Uncensored media considered harmless

By Jamie McCarthy

After watching the second of last fall's presidential debates, I realized that the word "Internet" was uttered precisely once. I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What now-President Bush failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen - the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment - have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."

- George W. Bush
Presidential debate, Oct 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a *4% increase* from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data on the Internet; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the Corn III, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released in October, takes over as the most violent game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard 3 are released.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, Crow II, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, Quake II is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream 2 are released in theaters.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon 4, Saving Private Ryan, American History X, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Check out these US Department of Justice graphs:

We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.

The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.

The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

A few months back, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30 Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

Sources:

1. www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/viotrd.txt
2. www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cvict_c.htm
3. www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/iscs99.txt
4. ojjdp.ncjrs.org/ojstatbb/index.html
5. ojjdp.ncjrs.org/ojstatbb/OFFENDERS.html
6. ojjdp.ncjrs.org/facts/facts.html
7. www.fbi.gov/ucr.htm
8. www.bluesnews.com/guide/fps.htm
9. www.crime.org
10. www.poynter.org/research/biblio/bib_crime.htm

This article originally appeared on Slashdot.org, a geeky web site Jamie contributes to.