Not sure how much I can agree with that. While I recongnize that some unscrupulous assholes out there prey on children, I don't think myself I would shelter my kids like that. At the least it would be nice if online games had "kiddie servers" or something where all the 12 and under can go. But seriously, what's the worst that can happen to a child in a game? If you teach your kids right they shouldn't have a problem with pedophiles or whatever. So what, they get owned real bad and start crying? They'll get the same kind of bullying out on the playground, no difference as far as I can see. When I was a kid if I got my ass kicked at basketball real hard, I would either not play, or play my ass off next time. The kid needs to learn that lesson, that he's not always going to win at everything. Really I can see, maybe under 10 is a bit too young... but at say middle school they should be old enough to know right from wrong, or not to trust creepy people they talk to online and not to go meet them at airports or whatever. Really this is no different to me than not letting a kid see a scary movie or whatever. My take is if you teach your child not to be a dumbass then he won't make dumbass decisions and get himself kidnapped. just my 2 cents...
That was me. And the reason I said that was not about pedophiles or anything like that. From what I've seen or rather heard is kids develop an attitude of I can say whatever I want, and they will hear all kinds of things, atleast on Xbox Live. I don't know how much you have played on Xbox Live but if you have had the experience I have and listened to some of the things people say on it I can't see letting your child communicate with anyone you did not know personally. If your kid's Xbox was setup so they could only communicate with people like other kids who's parents you'd actually talked to or something, then I could see letting them play online and talk to those people. But talking to any stranger on Live, bad idea. Also, age in my opinion is a key factor. When a child turns say 16, I would not see any reason by then to restrict them from playing online and talking to whoever and hearing all the BS. But 7? 10? 12? No way.
From what little I've seen of those games, 7 year olds shouldn't be playing them at all (online or off). Regardless of how good of a parent you are (I'm awesome!) children immitate everything they fucking see until a certain level of maturity. Most kids at 7 haven't hit it yet, I'm sure. On that note, I think anyting gun-related is out of the question until they realize exactly what they're pretending to do.
Really I haven't heard anything on Live that I haven't heard on a playground as a kid, that includes the excessive racism and all the other assholetry. Maybe 10 is too young, but by 12 your kid should be smart enough to know it's all shit talking.
Really you heard all that on the playground as a kid? Maybe it has to do with where you grew up. Around here atleast in my time, that sort of talk was not something younger kids did. Probably not until into High School would you hear kids start saying shit like that. GP, guns and kids I agree is a tough subject. But atleast when I was growing up it wasn't uncommon at all to play with friends and mimic guns or use toy guns. No one I know ever really got shot. Now games like Call of Duty, I highly doubt that many kids have access to the sorts of weapons you see in those games. So I don't really see how kids imitating it hurts anyone. Really you should have control over whether or not your kid has access to guns. When I was growing up there were guns in the house, but they were locked up and kept somewhere we were not supposed to be anyway. The only thing we might have been able to get our hands on would have been a shotgun which is awfully heavy and large for a child plus if you didn't keep a round in the chamber the child may never realize how to rack one in (pump action). I really think you should explain to your kids about guns atleast somewhat. Just like alot of other things like sex, you should inform them, not leave them to themselves and their friends to figure things out.
I started hearing stuff like that around the 4th grade. That's when I started to think for myself and stop being a follower. I think the difference between older people like us growing up playing games from an early age and kids in modern times is that games weren't trying to be simulations of partial real life. Every gun in call of duty is based of a real life counterpart with how it performs and acts in real life , recreated in the game. (now this is a good thing on knowing the characteristics of the weapons and how to use them in the proper situations, but mainly for adults. Kids don't have a clue about that) Back in the day our games were more like saturday morning cartoons. I think this sums it up. Instill moral values in your children, Let them choose to make their own choices but make sure they understand and think of the consequences can be.
Same here, but w/ games it's a bit different. They've reached a level of realism, and the bullets, while make believe, are now visually reassuring. Playing guns w/ kids in the neighborhood is different, me thinks. Those kind, yes. But being from Texas, I think everyone I knew had a rifle in their house, and not all the parents locked them up, unfortunately. I have a gun-totting friend (big time) who plays some of these games on the 360 w/ his son, who's like 10 or 11. His wife busts his balls, since the games are so real. The kids have learned how to use guns since they were young, but as a mom, you still worry. Still: children are extremely impressionable. I know you hear that, but until you watch your own child see something on TV and do the exact fucking thing you don't really stop to think about it so much. I'm not one of these holier than thou tree huggers, but I'm still a tree hugger. I have no plans to ever teach my son how to use a gun safely, b/c I won't teach him how to use one at all. I'm hoping he yearns to play Dodonpachi and not Call of Duty but at some point, I might have to sit him down and talk to him. There's also the issue of the blood and exploding heads and whatnot, but that's for another thread. My point was that this is impossible to do with most children at age 7. Everyone's mileage will vary, but I'm a firm believer that most people are idiots. About half of them snap out it around 16-18 or so, then about 10% of those sometime in college. The rest are doomed to show up on the news and www.peopleofwalmart.com. I know that's a negative outlook, but hey, am I that far off?
I have seen exactly what you mean with kids and TV. While I don't recall myself ever acting that way as a kid I have seen other people's kids act exactly that way. But still I'd say it's unlikely a kid playing a game like CoD would attempt to emulate that but still could be possible. I remember some TV show where they put it to the test with a parent's permission. They let some CoD playing 12 year old have a chance at shooting an AR15 and after shooting it once he didn't want to anymore and went to cry to his mommy about it.
I don't think it's likely. But I do think it's possible...especially if a kid has the proverbial chip on shoulder. Since I think most games in that genre are meh at best, I'm actually more worried about the kid playing drab than anything.
Yeah, but even still your child should be able to tell the difference between fantasy and reality. When I was growing up my dad always had guns around the house (He was a cop for 30 years after all.) Yeah we didn't have Halo or whatever, but there were plenty of violent games and movies in the 80s. Anyone remember Rambo? Me and my friends used to all play with pretend/toy guns, all kids do. But at no time whatsoever did I even think of picking up one of my Dad's guns, becasue he instilled plenty of fear and the "This is not a toy" speech. So some kid picks up his uncle's guns and goes and shoots up his school, who's fault is that? Is that Grand Theft Auto's fault, or the kids' uncle for not instilling that discipline in the first place? I think too many people today are too quick to blame outside forces for shit they should be taking responsibility for.
Go back to my statement about most people being idiots. For reals... it explains a LOT of problems with the world today.
As a kid, I was around guns ALL the time. My dad was in the military, my best friends dads were in the military. But it was explained at an early age - GUNS. KILL. PEOPLE. That's why they were made. That's the SOLE purpose of the gun. TO KILL PEOPLE. I was taught how to handle a gun, I was taught gun safety. It's better a child KNOWS everything about a gun, because then they WON'T fuck with one. They KNOW the consequences. Gun safety is so drilled into my memory with the exception of during Airsoft games (or when just doing pain tests like in Graciano1337's apartment lol) my BB guns for christ sake are kept unloaded, magazine out, safety on, and always pointed in a safe direction unless intending to fire. Also finger never on the trigger until ready to fire.
That's not true. Guns do not kill people. People kill people. I've sat down and watched a gun for a long period of time and not once did it attempt to kill me. I even taunted it, still nothing. Obviously guns are very safe to have around when in responsible hands. But in the hands of an idiot they can be quite deadly.
Guns were made for the sole purpose of killing. Either for food, or to eliminate. but yeah, back on TOPIC. My brother (and my neighbors) are 16 years old and have grown to apprciate the older games. I really think it's who you're around. a lot of people don't view video games in teh same way as movies - while many movies are classics instantly if they're good, good games are strictly contemporary.
This is true. Totally. Whether guns kill people or people kill people with guns, the gun was invented for no other reason than to take life. Whether you use it for that today is a different thread. The problem, I will reiterate, is that not all parent's are smart enough to teach their kids about guns and ARE stupid enough to leave them around the house.
