career and a life and for that I am grateful.

 

FB

[gwd-scouter]

Oh dear, another slam against video games. Electronic cancer for weakminded adults? Electronic drug addiction? OK, I will agree to a point that there are some youth and adults out there that spend so much time on video games that they exclude other important social and educational opportunities in their lives.

 

But, I don't personally know any of those people. I know my sons, both avid gamers, sometimes several hours at a time but not every day, both honor roll students, both involved in band/sports/clubs and other in school and after school activities, both always among the top five in reading competitions each year in school, and both in Scouts since 1st grade (oldest now in college, Eagle; youngest in middle school, Star).

 

Sometimes husband and I would play with them. Mario Kart is my favorite and usually results in hours of fun family competitions. I know, however, that the boys (husband included) prefer the more dramatic video games like Halo.

 

My sons do get engrossed in whatever game they are playing and do lose track of the hours that go by. At times, we must ask them to turn it off and they'll be surprised at how long they've been playing. They have had restrictions on games they could rent or buy based on the ratings, their ages at the time, and what their father and I viewed as content of the game. The other restriction we've had for years is that all games must be turned off by 8 PM on school nights.

 

Of course, oldest is in college now and is known to stay up 'till 2 or 3 playing computer games or Dungeons and Dragons (I'm sure there's a thread somewhere about that, too). He still manages to get up in time for his classes every day. He took 18 credit hours each semester and made Dean's list.

 

No worries from me!

 

 

 

[SR540Beaver]

I've been known to partake in a video or on-line game or two on occasion and I still consider myself a fairly productive member of society. Regulating gaming, like television, skateboarding, friends, etc. is all in your parenting skills. God gave them to you, use them. To those who don't believe in God, think of it as common sense.

[acco40]

Video games are not addicting to me (my kids are sucking me in to Guitar Hero however). It's those darn internet forums that suck up all my time! :-)