Analysis on How Videogames Affect Children Based on the Philosophy and Poetry of Romanticism Era

Violent video games have always been a factor to truculent behaviors, this leads to the stunt of kids being hostile and young ones fighting back and being real threats. To many people around the world, videogames are just a typical part of teens’ lives, but are they really? Video games that have a tie to these violent graphics have a corrupting factor because of what it can do with a teens’ mind. Due to this, many parents do not really know that video games will influence their kids actions.

As an effect, children are getting corrupted by what they comprehend through video games; they apply the skill gained from the digital entertainment into reality. Romantics believe that people are born innocent and that society corrupts them, and this correlates to how video games corrupt young minds, while also discriminating against young women.

The Tyger is a symbolic poem written by William Blake, which connects to Romantic philosophy. The speaker in the poem is puzzled at the sight of a tiger in the night, and he asks it a bunch of rapid questions about its fierce appearance and its creator. Additionally, even the title of the poem is unique because it is spelled differently. This symbolizes how the tiger has changed, and how it has adapted different characteristics. Tigers have fur that is orange, which represents good, and black stripes, which represent corruption, as once the tiger gets older, the stripes become more defined. Blake uses imagery and strong adjectives in stanza four which make the poem intricate, “What the hammer? what the chain,/ In what furnace was thy brain?/ What the anvil? what dread grasp,/ Dare its deadly terrors clasp!”(Blake 13-16).

The author is very descriptive with these four lines because he is trying to convey the actions of a blacksmith. A blacksmith is someone who takes a pure substance and transforms it into something new. In this case, the symbolic blacksmith is taking a pure tiger and using all these tools to produce a corrupted version. The blacksmith is also the creator of the lamb and thus the creator is also making a corrupted version of the lamb. The author also states a negative word in line six to explain that the creator “Burnt the fire of thine eyes?” (Blake 6). When born, the eye is white with only purities and no darkness. However the creator has burnt the eyes of thy which implies that the tiger has been corrupted to some extent. Also the fire in the tiger comes from a distant heavenly body, such as hell because this is where the darkness originates, the inner soul which is connected to hell.

William Wordsworth,famous poet, wrote this sonnet as a heartfelt response to the downfall of the cottage industry and rural ways of life, which had been taken over by mass production and factory work. People were no longer in touch with nature. Industrialization was overpowering during the time Wordsworth was writing the poem, which explains how civilization has lost all touch with mother nature. “The World Is Too Much With Us”, has so much detail of what is going on in such a short poem. Wordsworth includes a metaphor in lines 5-8 which really shows how the author revere's mother nature. Wordsworth explains in careful detail that “This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,/The winds that will be howling at all hours,/And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,/For this, for everything, we are out of tune;” (Wordsworth 5-8). The first few lines in this stanza combine to deliver a powerful but negative view of society and how the people are out of tune with nature. The people were in fact born without the idea of moving to the east where all the cities were. Once industrialization hit, society persuaded the rest of the people in the rural areas to leave

The person in this poem is looking out over the water from a high cliff at a time of calm, thinking of the ceaseless wind and of how we are no longer in harmony with the fundamentals of mother nature. The poem also reflects how industrialization has taken over and the corruption of people has begun. The author has a line in which he explains why he rather live in the time of pagans. This is very important because he displays his hatred towards industrialization and how he wanted to live in the past rather than the present time. The author desires to see a return of the times in which people were in tune with the land and connected to mother nature. The author introduced Proteus, an ancient being known to change shape or forms is very important to this poem. The author states that he can “Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;/Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.” (Wordsworth 13-14). Seeing Proteus from the cliff is also a very crucial detail because Wordsworth states two ancient ones, but he mentions Proteus first because he is the one that can escape the past, present or the future. Knowing this, the author can escape with Proteus back to the past.

Weapons are the main characteristics in many of the violent games seen today. Though many electronic games may not have genres connected to violence, the game can somewhat include violence. An example, could be Super Mario Bros or even Roblox. Most of the video games that are related to violence, drugs, and etc. are developed by the famous video game developer company, Rockstar Games.

For example, Jack Thompson, an activist claims that games like this can ruin the future generations. He is certain that this will not intentionally provoke a child's mind in the wrong way, but this is an intimidating factor. The generation of this time knows that “if a parent is smart enough to know what the title means, they should immediately know that this game will teach their child how to use the most common household items as if they should be considered illegal.”(Caldwell). Video games influence how kids can act out in front of their parents. From the title of the game to the gameplay, parents should figure out the difference in the child when they start talking more about weapons and certain things you don't want a child to be saying.

Let's take an example from The Call of Duty series developed by Activision. This popular series has proven to be detrimental to the youth because it can change the configuration of the human brain. Greg West, a researcher found out that through the use of weapons daily, the grey matter in the hippocampus can decrease which can lead to certain disorders such as PTSD. The games are having an effect on our children and they are getting corrupted by these unnecessary games.

Other activists such as David Grossman have even reached so far for what they believe in that they ended up a the White House. “David Grossman, an activist against these types of games, claim these games unintentionally teach kids how to use weapons and that emotions should be taken out on people through violence.”(Caldwell). Games that provoke children to use weapons from daily household items for emotional use is bad enough already, and this corrupts the kids at this age by using the weapons as a relaxing object. The kids can feel that the use of violence can be a tool to oppress the emotions they are going through. These violent types of games teaches how to think differently than normal children at their age.

Violent video games are the corrupting factor, because kids and teens may be more susceptible to these effects than adults. Playing these violent video games are associated with an increased level of aggressive thoughts, feelings and behaviours among gamers. Based of the weapons, these kids are not born with the idea of the use of weapons. The more video games introduce new context, such as weapons use and killing sprees, the brain gathers that and haunts the brain and all of that gets stuck in the brain which is corrupted at this time.

Weapons have a major part of how video games can corrupt the kids these days and this ties into how studies have proven psychologically that kids are going through some wild changes. Many studies have been done on kids expressing barbaric behaviors to the people surrounding them. Science has suggested that playing these types of games have negative effects on the human brain. For example, Rowell Huesmann, head of the University of Michigan, claims the idea that the article on how children these days have fallen to violent games and how this is really damaging to the brain.

Social psychologist Dara Greenwood has a lot to say on this topic. Greenwood acknowledges that 'no media psychologists worth their salt would conclude that violent video games will turn your children into gun-toting sociopaths. Despite her answer ' Still, she concluded that violent media, including video games, may affect people in 'countless subtle ways, increasing hostility and apathy to those around us.'”(Greenemeier). Studies like this prove (to the scientific community and the parents that read articles about the dangers of games like this understand) how games are negatively affecting the youth.

The young ones are most vulnerable at this time because they are so young and anything said can be stuck inside of their brain and provoke the addiction to play games that provoke violent thoughts. People who also play violent games get brain damage(emotionally) from these types of games and act hostile. Research from various studies have shown that people with certain amounts of grey matter in their hippocampus (part of the brain), face a higher risk of Neuro illnesses/disorders including Alzheimer’s. According to Greenemeier “..., the science to date suggests that violent video games do negatively affect the behavior of children.” (Greenemeier). To back up the science a group did a study on the kids ages and the violent video games they play. The psychological group also reported that more than 90% of children in the United States play video games.

Among kids between the ages of 12-17, the number rises to 97% from 55% from the ages of 9-12. More importantly, 85.8% or more of those games on stocks include some form of violence. The titles seem to say it all: 'Manhunt,' 'Thrill Kill,' 'Gears of War', “Grand Theft Auto”, “Call Of Duty” and 'Mortal Kombat.' Even the friendly 'Pokemon Go' requires players to go to battle. From this, the titles themselves just describe how the game will affect them eventually. The games listed above express different types of emotions. GTA V and Manhunt express the idea of how killing is normal. Thrill Kill and Gears of Wars expresses the feeling that some sort war background will be used and some gore will be used which can be detrimental. The kids are born pure and have no idea that video games can be this dangerous because they are meant to be for entertainment. The brain is born pure, but as soon as kids are introduced to the games, the brain gets corrupted with the context of the game.

Women have always been portrayed negatively in the gaming industry. The people in the gaming industry have been told over many years that girls are only there to show something sexual or something inapproriate. Women have been treated poorly at gaming events and even on YouTube. Many studies have been done to understand the misrepresentation in the industry and many of these studies have been by Works. Works believes, “One way that women are portrayed negatively within video games is through their attire. In most video games with female characters, the characters are dressed in sexy clothing that is usually skin-tight and very revealing.

The attire of female characters is one factor that plays into the sexual objectification of women that can be seen in video games.” (Works). Videogames have corrupted people's minds that only girls can dress up inappropriatley and it is okay to disrespect them. For example, the introduction of the original Lara Croft series presented as a strong female character nowadays but even in media such as movies. However, Lara Croft was pictured as a white woman in tight ripped jeans and a tank top that is very revealing. People grew to acknowledge that this focus was not for the primary visual but for the sexual visual. It can be clearly seen that people back then did not have a view of women in the gaming field and people start disliking it.

Therefore, afterwards society corrupted the pure and the idea of disrespecting women was brought up into place. Another example is from GTA V. Works states that “ Female characters within Grand Theft Auto are always portrayed in negative ways that reflect poorly on women and reinforce the stereotypes that exist about women in our society. Female characters in the game do not only dress in revealing clothing, but they also behave in ways that portray women in a very negative and degrading light; they are prostitutes.” (Works). To use this game as an example, many boys play this game because they are taught that girls only have one role and they can not do anything else. Boys are corrupted through the video games that they play and have no idea of what girls can really do and discriminate them. Beasley and Standley pointed out that the strong sexual messages that female characters in video games send to their players can have a serious effect on the actual attitudes about women that those players hold and therefore men hold a corrupted viewpoint on these women gamers.

Violent games are the one causing corruption in the youth today and the innocence are growing up in a period of time where videogames are causing many problems. Parents have to guide their children to not follow the social norm and defy against some rules. Weapons and gender discrimination can both hurt a person tremendously both physically and mentally. Although kids love videogames, to stop this from further corruption there should be a time limit to gaming and the type of genre the kids play.