Grand Theft Auto's Detrimental Impact toward Gamers Essay

Grand Theft Auto's Detrimental Impact toward Gamers - Essay Example This paper has brought out the fact that incarceration is one of the major consequences for youth and young adults arrested for committing violent crimes. The violent crimes include murder, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault (Delgado, 2001, p. 3). This, however has not appeased society nor has it abated one's fears of crime and its circumstances, which games such as grand thief auto have contributed to. Much attention has been paid to the propitious drop in the nation's crime rates, and more specifically, the murder rate. An increased rate of incarceration is considered one of the key factors behind this drop, although a number of notable criminologists disagree. Incarceration is one of the major consequences for youth and young adults arrested for committing violent crimes such as murder, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault .(Delgado, 2001, p. 3) This decrease however has not appeased society nor has it abated one's fears of crime and its circumstances. Researchers continue to report that crimes are however densely populated in urban communities; and usually consist of black on black crimes. On the other hand, it is imperative that one accept that urban areas are not the only locations where crimes are committed. In fact, there are various types of crimes that continue to occur because of the violence in video games Since the early 1960s, research evidence has been accumulating that suggests that exposure to violence in television, movies, video games, cell phones, and on the Internet increases the risk of violent behavior on the viewer's part, just as growing up in an environment filled with real violence increases the risk of them behaving violently. In the current review this research evidence is critically assessed and the psychological theory that explains why exposure to violence has detrimental effects for both the short and long-term is elaborated. Finally the size of the "media violence effect" is compared with some other well-known threats to society to estimate how important a threat it should be considered (Huesmann). Evidence has shown that researchers examine the correlations between race and crime, as well as the discrimination that occurs when classification of crimes and its perpetrators come into account.(Knepper, 2000, p. 15) There is however not an objective definition of race given. Knepper continues to express that current statistical methods are not accurate nor due they portray the proper picture of current criminals and their circumstances. Knepper questions the idea of whether or not African Americans do in fact show a higher instance of criminality than others do, or are the statistics biased and skewed in nature. He concludes that there are currently four officials races used for classification: White, black, American Indian/Alaskan Native, and Asian and Pacific Islander and two official ethnic groups: Hispanic origin and not of Hispanic origin. This is also shown in the game Grand Thief Auto, which race is related to crime. Furthermore, it has been discussed that when it comes to crime certain racial groups are thought to commit certain crimes. From there, the death penalty is extremely racial because some people feel that individuals that are not of the white race are quickly sentenced to death. Fortunately, this is only a feeling among minority groups due to the fact that they are among the minorities. Statistics show whites are served the