Gaming and Violence

There will probably always be a large group of "book burners" in the United States who would rather attack free speech than insist parents be responsible for their children.  There is also an increasing pressure on society in general to care for the increasing population of children who have been left to run wild in the street due to lack of parental guidance.  It puts us all in a difficult spot.  Violence is increasing amongst the youth in our society and many people are quick to blame everyone but parents. 

I sincerely doubt that there is any connection between violent behavior in children and video games as long as there is an alternate source of experiences for the child outside of the games they play.  In other words, I believe the average child can get away with playing video games for 8 or 9 hours a day, as long as the rest of the day entails going to school, talking to friends and family, and doing other constructive events.  Other real events outside of the so called "reality" of video games will contradict the things a child sees in those games, and the child will come to see reality as it is.  This is why good parents and strong family are so important.  Strong parental guidance is needed to (1) provide the child with notions of true reality, and (2) discipline the child to spend more time in that true reality.  Left to their own, many children will plant themselves in front of a video game for hours, sacrificing sleep, and living off a diet of stale chips.  (If this sounds too specific it is because I am describing my little brother.) 

We didn't spend much time talking about the positive aspects of video games.  I once saw a t-shirt in the mall that read, "Everything I know I learned from video games."  My little brother Bart, embodies this expression.  At 15 years old he writes computer programs, builds web sites, and even builds computers.  Bart got into online gaming at age ten, and from there he learned most of what he knows from talking to other people online, especially from the people he games with.  Most likely he will start at Clackamas Community College in a couple years, and breeze through computer classes in no time.  Then he will most likely find a great high paying job designing video games, and if he's really lucky by that time the "book burners" will have failed to impose regulations on technology once again.

Identity: Option 1

In psychology, we learned that almost everyone adjusts their actions and behaviors according to the present company surrounding them.  For instance, people will tend to behave differently around their parents than they would act around their friends.  Although this phenomenon is not completely true for all people all the time, it is still nontheless a bit disturbing.  For if we change our behavior for different situations, what is our true identity?  Or do we even have one?

Personally I think identity is not something that can be easily defined because identities are usually dynamic.  Unless we are locked away in a cave somewhere, our identities change with the increase of knowledge and experience throughout life.

Ideally we should all view identity as something specific and individual in nature.  Unfortunately, social and cultural identities often influence or dominate our individual identities.  It almost seems that our minds are not capable of imagining billions of people with completely different identities, so as a society we constuct identity catagories so people will know where they belong.  We observe the more noticable differences between people to separate ourselves into generalized groupings.

High school is probably the best place to observe society's identity segregation.  My 15 year old brother recently relayed to me the current identity groups at his high school.  The groups from my high school days are still there; nerds, preps, gangsters, hicks, stoners, ect.  But there were more on my little brother's list.  I can't seem to remember any of the names he called them, but the list was definetely longer.

The oddities of identity classification can also be seen in downtown Portland at night.  The punk scene is the best example.  I always thought punk was supposed to be about non-conformity.  Sure the punk style dress doesn't exactly conform to the average dress of today.  But there seems to be extreme pressure in punk circles to conform to another "punk standard" style.  In many ways, conforming to the "punk style" seems much more difficult than conforming to daily standards of dress and appearance.  Really, where does a guy find the time to put on makeup, spike his hair, and put all that jewelry on?  And as the band "Cake" has so accurately put it, "How do they afford their rock-and-roll lifestyles?" Personally I would think that the most sincere non-conformist movement would be more utilitarian in nature.

There is a difference between our identities and they way we choose to represent our identities depending on our audiences.  And maybe it is true that we are actors much of the time.  Personally I go by the old proverb: As a man thinks, so he is.  I believe we can shape our identities by choosing some of our circumstances and believing that we can change.  We can change our personalities by choosing who we associate with.  We can change our bad habits by choosing which places we frequent.  We are actors but we are still in control.       

Cyberfeminism and Artificial Life

Fear of artificial life and artificial intelligence is a common theme in entertainment creations today. And a common theme in education today is the use of entertainment devices, such as movies, to compare and contrast reality. I do not agree that media works are a great representation of reality, and they are not meant to be either. However, the fear of AI themes in movies today, in my mind, is a good thing. If we can imagine and calculate the potential problems with AI, then we might be able to devise ways of avoiding those problems. The movies we watch seem to overlook this point. In the movies, when the machines become self aware, the first thing they do is run out and start destroying things. Of all the choices a machine may have after gaining consciousness, why would it run out kill everyone? Machines and artificial life have no power over humans unless we give it to them. It is therefore unrealistic to think that humans will create artificial life or artificial intelligence without taking some precautionary measures to protect the human race.

There seems to be another fear of the Internet as well. People seem to think that everyone is going to go virtual one day. That we will have no more interest in reality as we know it. We fear things like "internet agents" who might evolve with the user in cyberspace. Why is this something to fear? We don't live in cyberspace. Cyberspace is only a place we go sometimes. It's just a temporary reality of sorts. People seem to think that we are going to become trapped in cyberspace with no will to come and go as we please. Perhaps someday cyberspace will appear identical to the real world. But it is unrealistic to think that people will not be interested in reality and that everyone will ultimately flock to cyberspace.

I also don't fear attempts to create artificial life on a biological level. I don't have a rational explanation for why, I just believe that humans will never figure out how to bring forth something out of nothing. Currently we have the technology to take pieces of things and put them together to make other things. But as far as I know, we can't really "create" anything.

Yes there may be some things to fear from the mixing of machines with man on a biological level to creat cyborgs. Possible the technology could be abused. However, the technology could be used for good as well. Imagine if someday our educations come on computer chips that get downloaded by our brains and stored in our memory, similar to the "Matrix" learning simulators. Imagine the time this would save. Also most people these days seem to believe that education will solve many of the world's problems. Imagine if we could educate all the people of the world quickly and efficiently at the same level. Of course this begs the question, can we really learn anything without having the experiences to go with it?

Midterm Summary

I chose the Whiteness Online option for my Midterm paper:

I entitled my paper "Mythical Whiteness" Online. Essentially I challenged the idea of "whiteness" as being a generalized term that does not really have a meaning. I also challenged our notions of words like diversity and multiculturalism. Basically my thesis was this: We invent catagorial words like "whiteness" when we give special attention to special catagories of people, mainly minorities, in an attempt to be diverse or multicultural, because we do not know what to call the people who are not made special, labeled and put under the spotlight.

I analyzed the Washington State University web site to provide evidence for this phenomenon. I noticed how the web site was divided into different sections for different catagories of people. Examples were the African American section, the Native American section, the gay and lesbian sections, the Diversity section, and the Multicultural section. I wrote how these sections of the web site brought attention to minorities, which in my opinion makes the web site appear more segregated. The remaining areas of the web site not reserved for minorities and not labeled for a particular race or culture are therefore labeled as the "white" sections of the site. We don't know what to call the areas of the site not reserved for a particular race of people, so some automatically assume they are white, and the site is biased with "whiteness."

My strongest argument against this position was the analysis of the pictures throughout the site. At first glance, the site does appear to have more pictures of white people. However I discovered that the supposed "whiteness" section of the web site did always contain at least a couple pictures per page of minorities, whereas ironically, the diversity and muliticultural pages contained no pictures of white people. In my mind, this shows that people define the word diversity as "the including of minorities in a white world" rather than "the including of all races equally."

Most of the ideas in my paper I developed from thinking about our discussions in class. I didn't like how everyone seemed to buy into the "whiteness" theory. I also took some ideas from Virtual Inequality about class theory and thought about how the WSU web site might be received by people from different classes.

There will surely be refutations of my argument. Some will surely argure that minorities need special sections of the WSU web site reserved so they will get attention. Some will argue that because the population of WSU is predominately white, "whiteness" in the web site will be unavoidable because white people will be the largest audience for the site.

However, my conclusion is still the same. Separating people into catagories and giving certain people special attention causes division and not diversity. It also cause people to invent imaginary term like "whiteness."

Whiteness, Invisibility Dominant Culture:

I have had a reasonable amount of experience with the Internet and the world on the web. As it relates to RACE, I have never had feelings of "invisibility" or a lack of feeling "normal." I don't even think about race when I get on-line. The "diverse audience" in my mind is exactly that. How can I feel abnormal or invisible in such a diverse audience as the web? I'm not understanding this question. Are we suggesting that there is one general group of people out there that control the web and everything that is on it? That is surely not the case.

As far as technical issues go, yes there are times when people including myself can feel like we are out of the loop. However, this only depends on what aspect of the Internet we are viewing at the time. If I go to a web site about computer programming, I will probably feel "invisible" if the creators of the site are gearing the discussion towards a more technical audience.

It is my opinion that my race and whether or not I'm white has little to do with the web IN GENERAL. If I am a white supremesist and I go to a hate web site, I will probably feel like I am visible. If I am a japanese programmer and I go to a site about computer programs written in japanese, I will probably feel visible. Therefore I don't ever feel "invisible" on the web because I typically go to places where I know I'll "belong." When I was in the military, I spent three years in Italy. There were times at first when I felt like I didn't fit into the culture there. However I had to go there to feel that. The web is no different. How visible we feel on the web depends on where we go.

Brasher vs. Hate.com Video

Is Brasher's argument that the productivity of online religions are bunk simply because we have pinpointed one example of how so called "hate religions" break the trend of the typically good intentions of religious web sites?

I don't know if there is an argument here. For one I don't agree that these hate groups are religious. Maybe I need to look at the definitions of religion.

The definitions of religion according to Websters Dictionary are as follows:
1. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe.
2. A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship.
3. The life or condition of a person in a religious order.
4. A set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader.
5. A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion.

These "hate religions", as far as I can tell only seem to resemble religion with definition number 5. Perhaps definition 4 as well, but that is pushing it.

In my blog entitled "The Purpose of Religion" I questioned the sincerity of some religious individuals. I posed the question, "Do people choose a religion compatible with their actions?" In the case of the hate groups, there is a noticable lack of sincerity. Their "religion" isn't about a supernatural power, or a creator of the universe. There religion isn't about bringer people closer to a supreme being, or giving people hope. In other words, religion is simply a cover for these hate groups. As I have written before, religion is the scapegoat for the evil intentions of men.

I am guessing that Brasher does not approach this issue because these hate groups are extreme and should not be contrasted with the typical well meaning religious site. If there is one bond between all religions it is "The Golden Rule." Treat others as you wish to be treated. There is no concept of the Golden Rule in these hate sites.

If religious web sites are capable of fostering community awareness, then is would appear that a larger community of white supremist morons could develope. Yes the Internet could foster the growth of such groups. However, it is not the case that the Internet is only available to hate groups. It is available to everyone. If the hate movement is growing with the aid of the Internet, then so are the anti-hate movements. Things should balance themselves out.

One issue I didn't like about the video: The video seems to suggest that these hate groups are capable and have "the power" to broadcast directly into your home due to the innovations of the Internet. In this case, it's just another censorship issue. Nobody forces us to buy music with a parental advisory sticker on it, nobody forces us to view "The Vagina Dialogues" at a theatre in Portland, and nobody forces us to visit hate sites on the Internet. Why do we have to give these idiots a stage? The Internet is not guilty of providing these thugs with power; we are. Should a local tavern be considered guilty of serving alcohol because a few drunks may abuse it? Well, come to think of it, they are. Oh well.

The Purpose of Religion

Religion is a systematic means of organizing one's life into a routine that allows for contemplation within other areas of life. However, religion should be more than a way of life, a series of rules, or a simple routine. Worship of a higher being should be implied in religion, otherwise it is nothing more than a way of living.

From a cultural standpoint, what do religions do? Well, lots of things. Some give people meaning, a feeling of belonging, a few answers, security, and maybe even hope. Some provide people with a means of setting themselves apart from other members in society. In America, many religions focus on community living and can therefore be credited for bringing the American modern day dependent households together.

More important than the question of what religions do is the question of what religions do not do. For example, they don't start wars, but get blamed for doing so all the time. There are usually other economic issues or power struggles that exist as the root causes of war. But by questioning religious motivations in war, we must also question the motivations of religious people. Do people do things for the sake of their religion, or do they do the things they want and choose a religion in which their actions may be better justified? In this case, it could be said that religions also help people justify their actions.