Essay About Violent Crimes And Video Games

School Violence
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Presentation #1
Topic: School Violence
General Purpose: To inform
Specific Purpose: To inform what needs to be done to
stop school violence.
Central Idea: To inform the effects, causes, and
solutions of school violence.
INTRODUCTION:
Since the April 20, 1999 shooting at Columbine High
School in Littleton, Colorado I have been looking
deeper into the issue of school violence. The number
of extremely violent crimes committed by students has
been increasing in the last few years. These
incidents are not only increasing in number, but in
the amount of bloodshed in each occurrence. Some
experts seek to analyze the effects this violence has.
Others figure the causes to be everything from movies
to video games. In the end it has been determined
that there are many solutions that must work together
to help solve this urgent problem.
MAIN BODY:
I. Effects- 2 main effects
A. Copycat crimes
1. Since the Feb. 19, 1997
shooting in Bethel, Alaska, there have been 9
more school shootings
(Start Em Young 1-3).
2. Six of these shootings took
place in a 4-month period.
B. Students feeling unsafe in school
1. For thousands of students
throughout the country, the feeling of being
the next victim looms over
their heads.
2. For many students, feeling
unsafe creates a very difficult learning
environment (Nolin, Davies,
Chandler 2).
II. Causes- 3 main causes
A. Parental Violence
1. Children are influenced by what they see and hear,
but what they are
exposed to will often have the lasting effect on
them.
2. If a child witnesses a parent behaving badly, such
as shouting at or
hitting another person it is likely the child
will copy the parents
behavior later in life.
3. If a parent chooses to inflict pain on their child
for a behavior they see
unacceptable, this teaches the child that using
force to get your way is
okay (Peterson).
B. Video Games
1. There is no doubt video games
are a cause of school violence, especially
with scientific proof
supporting it.
2. A study conducted by Buchanan
and Funk in 1996 showed that 50% of
boys listed action video
games as their favorites. These games include
“first person shooter” games
such as Doom and Quake. It turns out that
one of the gunmen in the
Columbine shooting played Doom quite often
(Walsh 2).
3. Craig Anderson and Karen Dill
of Iowa State and Lenoir-Rhyne Colleges
conducted a study in which
they gave video games to students who were
not predisposed towards
aggressive behavior. Some students were given
violent games, and others
non-violent games to play. Those given
violent games showed an
increase in violent thoughts and behaviors,
whereas those given
non-violent games did not show a change (Walsh 3)
C. Movies/Television
1. After the March 24, 1998
Jonesboro, Arkansas shooting, the head of the
American Academy of
Pediatrics Task Force of Juvenile