, my parents would have been annoyed as hell if I woke up at 6 AM fully dressed and started building magnetic towers and doing arts and crafts. They were okay with me waking up at 9 to watch cartoons but as long as it wasn't loud enough to wake them up before 11. And if video games meant they could sit and do their check book and cook dinner without being annoyed or pestered then video games were the holy grail of parenting.
More than anything, at least when I grew up, video games taught me more than magnetic blocks or crafts could. I forget what television show it was, but there was this one parent who said "you know, if you pay attention, video games can teach you a lot" and it's
ing true. Some 10 year old playing through Shining Force and Phantasy Star, memorizing combos and specal moves in Street Fighter, doing Sonic levels in under 4 minutes with 200 plus rings, has a lot more skills than these fancy pants Hobby Lobby loving brats.
I'm just saying: the analytical skills, memory workouts, thought processes, reflexes, and just plain reading and thinking that video games [at least the good ones] put you through can't be found in most entertainment media. Some kids won't pick up a book for even a second but they'll read through an entire RPG? That's got to mean something. Even if some people say, "well, he could have the presidents and the states memorized instead of the Pokeman", I'd like to see you try to memorize over 150 monsters, their moves, their best strategies, and where to find them. Once that kid finds something else he likes, he'll pick it up just as easily too, and who is to say that something else isn't math or science or music or something of real benefit to society
More than anything, on a purely instinctual level, these parents are just plain weird. They remind me of the borg, or a beehive, or some sort of unified collective with the express purpose of destroying all civilization. Who cleans up that
ing magnetic tower?! What games do they invent?! You know who invents games and makes up stories to pass the time? Crazy people in prison: the
ing Count of Monte Cristo holed up in chateau dif counting the bricks in his cell, writing catchy catch phrases, and giving the bricks names!
Of course, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt: video games today aren't the same games I grew up with. Back then you could actually learn something through the games, the games actually tested you and made you a better person, now the games are all just mindless fluff for the express purpose of meaningless entertainment. Parents worry about 9 year olds playing "violent video games"?! I'd worry about them playing SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS THE MOVIE and KIMPOSSIBLE SECRET MISSIONS.
