Dutch game addiction clinic is "swamped
Smith & Jones, the Dutch addiction clinic that opened a gaming treatment program earlier this month, has been inundated with calls from pleading parents leading clinic director Keith Bakker to exclaim, "Computer game addiction is obviously an even greater problem than we imagined." Whoa there buddy, let's slow it down a bit. Is it possible for someone to actually be addicted to video games? And can you really claim that your anticipated call volume is directly proportional to the size of the perceived problem? How scientific.
Bakker concedes that video game addiction "is not a chemical dependency, but it's got everything of an obsessive-compulsive disorder and all of the other stuff that comes with chemical dependency." Like the physical effects of heroin withdrawal, eh? Do gamers exhibit those? What about any other compulsive addiction, like picking one's nose or watching TV incessantly? Are those treatable? Certainly some of the "patients" that Smith & Jones will treat will have serious issues with compulsive behavior and the facility may help them overcome such behavior, but to brand it as being the fault of video games is misleading. It's intended to drum up publicity as much as it is to define their mandate.
