wraggster
November 25th, 2011, 22:27
The new President of Ireland Michael D Higgins has used his first official public engagement to attack video games.
He issued the warning when attending an event at The Ark in Dublin’s Temple Bar – his first presidential appointment since taking office on November 11th.
The 70 year old told the audience that: “We must encourage all citizens, particularly children, to, as Raymond Williams put it, ’Be the arrow, not the target’.
“It is possible to form the impression that many of today’s children no longer fully appreciate the joy of taking refuge in their own imaginations, preferring to spend their time on computer games, or watching digital television or playing with pre-programmed electronic toys.”
The attack follows an Early Day Motion filed in Westminster this week (http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/if-at-first-keith-vaz-doesn-t-succeed-he-tries-tries-and-tries-again/087560) by long-term games critic Keith Vaz in which he claimed that “there is increasing evidence of a link between perpetrators of violent crime and violent video games users” and called for the BBFC “to take further precautions when allowing a game to be sold”.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/now-irish-president-attacks-video-games/087714
He issued the warning when attending an event at The Ark in Dublin’s Temple Bar – his first presidential appointment since taking office on November 11th.
The 70 year old told the audience that: “We must encourage all citizens, particularly children, to, as Raymond Williams put it, ’Be the arrow, not the target’.
“It is possible to form the impression that many of today’s children no longer fully appreciate the joy of taking refuge in their own imaginations, preferring to spend their time on computer games, or watching digital television or playing with pre-programmed electronic toys.”
The attack follows an Early Day Motion filed in Westminster this week (http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/if-at-first-keith-vaz-doesn-t-succeed-he-tries-tries-and-tries-again/087560) by long-term games critic Keith Vaz in which he claimed that “there is increasing evidence of a link between perpetrators of violent crime and violent video games users” and called for the BBFC “to take further precautions when allowing a game to be sold”.
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/now-irish-president-attacks-video-games/087714