Your Thoughts on anti-video game parents?

Some parents seem to be completely against video games, others seem like they are trying to shield their kids (maybe a little too much) from violence, blood, guts/gore.

What are your thoughts?

I think the ones that are completely anti-video game are going too far, not all games are created the same, in fact many are made to be completely kid/family friendly (like basically every "typical" Nintendo game franchise like Mario Bros, Yoshi, etc; which at worst have very unrealistic cartoon violence).

When it comes to the more realistic ones though, I could see a point to keeping young kids away from those; but its probably worse to try to always shield them than to eventually let them move on to more "adult" games.

I remember watching one show where a teenager tried to kill both his parents because they kept him from playing Halo 3, which he only started playing after he got injured playing (American) Football and could not play sports.

After all most parents want their kids to eventually be able to move out and live on their own; unless they want to keep their kid in a giant plastic bubble living at home like Bubble-Boy.

Completely anti is not good imho, they just become forbidden fruit and all the more desirable,,,

Maxx said:

I think parents need to be careful about the amount of screen time kids are getting, whether its phone, games or TV. Physical activity, outside time and socializing with real people are important.

Click to expand...

Agreed, but the topic at hand is more the parents that just have some big grudge against video games.

They seem to have the opinion that video games from people to be killers or something, if that were true people would be getting shot dead like 1000x more frequently worldwide.

Those are the kind who often hate PnP RPGs as well.

I was lucky in that my parents were GIANT NERDS and not only were fine with video games, but also played them. It's s pastime that keeps you from getting into trouble and can be used to bond.

I think anti video game are largely overprotective and buy into the false narrative that they cause violence.

I always used then to blow off steam — I had an anger management issue in my teens that made gaming therapeutic.

I grew up not liking video games that much, but my brother played them a lot. Our mother didn't try to restrict the types of games we had - we were pretty responsible children - but she did restrict the time we were allowed to play. All the consoles were kept in a room that could be locked, so that was pretty easy.

I think it is good for parents to have some kind of control. Like I said, we were pretty free to choose our games, but I think if we had chosen anything too violent, our mother would have interfered, and rightfully so. In my opinion, my brother still played too much, but his grades and social life were fine, so I guess it's okay...

Anyway, completely prohibiting video games makes no sense, restricting screen time and maybe checking that everything is age-appropriate is good, not caring at all and giving kids free reign is bad. Kids need more than one hobby, and no matter how much they might insist that violence doesn't bother them, on a subconscious level it most likely does.