Ways to end the culture of violence

When I was in elementary school, I had a radio series action hero. It was the do-gooding masked Lone Ranger bringing justice to a lawless Wild West.

The bad guys were defeated and he left his calling card: a silver bullet. Radio let me imagine what he looked like and picture the events in my mind. Yes, there were gunfights, but with six shooters, rifles, or a shotgun like my grandfather taught me to fire. Violence conveyed by radio did not show pain, agony of death, and blood. Comic books were the only visual pictures and cartooning kept the violence in the realm of fiction for young, impressionable minds.

What we see, hear, and read as children are large factors in shaping adult lives. Violent modern media glorifies the shooter and teaches young people that violence is the right way to gain power, resolve conflicts, or settle grievances, instead of negotiation and peaceful means. But America is no longer the Wild West.

Seeing violence on TV and movies is worth a thousand words. Being able to participate in violent video games is a whole new level. Especially troubling are video games that put the players' hands on the trigger of the same weapons used by our troops.

Violent media is also desensitizing. The remake of comic book heroes ... from Spiderman to Superman are masked or costumed do-gooders. But agony of death is shown in vivid color, and both heroes and villains are the perpetrators of insensitive violence, using weapons of nearly unlimited bullets, never having to pause to reload.

I stopped toting up body counts in these movies and convinced myself the carnage was only a movie. I noticed, though, that eventually the shock of bloodshed turned to numbness. While intended as entertainment, the U.S. military has used video games to desensitize soldiers to violence and reduce empathy toward their targets. Studies that show such games also desensitize civilians.

There are others with twisted minds who see villains as heroes. The bad guys become their inspiration and instructors. There is a reason the Aurora movie theater shooter was dressed as The Joker.

While rating systems give parents the knowledge to keep violent media away from impressionable 10-year-olds, there are parents who act as straw buyers and buy media rated for 17-year-olds-plus for their youngsters.

The problem with the National Rifle Association's position of having armed, trained guards in schools is that the organization treated it as a silver bullet. There are so many other factors at play: lack of mental health services, easy access to military style weapons, and violent modern media. The NRA gave only lip service to some , while ignoring the access issue.

What the NRA could do is to lead a campaign for parents to keep M rated video games out of the hands of those under 17 and to educate adults if they fear their child is potentially violent, to remove weapons from their homes. Both ready availability of weapons of war and violent video games appeared to have played roles in Sandy Hook. We adults, including NRA members, could also press government to fund mental health services.

Changing media culture is also not a silver bullet, but it can help. Government censorship is an anathema to our democratic society so the burden falls mostly on those who produce media. But media that does not police itself can be influenced by its audience, too. Adults themselves can take away their profits by not watching or spending money for uber violent films, games, and TV shows and by restricting what media their children are seeing and playing. We can personally take the pledge to boycott violent media. That is one message the entertainment industry will heed.

This is my column in the Sky Hi Daily News this week.

Culture of violence can be curbed by adults boycotting violent media

When I was a first grader, and even until I was in fourth grade, I had a superhero.  He was the Lone Ranger.  It was not only that he had a wise Native American sidekick, or that he rode a beautiful white horse , but that in the days before TV, radio let me imagine what he looked like without the visualization of what happened.  In my later years, I realized what an influence he was in developing my own set of ethics.  He rode around Texas doing good; the only weapon he used was a six shooter  and his calling card was a silver bullet .  He planted two other lessons in my young brain:  1) individuals acting alone can also do powerfully good things; 2) the heroes are those who do not take credit for their good deeds . (“Who was that masked man” was another iconic phrase the emerged from radio series.)    This was the Wild West I loved.  A reader of my blog  from  Europe asked when the US would stop being the Wild West…but there are two sides of the wild west in a lawless community: the Lone Ranger and Jesse James  who killed to  commit crimes.  I understand there is another  superhero movie in the works: the hero is the Lone Ranger.  I hope the newest version does not lose sight of the original spirit of that old radio series and that the violence, what little of it there was, is not made into gory visuals.

In order to keep up with the  times of   “Now”, I have gone to recent movies featuring the remake of other heroes…from Spiderman to Superman,  who also were popular in the days of radio and comic books. They  too hide behind costumes that keep them anonymous,  but their methods of saving humanity are violent and bloody.  I have stopped  making conscious body counts  and convinced myself the carnage was fantasy and it was only a movie so  I could still sit back and enjoy the adrenaline rush the fast action brought.  The heroes, most of them, are still saving the damsel in distress or society from an ogre, but after a few minutes the shock of the  bloodshed so graphically displayed  turns to numbness. . 

I have peered over the shoulder of my grandson, an ace player of international standing of on line video  games. His are set in fantasy of medieval times  using weapons of that era.  But there are other games that arm the player with deadly modern weapons of war to kill.  My understanding is that the military uses games like these to desensitized troops, making it easier for them to take lives in combat.   We are conditioning our youths to do likewise and those who already have psychological problems can act them out.

We are seeing the fruits of our media. Controlling  this is indeed a problem  in our land of protection of the first amendment.  We can offer alternative programs such as those geared for the young on PBS and we can provide a parental guidance rating system, but it is  not enough.  The quandary becomes who can do more and who should do more.  Changing the media culture is not a silver bullet, but it can help. Availability of weapons and access to mental health are also parts  of the solution.  Government censorship is an anathema to our democratic society so the burden falls on those who produce modern media and their willingness to forgo the profits that violent films, video games and TV bring  them.  But the burden falls ultimately on adults  to take away their profits by not spending money on them for their own pleasure  and/or firmly monitoring and governing what media  their children are seeing and playing .