Whether violent video games ought to be censored by law or not is really to question the morals of our society today and even of our society tomorrow, for the majority of the video game age demographic is young to adolescent. Isn’t this also the same when we ask how movies ought to be rated? Why are there so many different movie review websites catering to parents who wish to monitor what their children see without them on a Friday night? Would these exist and be visited so frequent if this was not an issue? “While philosophy doesn’t always provide clear answers to our questions,” Nehamas draws from the philosophical discussion of 4th century B.C. Plato, in order to “reveal what exactly it is that we are asking” (Nehamas). So what exactly are we asking? The debate seems to be directly concerned with what is a “violent” video game. The United States Court of Appeals defines “violent video game” as:
a video game in which the range of options available to a players includes killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being... it is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the community as to what is suitable for minors... enables the player to virtually inflict serious injury upon images of human beings or characters with substantially human characteristics in a manner which is especially heinous, cruel, or depraved in that is involves torture or serious physical abuse to the victim (“Video Software”).
So the question in which we turn to a very old man for an answer is: ought the video games considered violent be permitted for mass consumers?
Plato describes the nature of 4th century B.C. poetry as imitation (10.595-595b). This is particularly relevant to the simulation that video games provides because the gamer directly participates with the given settings, personalities, and controls. Thus, the medium of theater has evolved into a much more imitative interaction: you see what the “hero” sees, you control what he does, and your score reflects how well he performs. Plato’s description of the artisan is not far from the video game creator: “[he] makes everything that grows out of the ground, and creates all living things, himself among others; and, in addition to this, heaven and earth and the gods and all the heavenly bodies and everything in Hades under the earth is his workmanship” (10.595c). These are all appearances, a mock-world in which the audience is invited to observe, and in the case of video games, to directly influence and participate. Plato does not argue this in order to negate poetry altogether, but simply to deny it the truth that can be ignorantly attributed to it.
Therefore, he delineates real from artificial and presents the moral effects that result from ignoring this distinction. First, he argues that it seizes upon an object in a small part of its extent, and that small part is itself only an image (10.598b). So then the “addiction” of poetry is that “he will go on imitating, notwithstanding his being thoroughly ignorant as to the way in which a thing is good or bad. Apparently he will copy beauty as it appears to the many who do not know... the imitator knows nothing of importance about the things which he imitates, and that therefore imitation is a kind of play and not a serious business” (10.602b). Does this not particularly address the video game aesthetic? So we can agree with Plato, the attraction of video games and its influence upon the imitator is the lack of sincerity in itself. Being able to recognize sincerity is particular of the intelligible human, an attribute children discover early when discipline is or is not administered to regulate their actions.
Thus, the games themselves do not pose a threat to a civilized society, but how we interact with them does, according to Plato. For, “it is our duty to think over the event that has taken place, and to arrange our affairs to take the way which reason pronounces best” (10.604c). So no matter what conflict or situation is presented to us, we are obligated, by our nature, to proceed to take the best way reasonable, like how a child responds to discipline: does he correct himself? or does he continue to rebel? This is the role we assume in the video game--we subject ourselves to the society the creator has developed. So the creator, himself, regulates what is developed in the imitated world, and especially the characters. Plato suggests, “His business is with the irritable and changeable character, because it is easily imitated... he holds intercourse with a part of the soul which is like himself, and not the best part” (10.605-605b). Thus, because we seek the best way reasonable, we want to be the hero in order to “glory in being able to endure with calmness” (10.605e). It would be ignorant to believe that the conduct of others does not influence our own, and so imitation is inevitable. Plato argues, “it is not easy matter, after feeding the strength of the principle of pity upon the suffering of others, to keep it under restraint when we suffer ourselves” (10.606b).
To such a degree, the premise of the video game is this: we have been given the controls to be able to better a situation for the sake of the greater good of the mock-world. Thus “bettering a situation” suggests what is good, well-ordered, beneficial, and just. How far is this from the role of government and authority? Might children be so attracted to video games because they are given a false authority that is not yet granted to them in reality? Thus, video games are political. If they act as a simulation for children to learn how to better a situation within given scenarios and conditions, then what is practiced in theory, void of absolute sincerity, will only be imitated, according to Plato, by he who does not guard himself from the constitution within him. Plato concludes, “it is wrong to be heedless of justice and the rest of virtue, under the excitement of honor, or wealth, or power, or even of poetry” (10.608b). Thus, it is the duty of the government to regulate the values of law and justice, in order to teach the next generation what is deemed good and true in a well-ordered society. This does not ignore the ability for children to choose what is right or wrong, but teaches them the values upon which their society is ordered. This must be a concern of our leaders, if they are to be what Plato considers the best: the philosopher-king, a disinterested person who rules not for their personal enjoyment but for the good of the polis. For this is what must be the priority of the gamer in order to reach the highest score. A game that encourages unnecessary violence and sexual activity is not conducive to these priorities and deceives the ignorant to believe the opposite is true: the personal enjoyment of murdering, stealing, and sexually assault is at the expense of the good. The insincere imitation directly influences a child’s ethics and the values by which he makes decisions. Thus, the actual authority exercises its controls, in order to endure with calmness, the real defense against The Video Software Dealers Association. I agree with Nehamas that if Plato is right, then so are we.
Bibliography
Nehamas, Alexander. “Plato’s Pop Culture Problem, and Ours”. 29 August 2010.
Plato, The Republic, ed. Andrea Tschemplik, trans. John Llewelyn Davies and David James
Vaughn. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006. pp. 352-69.
“Video Software Dealers Association v. Schwarzenegger”. United States Court of Appeals, NInth
Circuit. 20 February 2009. <http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-9th-circuit/1211231.html>.
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