Why do parents get their Kids COD and GTA and stuff like this?

[asim1999]

Its always baffled me why parents get their kids games like this. And i am not talking about people 2 or 3 years under the age rating, but kids that are between the ages of 5 and 11. I have seen Xbox Live videos where kids are acting all immature and saying stupid stuff. 

I saw on one where this kid was on Battlefield Hardline:

Guy doing commentary saying to annoying kid: Well your fist is the size of my pinkie

Annoying kid: Your fist is the size of my Weiner!

What are your thoughts?

My opinion is that the kid should be mature enough for the material, age doesnt matter, maturity does and most kids between 5 and 11 dont have the maturity 

[Matty2hatty]

Yeh, my parents never let me, i understand why.

[PlayStation 2]

Well, my parents know that I'm better than that, so...

[asim1999]

Just now, Matty2hatty said:

Yeh, my parents never let me, i understand why.

My parents are pretty chilled. As long as i am one year under the PEGI rating, i am good 

[ismma99]

well i think it is when the kid keeps whining about that he wants that game the parents in the end are gonna give it since the kid will be even more pain in le buttom

[asim1999]

Just now, ismma99 said:

well i think it is when the kid keeps whining about that he wants that game the parents in the end are gonna give it since the kid will be even more pain in le buttom

True, the only acceptable exception i can think of is if the kid wants to join the army and he knows a decent amount. Then by all means do get it for them 

[Guest]

I bought Battlefield 4 for myself when i was 12. I couldn't play campaign because of the torture scenes and swearing. I don't think my parents made a mistake. 

[2001jaden]

Depends if the parent knows that their child is mature enough to play it

[Matt100HP]

I remember playing one of the earlier GTAs (without giving away my age) when it came out and I was 6 or 7 years old.

 

I have since been to University, got a law degree and managed not to use my car (or anyone else's, remaining true to GTA style), as a weapon of mass murder or gone on any shooting sprees. 

 

I think horrible kids are horrible (usually due to crap parenting), irrespective of what games they play. Successful parenting is not dependant on what games you let your kids play. 

[IsaacDaGrazin]

Bad parenting?

GTA V has ALOT Of disturbing images (( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)) and the parents are very aware of that and still buy it for them.

Battlefield eh just like cod

[xQubeZx]

Probably parents that doesn't care or the kid just annoys the shit out of them so eventually they give up. Me myself have not always been able to play the latest games since my parents haven't really been willing to buy me 16+ rated games when I was around 12-13 years old. But after I turned 14 or so I pretty much have been allowed to play whatever I want if I pay for the game and handle it mature. At 16 soon 17 now I can pretty much garauntee if I would behave like kids now days screaming stuff like that I would not even be allowed to be on the internet. But since I handle it nice and mature I'm allowed to do as I please pretty much. 

 

But I hate parents that allow  their kids to be that unrespectful and annoying. It ruins for everyone else and give the mature teens a bad reputation. 

[xQubeZx]

3 minutes ago, Matt100HP said:

I remember playing one of the earlier GTAs (without giving away my age) when it came out and I was 6 or 7 years old.

 

I have since been to University, got a law degree and managed not to use my car (or anyone else's, remaining true to GTA style), as a weapon of mass murder or gone on any shooting sprees. 

 

I think horrible kids are horrible (usually due to crap parenting), irrespective of what games they play. Successful parenting is not dependant on what games you let your kids play. 

I agree that the kids that can handle it should be allowed to play. But the ones that can't shouldn't but they don't have parents that care most likley and then also probably behaves like that in real life too. Which just is sad.

[Timopomer]

kids dont go on murderous sprees because they play battlefield. most kids know war is a thing. censorship wont help.

maybe education on how we should prospectively percieve games and reality should be a thing. but saying "GTA IS THE REASON FOR SCHOOL SHOOTINGS" just makes you sound like a conservative 80 year old with no clue what they are talking about

[Matt100HP]

1 minute ago, xQubeZx said:

I agree that the kids that can handle it should be allowed to play. But the ones that can't shouldn't but they don't have parents that care most likley and then also probably behaves like that in real life too. Which just is sad.

Yes, it's very much a case of: kids who suffer a poor a poor quality of parenting are allowed to play 18 rated games, not kids who play 18 rated games suffer a poor quality of parenting. It only works one way around. 

 

I suspect the difficulty is telling whether your kids can deal with 18 rated games at a young age; lots of parents have no idea what's actually in a game like GTA, as they've never played one. 

[Coaxialgamer]

Never understood that either.

Had friends back in primary school already playing COD.

[asim1999]

57 minutes ago, Coaxialgamer said:

Never understood that either.

Had friends back in primary school already playing COD.

I know, Modern Warfare 2 was all the rage in my final year of primary school 

[asim1999]

1 hour ago, Timopomer said:

kids dont go on murderous sprees because they play battlefield. most kids know war is a thing. censorship wont help.

maybe education on how we should prospectively percieve games and reality should be a thing. but saying "GTA IS THE REASON FOR SCHOOL SHOOTINGS" just makes you sound like a conservative 80 year old with no clue what they are talking about

True, i didnt say that. All i said was that  most immature kids wont be able to handle it.

But yes i do agree 

[ivhyn]

To be honest, I don't know either - they just don't care I guess, or they don't know. When I was a child, my parents didn't let me play games that were 16/18+, but I had my first contact with a shooter (Halo) back in 2002 at the age of 6 at a friend's place, and although it didn't turn me into a twisted murderer (I ended up here though ), I can't deny that it had some kind of impact on my childish and naive sight on the world (despite not really understanding all the implications of shooting, war and murder (yes, aliens count too)).

I'm pretty sure a 14-15 y/o nowadays understands much of the context in a game like GTA 5, but under that age I wouldn't let my children get their hands on a game that features drug abuse, sexual objectification and torture. On the other hand, I was beating down hookers with a purple dildo in GTA San Andreas (?) many years ago so I don't know if that backs my argument.

 

That's definitely a complex topic.

[ShadowCaptain]

My parents never stopped me getting any video games

[Wolf_Lbh]

Not all parents are good parents and some parents have no clue about the content in video games or how to find out. Also some kids have allowances/find ways to get money and buy things on their own. Also borrowing games from friends/older siblings is a thing.

Parents can suck or be dumb and kids can be resourceful. This shouldn't be major news.

[SeriouslyMikey]

My mum cared about it, but she made sure that I was restricted with the amount of time I could spend on a game made for older kids. For example, Halo Combat Evolved was my first ever game, at the time it was rated 15+, I was ten years under that bracket. I was allowed an hour on it during weekdays and two hours on it during weekends. 

I wasn't allowed GTA until I was 12. As long as I knew that it was just a game and all the actions in the violent games were a work of fiction and must NEVER be recreated in real life, my mum was fine with it. 

Age appropriate games, I could play as long as I wanted, heck, I played Jet Set Radio Future and SSX Tricky all the time with my mum. Good times. 

[Corwin111]

My childhood, and that of my friends was marked by by blood and gore in Wolfenstein3D and Doom, blood and gore and boobies in Duke Nukem 3D, blood and gore in carmageddon and GTA1, and later on, blood and gore in Starcraft and Brood war. More blood and gore in Terminators, Van-Damme and Segal movies, Hellraisers and so forth.

 

If I may be so bold, we all kinda turned out alright.  In contrast, the kid in my school who had an earlier curfew than the rest of us, was not allowed to watch and play the "bad" stuff and was grounded when he was rude to someone, later committed suicide in prison, where he was incarcerated for rape and aggravated assault. :-/

 

I realize that any evidence I can give is anecdotal and circumstantial. However there is no shortage of serious studies on the subject as well.

 

Violent entertainment is an outlet for the base animal, carried within us all. From public executions throughout history, through the Greek Olympics and Roman Gladiatorial battles, to medieval jousting tournaments, to honor duels. People just always gathered to watch this stuff. Yes, even children. This does not necessarily make them bad people... just people. And now is a time of wonder indeed. Because we have ways of doing all this without anyone getting hurt! 

 

Empathy is innate within us all as well, but using it as a barometer to restrain your actions is learned behavior. And children, not having had the time and experience, necessary to learn life's basic lessons in this regard are, in fact, more violent and cruel than your average adult. And there is no better way to develop your empathy into a moral code, than to decide what is acceptable and what is not for yourself. No one can really teach you that. They can give you pointers, but they can not build your morality for you.

 

You know, I eventually came to the conclusion that shooting the strippers in Duke Nukem was somehow less fun than shooting the aliens. I came to that conclusion all on my own, even though nobody was stopping me.

 

 

And as for "maturity", the kid in the OP's example actually gives a much wittier response than you can see from many adults playing these games anyhow. Average Joe CODplayer would probably go "Oh yeah? My fist is inside YOUR MOM! HA!"

[Headshot_]

My parents let me play the GTA series when I was young (Well I'm still underage but, eh). I started playing Vice City when I was four years old.

 

BUT, I never progressed through the game at all. All I did was drive, use cheats like the cars drive on water cheat and have fun driving and stealing cars. I never properly played through the game till I was 12. 

 

According to myself, I turned out alright. It's not like I just played gta all through my childhood however. Need For Speed took up most of my time too. 

I knew where to draw the line between reality and video gaming. I wouldn't run around with a .357 and gun down people IRL. In video games, maybe. 

If you can draw the line between reality and the virtual world, you should be good.

 

But yeah I've seen a lot of kids in GTA Online who like to run around in tanks just to feed their bloodlust. Meanwhile I just wanna play missions with people and race supercars down highways (which is hard because of the goddamn dirty racers)

[FmPhenom]

My son started playing those games when he was 11. He doesn't act stupid like that online. Probably because I do not act like that around him. He understands that it is just a game but people do bad things in real life. Again he understands that all he is doing is playing a social game with his friends over psn, live or steam..

 

 

Maybe I am lucky as a parent that my son loves his video games but him and the crew he hangs around with love sports and being outdoors more. I coached all his friends since 5 years old peewee till 11u in football and would like to think I had something to do with all those young mens upbringing and ideals.

[Ykno]

my parents let me have them when i was a kid because they trusted me and brother not to be idiots and copy the game! they new we understood the difference from a game to real life! and how to behave