In this chaotic and technology-driven world, kids may not ever have the childhood experience of playing freeze tag or hide and seek because video games have taken over, but that is not a bad thing. Many children spend many of their free time playing video games. Video games are the number one source of entertainment for numerous kids. As numerous games contain; blood and gore, intense violence, strong sexual content and use of drugs, it does not hurt kids on the long run. Violent video games can benefit you by enhancing your social skills, problem solving skills, and critical thinking skills.
Although many researchers state that video games are not harmful to children, many children have done vicious acts because of video games. Laura St John stated "Violent video games show kids how to express themselves physically in a violent way" (St John). From first hand experience, I have witnessed my younger brother get pushed around and instead of resolving the issue by telling an adult, he used a fighting attack used in a violent video game we play. My little brother has autism, which means he has no filter when he speaks, so he speaks without caring whether or not he will get in trouble or hurt someone. I regularly catch him saying phrases from many video games. He has gotten in trouble at school because he had told another student he was going to cut his head off. We often play video games like Grand Theft Auto and we come across times where the character says phrases that are intended to do a violent action. One time he screamed out in the bank, that he wanted to rob the bank. To kids like my brother, video game experiences feel very realistic. They are experiencing a first person action in the killing process. The experiences becomes stuck in their head, and at times they use those video game experiences in real life. Kids have a hard time knowing the line between the real world and the video game world.
