Legislation to regulate the sales of video games is being attempted across the country. Every state that has enacted such laws has had them ruled unconstitutional — yet Massachusetts is trying their hand next. Boston Mayer Menino has enlisted the aid of attorney Jack Thompson, who has attacked the gaming industry with such unrestrained, illogical zeal that he was found in contempt of the Florida court. As various experts lob conflicting reports on the consequences of and solutions to youth exposure to violent media, it is important to view this current threat as the latest manifestation of a moral panic.

"Moral panic" is a term coined by Stanley Cohen, a professor of sociology at Britain's University of Essex in the 1960s. A moral panic is the process in which individuals receive a group stereotype they did not have before, being described with blanket statements and exaggerated reports. Leaders in the community address the group from a supposed moral high ground, "treating" the panic with solutions that more often than not reinforce the stereotype and fail to produce any real resolution. The stereotype eventually fades of its own volition when the stereotyped behavior and the response to it change and are replaced by a new panic that is a variation on the original. Moral panics and those involved in such do not necessarily define the "true" cause or nature of the panic or deviancy, but more how the subject is represented in the media.

An early example of a moral panic occurred with the appearance of comic books in the 1940s, which provided teenagers with a dangerous world into which to escape, just as their fathers had left to go to war. Crime comics, like today's video games, depicted dark and gritty injustices, representing a violation of morals and values that our country had just defended in war. Soon, comic books were decried by psychologist Frederic Wertham in his book Seduction of the Innocent, banned by retailers seeking the approval of the Catholic Church's National Organization for Decent Literature, and burned in the streets by parents fulfilling their roles as moral guardians.

Children found another form of escape with the arrival of Dungeons and Dragons. In the mid-'80s, Patricia Pulling formed Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons (BADD) and sued the manufacturer of D&D after her son committed suicide, supposedly in response to a curse placed upon his D&D character. Suddenly, D&D was not a game where players escaped into fantasy, but where fantasy invaded reality. By creating a virtual environment where actions have no consequences, gamers were allowed to remove their inhibitions against criminal behavior — a tendency that supposedly bled into their real lives. Schools banned the game, religious leaders linked the game's black magic to Satanism, and police investigations identified D&D as causal. At this time, the annual suicide rate was 12 per 100,000. No reporter pointed out that this meant there should've been 360 D&D-related suicides — not the 28 that were reported.

In the wake of Columbine, the media have declared video games to be our children's latest satanic lure. In this tragedy's aftershock, video games were portrayed as the fantasy that Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris turned into a nightmarish reality. But traits these teenagers exhibited were evident in youth of previous decades. In response to D&D, BADD's profile of kids headed for involvement with Satanism described them as rebellious, intelligent loners with low self-esteem. Likewise, in the wake of Columbine, a psychological profile released by the FBI used similar characteristics to identify "potentially violent or dangerous students." Yet many young adults are intelligent, and rebelliousness is a hallmark of adolescence. The Surgeon General's report on the effects of media violence on children lacked wide coverage, as the report ranked video games as the tenth most significant factor, behind such factors as poor upbringing and violent parents, poverty, substance abuse, and natural aggressive tendencies.

Moral panics often originate from parents and community leaders wishing to protect their children. However, moral panics occur before definitive research can be performed and evidence reported on what truly does or does not cause youth violence. For a journalistic medium to examine or support the theories for delinquency such as those proposed by the Senate or the Surgeon General would be threatening to parents, society, and even the medium itself.

One step toward the preclusion of moral panics would be the desegregation of media. Few mass media outlets make an effort to portray video games, gamers or gaming culture except in a negative light associated with juvenile delinquency. Integrating content and audiences across media would provide youth culture with more direct representation by allowing participants an equal voice. By improving communication among generations and making youth culture better known and thus less feared, society would be able to develop a more informed opinion and a productive course of action. o

Ken Gagne is formerly a teacher of tech writing and film studies at Mass. Academy in Worcester, and is currently an online editor at Computerworld magazine in Framingham. he runs the video game Web site Gamebits.net and the film site Showbits.net.Comments? E-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .