What has the world come to these days? It often seems like everywhere one looks, an act of violence is taking place. We see it in the streets, back alleys of cities, schools, and even in the home, not only where it is taking place but also where it can be seen on various forms of media, such as television, movies and video games. Violence in these various forms of the media

often leads to an increase in aggressiveness and can sometimes lead juveniles to commit violent crimes. By constantly viewing these acts of violence, children and adolescents may become less sensitive to the pain and suffering of others, fearful of the world around them, and be more likely to behave in aggressive ways toward others (Murray).

When it comes to violence on television, most of the research has been done on children because they are considered most susceptible (Leland 46). These days, kids are learning things not only from their parents but also from that big glowing box that tends to occupy them when the parents are not around. John Leland of Newsweek magazine states, "Psychologists have used four theories of learning to describe how TV violence may influence kids: they learn t

Here's a movie Hollywood doesn't want you to see: the daughter of a judge from a politically prominent family runs off with her ne'er-do-well boyfriend. They drop LSD and watch, over and over, the ultraviolent Oliver Stone movie Natural Born Killers, about a young couple who takes drugs and kill people for pleasure. (42)

A very convincing argument for the theory that violent video games teach violent behavior comes from Lieutenant Colonel David Grossman who specialized as a "killologist" for the United States Military (Grossman 110). Grossman argues:

According to John Langone, "For some, television at its worst, [sic] is an assault on a child's mind, an insidious influence that upsets moral balance and makes a child prone to aggressive behavior as it warps his or her perception of the real world. Others see television as an unhealthy intrusion into a child's learning process, substituting easy pictures for the discipline of reading and concentrating and transforming the young viewer into a hypnotized nonthinker" (48). When a child is not able to think or reason, it is possible that he will not do well in school, and his whole future may be at stake.

Violence in movies is just as bad, and sometimes worse, than violence on television and has been proven to have the same effect. An article entitled "Can Pistols Get Smarter?" in an August issue of Newsweek magazine reads:

The explosion of video games affects many homes around the world, and evidence is mounting that the most popular games are found to be more violent and contain more aggressiveness. In 1995, a study was done to find the top thirty-three games sold by Sega and Nintendo (Hae-Jung Song 102). Eighty percent of these games featured aggressiveness or violence and in twenty-one percent, the violence was directed toward women (Hae-Jung Song 102). Also, another survey found that violence was a theme in forty of the forty-seven top rated Nintendo games, which means that one of four boys in the United States plays an action or combat game like Doom or Duke Nukem (Hae-Jung Song 102).

This is a frightening thought, yet children are exposed to this everyday.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Hae-Jung Song, Born Killers, Michael Carnealfired, John Langone, Accessible Children, Television Children, Characters It's, DD Buchman, Military Grossman, Harris Klebold, video games, hae-jung song, hae-jung song 102, song 102, violence television, television violence, various forms media, television affect, various forms, learned behavior, violent video games, forms media, natural born killers, movie natural born, child's mind,
Approximate Word count = 2202
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)