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 The nonpareil gaming experience of the PS3 carries a steep $599 price tag, but a grim procession of crimes surrounding the console’s frenzied release makes clear that getting your hands on a PS3 could cost you your life. Image - Wikipedia
Dec. 10, 2006
Today, people in the Western world are living in societies that are teeming with technology, inundated in innovation and engulfed by electronics. It was a little more than a half century ago when members of the “Greatest Generation” persevered through one of the toughest times in world history: the Great Depression and the Second World War.
At a time not too distant from the present, multitudes of Americans were forced to live in third-world conditions, with many residing in corrugated tin and tar-paper shacks - communities of which were referred to as Hoovervilles, after the president of the time - or performing duties that now would be relegated to poor immigrants, like picking fruits. “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck illustrated the ills of the American farmer, forced off the land by big banks and the mass migration in search of the American Dream, only to find more hardship at the road’s end. During the war, people rationed and made monumental sacrifices, including cigarettes, gasoline and meats, and women worked in place of the men in the factories. These were hard people living in hard times.
So what would happen to us were we immersed in similar troubles? It seems that results would be horrific. American society has already begun to tread on the threshold of technological turmoil.
The viewpoint from the video-game industry offers a rather grisly glimpse at society’s underbelly. Take for instance the case of the ‘Xbox murders’ in Florida a couple years back, where a young man was brutally murdered by a group of youths for his Xbox game console. Ostensibly, much lesser crimes are commonly committed over these ingenious items. More recently is the insanity surrounding the release of the PlayStation3, a remarkable game box that carries an even more remarkable price tag.
The PS3 boasts lighting-fast processing speed and comes equipped with a removable hard disk. In addition to offering users a full range of advanced network gaming options, the console comes with a built-in Blu-ray disc player, a next generation DVD format. The nonpareil gaming experience of the PS3 carries a steep $599 price tag, but a grim procession of crimes surrounding the console’s frenzied release makes clear that getting your hands on a PS3 could cost you your life.
Due to supply shortages resulting from production problems, PS3s were scarce upon release. Droves of customers camped outside storefronts for days on end for the mere chance to purchase a console, often enduring freezing temperatures and crowded lines. Sadly, in many instances the scene turned ugly: riots, beatings and even a BB-gun drive-by.
The string of game console-related atrocities underscores several grave paradoxes that inhere in the very technology that makes the system’s release such a monumental event in the $7 billion US video game market. As gaming becomes more advanced, gamers are called upon to employ increasingly complex strategies and decision making functions. Moreover, with the proliferation of broadband technology, these functions are often performed in an elaborate relational context, with users interacting and collaborating with one another in real time.
However, while technologies like the PS3 empower users by allowing their meticulously generated digital avatars to interact in awe-inspiringly realistic simulacra – without regard to age, gender, race, religion, or region – such integration is not without costs. The crimes following the PS3’s release reveal that, as gamers grow more comfortable with their digital selves, they are accordingly less adept at interacting with one another when they log off.
Perhaps people are, by now, all too accustomed to the omniscience, anonymity, unaccountability, adventure and control concomitant with our beautifully rendered digital fictions such that we find the “real” real world intolerable or comparatively uninteresting.
Or, conversely, perhaps the existential estrangement of modern society drives us to seek refuge in the vagaries of the digital world. In either case, the PS3 crimes illustrate the dangerous retrograde effect technological innovation can have, inspiring Neanderthal behavior and an estrangement from our fellows that subverts the basic humanity that underlies modern civilization.
Is there a certain amount of disconnect caused by the video game lifestyle? Definitely. Is humanity losing its grip on reality? Not quite yet. However, consider whether people of today would be able to survive the hardships of yesteryear. Could they survive socially, economically or even be able to forage for items of dire need? Not even close. The world has become centered on instant gratification and a 'me first' attitude, and patience has become a lost virtue; a world where meals are made in the microwave and fast cars take people miles from their homes in minutes.
The problem runs deeper than just game consoles. Blackberries, Wi-Fi, cell phones, interactive television, satellites, automobiles and countless other devices hasten the pace of life for Americans, and ultimately, the entire globe. It is questionable whether or not modern man could live at a slower speed, without the gizmos and gadgets, like his ancestors did. There really is no real solution to the perceived problem with progress, but awareness of potentially looming issues is integral in preventing a doomsday-type scenario should humankind come into dire straits. Hopefully, of course, we’ll learn our lessons before that time comes.
[Image - Wikipedia]
Senior Editor Jared Leone did not participate in this week's editorial. Senior Editor Dwayne Robinson abstains from all staff editorials.
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