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Comment by jbondeson | Hacker News Reader

> Here's the point: video game violence develop a shitty moral compass.

No, shitty parents develop shitty moral compasses. Take your pick about shitty information sources: TV, video games, the internet, trashy magazines/newspapers. If that's where you learn about normalcy, you're going to have a shitty moral compass.

Yes, there are also cases of great parents having shitty kids, parenting is a complicated and messy business. My point is that if you can actually say one source (e.g. video games) is developing a child's moral compass, that's shitty parenting.

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Good parents engage their communities to shape the community policies.

I'm not vain enough to believe that my moral compass is The moral compass for all.

This is also not a community safety issue until I see the study that shows a statistically significant change toward aggressive/violent behavior in children who play violent video games.

By force!

This is the thing you're not getting. It is not moral to impose morality by force (except if it is being imposed on you by force).

I'm not arguing for imposing morality by means of physical violence. But you can be sure I would be happy to impose a hefty fine on Gamestop if they start selling AO games to my kids.

Go all the way with it. Gamestop refuses to pay the fine because it is immoral or unconstitutional or whatever.

The directors of the corporation are jailed.

That's the force.

I hope this doesn't mean that you're claiming one can't be a good parent (and raise ok children) in a shitty community...

I for one don't agree with what most people do in my community, and most everywhere around the world. Not that I'm a saint who never cheats, lies or steals, but I am true, I don't pretend I'm someone I'm not, and I don't much care about looks, money, fame and other irrelevant things in life. Most people around me do the opposite, and care only about their perceived status in the group, would sell a friend for pennies, and pretend they care, but never really listen. I filter most of these people out of my life, and don't have many true friends that I would spend a lot of time with.

This only makes me more motivated to instill really strong moral values in my future children.

Additionally, good parents engage by example. I can't tell you the number of times people have asked how my daughter was able to do <awesome scientific achievement>.

Somehow, she managed even with the existence of and playing of (gasp) video games! And with such shitty parents that didn't have a well-meaning bureaucrat telling us what to do.

THE HORROR.

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