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Grant Foote
Mr. Hackney
Rhetoric 101
7 October, 2014
Violent Video Games and Heartlessness
No matter where you go, video games are prevalent in society today. Violence in video
games has attracted gamers to a more complex gaming experience. Call of Duty, a franchise of
violent video games, rakes in millions of dollars from eager gamers ready to play the latest
installment, showing the number of gamers who enjoy the excitement of violent video games.
Nick Bilton, in his article Looking at The Link Between Violent Video Games and Lack of
Empathy states several studies to appeal to logos within his writing. He also uses a harsh
demeanor towards gamers to maintain that there is a link between violent video games and a
lack of empathy.
Bilton explains that there are studies that show how violent video games desensitize
people toward real violence. Bilton has the task of handling a very controversial topic in
society today, with the increase of shootings people want to get to the cause of the issue. With
new games coming onto the next generation consoles, of course this is the easiest thing to blame,
however several studies even link violent video games to a decreased aggression level due to the
fact there is a new way to vent all your anger into something. Bilton states in the article that
new psychological studies are finding that as violent video games become more realistic,
constantly playing them can lead to a desensitization toward real violence Bilton successfully
uses pathos in this statement to show that there are studies out, as well as showing that the

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psychologists who are studying this are also knowledgeable about videogames and current
progress within them.
Investigating even more studies about the brain and which side controls empathy, Bilton
introduces the journal called A Study from Canadas Brock University, by Dr. Jeanne
Brockmyer. Brockmyer, a clinical child psychologist states: children that play videogames for
significant lengths of time, they are not as morally mature as other children their age(qtd. by
Bilton). Researchers believe that the constant flood of violent images takes away from the childs
ability to feel empathy for people who have been through similar situations in real life. However,
Bilton points out that studies did not determine if these effects happen to people who play firstperson shooters games for two hours a day, once a week, or any other specific amount of time.
So Bilton does give counter-evidence to his argument to show that he isnt only trying to get his
point across, but trying to show all information that is available to him.
At E3, acronym for Electronic Entertainment Expo, Bilton speaks to people who play
violent video games and that is when he starts to get more opinionated. He explains about when
he asked someone if they think that there is a link between violent video games and lack of
empathy and his response was one young man said snidely, rolling his eyes at me before
returning to the first-person shooter he was playing which sounds almost like a jab at the man,
which this article isnt a place for. Bilton states that other valid arguments were: Mass
shootings happened before video games even existed which is true and can be considered a
counter to what this article is stating. Almir Listo, when talking to Bilton, gives a very educated
statement when he proclaims If you look hard enough, you can find an excuse for everything,
that doesnt mean there is a correlation. This being said after Bilton and Listo started talking

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about the relationship between his game Payday 2 and the recent shooting of 2 police officers in
Las Vegas.
Overall, Bilton successfully uses logos in several researches he explains in his article to
convince the reader that there is a correlation between lack of empathy and violent video games,
however he does give some distaste to gamers at some point in his article. Bilton sums up with,
We dont conclusively know if there is a link between violent video games and lack of
empathy. He ends his article with the powerful statement Gun violence in the real world -- and
the gaming world -- goes on which is not the best way to end the article, but effectively explains
his view on the subject.

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Works Cited
Bilton, Nick. "Looking at Link Between Violent Video Games and Lack of Empathy."
New York Times. N.p., 14 June 2014. Web. 7 Oct. 2014.