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Media violence does not cause children to be violent. If a child is angry, violent movies, television shows, and negative lyrics in music merely add fuel to an already burning fire. A violent world contributes to violent children, but it is not the cause. That is not to say that television, movies, music, and video games do not hold a tremendous power to influence. They do, and in that respect, they can share the blame, but we must not forget the deeper cause of violent children, which is an increasing lack of nurturing adult involvement. It is also true that while guns facilitate the act of killing, guns do not create the mindset for the action. A recent article in The Washington Post, Lawrence Douglas sarcastically shares his experiences and opinions about the popular violent movie “The Matrix.” Douglas first relates how watching the movie seemed to be like watching a dramatization of the killings that occurred at Columbine High School. Douglas continues to say that the killings were caused by the harmful and violent images of movies like “The Matrix” (Douglas). However, this assumption of causation is not viable. Like Douglas, many people agree that the violent images portrayed by the media causes violent behaviors in our society, but it is not the only cause. Aggressive kids who turn into aggressive adults like aggressive media but this is only a correlation not proof of causation (Siano). Without question, media violence contributes to the breakdown of inhibitions. The repetition of killing seen on television and in movies, desensitizes our youth, and increases the likelihood that someone will gravitate towards a gun to settle a conflict. However, the person has to have a pre-disposition to kill. The issue at hand, which cannot be over-emphasized enough, is that people are raising children to have such a disposition. Murderers are trained. Why Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold plotted, and then stormed Columbine High School with an arsenal of homemade bombs and guns, remains a mystery. The media asks, was the lack of parental involvement the reason, or should the blame fall on our violent culture? What about the effects of the large numbers of offensive computer games, TV shows, movies and CDs which are filled with death and murder themes in the marketplace?
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