Ten Game Addiction Fallacies

Well he is right to say that video games are new so we cann ot simply through the idea that they could be addictive out.  But I still think most studies that get media attention are mainly bull. 

I do not htink I could fathom running into someone who played 20+ hours of wow a day... Honestly that means he should be dead, and I am skeptical of anything just told on the internet, who says the guy wasn't greatly exagerating his situation, or even lying about it for whatever reason many trolls find to bother people.  I admit that if there is suh a person who droped out of college he does need a bit of help, since you life should not revolve around a game (unless it is your job and leisure I suppose).  I think what I mainly take offense to in the current research is the huge link the word "addiction" has to drugs and gambling.  Drug chemically alter you unnaturally, while gambling not only absorbs time but much larger sums of money than a video game could. 

I probably am biased, but I also think that 1 to 2 hours of gaming on a day where I have nothing else to do is a bit shy of what I will actually play, but then again there are other days where I am so busy I have no time for games.  Fact is I think addiction is a term to be reserved for those people playing 20+ hours aday and revolving thier life around a game.  I love games but to say I am addicted if I play over 2 hours some day is ridiculous. 

I haven't read his book yet, but I would like to hear what Clark has to say about the implications that will arise should the very medium of videogames be declared as inherently "addictive". 

TV, books, sex, etc are all considered addictive within conventional wisdom.  However, those things have been around long enough to be fixtures in life and get a pass for it.  Videogames are a product of modern society- one which has been moving gradually in a direction where nobody is considered responsible for their own actions/life.  People are looking for a surrogate parent into adulthood in the form of governent coddling- or even by living with parents (and supported by them) long after adulthood.

For games to be pronounced by an official body to be addictive would potentially be the death of the medium.  All it would take is to declare games = gambling and we have an entire creative medium instantly turned into an adults-only affair with all the stigma and dirtiness that comes with it.  I doubt many creative or innovative games would be made to cater to a market that is on par (in the eyes of the government) with porn, casinos, and tobacco.  

As we are seeing already, many of the stalwart anti-games activists are shifting their strategy to the addiction angle.  Their attempts to circumvent free speech have been met with total failure. Their claims that games magically transform normal people into mindless serial-murderers are increasingly being taken as debatable at worst and all-out kookery at best.  However, to demonstrate that games are as addictive and harmful as a gambling addiction or tobacco (the comparison isn't right, but the media won't care) would achieve their goals even more effectively- by banning the sale and use of ALL games by ALL minors. 

After all, the games = gambling arguement is much more likely to be swallowed than the "games turn normal people into killers" approach they have been taking.