Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id XAA16327 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Mon, 15 Apr 2002 23:33:55 +0100 X-Originating-IP: [209.240.222.132] From: "Scott Chase" <ecphoric@hotmail.com> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: RE: media violence report in Science Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 18:27:50 -0400 Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed Message-ID: <F169Oe6hLT2ROONwIid0000140b@hotmail.com> X-OriginalArrivalTime: 15 Apr 2002 22:27:51.0163 (UTC) FILETIME=[C752ACB0:01C1E4CC] Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>From: Vincent Campbell <v.p.campbell@stir.ac.uk>
>Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
>To: "'memetics@mmu.ac.uk'" <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
>Subject: RE: media violence report in Science
>Date: Mon, 15 Apr 2002 13:59:55 +0100
>
> Sorry to butt in. Still playing catch-up.
>
> <Up until quite recently societies have been quite violent on a day
>to day
> > basis. In the late 19C and 20C the advent of law and order has generally
> > made living a lot safer, and people are not exposed to violence. With
>the
> > advent of the visual image you could be introducing children to a
> > predisposed propensity to violence that ocurs in the presence of certain
> > stimuli.>
> >
> You could, but since one can't even predict whether exposure to
>real/actualy violence will lead individuals to commit violence, how could
>mediated violence do so? Besides the point about pre-media societies being
>violent, indeed more violent than contemporary society is an argument
>against media causing violence- indeed, it's an argument for the
>diametrically opposite view, the catharsis view that media violence sates
>human's desire for violence and thus stops us doing it. (I don't really
>buy
>that either, as it still suffers from a simple behavioural effects model,
>but there you go).
>
> <Remember that in films, shoot 'em up games etc the victims and
>protagonists
> > turn up again. Either the game gets replayed or the actors make another
> > film.>
> >
> But studies of children show that kids, even quite young kids are
>able to recognise this (e.g. the work of David Buckingham).
>
> <Also, the military is quite good at conditioning people to do
>amazingly
> > dangerous things. If soldiers can be conditioned why are children
>immune?>
> >
> Because soldiers (and kids in classrooms, say) have their
>environments physically manipulated by other human beings. A recruit can't
>turn the drill instructor off, but a kid (or adult) can turn the TV off, or
>walk away. Also teachers and drill instructors are persistently and
>deliberately trying to impart particular ideas and behaviour into their
>respective audiences, audience who are at least supposed to be motivated
>(by
>other social pressures, like family etc.) to pay attention and do what
>they're told. None of that is true for the media- advertising is
>increasingly a competition for attention the teacher should have the
>child's
>undivided attention. Conditioning via the TV, or other media source, just
>doesn't wash.
>
>
Thoe who eneter the military, especially those who subsequently attempt to
become members of special forces, are kinda pre-disposed to that sort of
mindset, so "conditioning" is more like "singing to the choir". If the
recruit or special forces candidate weren't prediposed to that ort of
training they would likely wash out. I just watched a program(me) on the US
Army Rangers gruelling training regimen and can't quite think that some
greenhorn without a genereal idea of what they were geting themselves into
would even attempt that sort of thing. Of those predisposed and "gung ho"
enough to try, not so many succeed.
In elite combat units like Rangers, Navy Seals or British S.A.S. (?), if you
aren't cut out for that sort of thing to begin with, you probably won't make
the grade. And if you decide to go that route, you best learn all you can,
however brutal, lest you get caught in a serious bind during a real combat
mission. That's where the "conditioning" will *hopefully* pay off.
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