Rating: 
Summary: A Must Read for Parents and Caring Adults
Review: "Stop Teaching Our Kids To Kill" by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Gloria DeGaetano is an excellent book for parents and anyone interested about the welfare of young people. The authors do an outstanding job of laying out the issue of violence in the media and the affect it is having on our children and our culture. Not only do they educate us on the issue but also they provide ideas on how we can become involved and make a difference in our own families and community.I found this book is a very credible source of information, because it is supported by numerous national studies on the issue. The resource section of the book not only provides back up support for their stories, but it gives places to go to gather more information on the topic as well as ideas for action. I recommend read this book. Get involve!
Rating:
Summary: excelent scholarly presentation of a controvessial subject
Review: This book is a wake up call for those who want to be savvy about the effect of modern technology on society. As a research MD with a special interest in the biology of violence, I was impressed with the research that backs up this book. Having looked into this a bit myself, I was impressed with the volume of good research done on these subjects. As a citizen, I am appalled at the lack of attention this has received considering the strength of the findings and their importance to society.
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Summary: Accountability
Review: This book gets right to the point. It is not about taking away a citizen's rights. Its about understanding causal factors which provoke simulation responses and the accountability thereof. Our children cannot be shieled every minute by the parent. In fact, upon entering elementary school through high school a parent actually spends very little time trying to police after their children. Most liberals and under educated americans who read this book will tend to become defensive from dealing with their own guilt concerning the relm of possibilities. It is a book of fact-based material. Regardless of what any individual thinks, these are still the facts. Colonel Grossman does not say that children will commit violent acts after playing video games. He knows that most families are doing their best to provide a safe haven for their children. He is simply committed to raising the awareness of what the American Medical Association considers the greatest health threat in America today. How many supposed readers out there were aware of this earth- shattering statement? Its really quite simple.
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Summary: A revealing look at the electronic babysitters...
Review: With so many parents installing closed circuit video in their homes to observe the effects their nannies are having on their children's development, it seems we have overlooked the pervasive influence of media. Col. Grossman is right in sync with the need to examine the way movies, television, and especially video games gradually desensitize young people to the sanctity of human life. Our media has done a massive disservice to parents by overwhelming the airwaves and store shelves with opportunities for kids to see the tragic destruction of life as entertainment. The authors show us the real effects, and illustrate with real examples of the consequences: a generation of kids sporting electronic body counts into the thousands, all who know that a head shot is always preferable to a chest shot, but that a double-tap to the chest is pretty reliable. Reality is frightening enough without having home-grown killers to fear.
Rating: 
Summary: The Truth vs. the First Amendment
Review: As a U.S. Army veteran, a law enforcement officer for over 20 years and a nationally known law enforcement trainer, I have often been puzzled by the proliferation of violence among youth. I have watched the trend continue for years and have tried to apply my graduate-level education to determining cause so we could attack the effect. And yet, intrinsically, regardless of the rhetoric being spewed by liberals who seek riches over community safety and the mental health of our youth, I knew what was wrong. The desensitization of our youth was clear. At the scenes of gang homicides and drive-by shootings, in the aftermath of serious injury producing physical altercations, in investigations related to extreme violence among youth, I heard the same words from the perpetrators, words that weren't heard in my generation, even among those who trained for, went to and returned from combat. Say what you will, the truth hurts. And the truth is clear to all of us who work in this arena. Col. Grossman and Ms. DeGaetano present the truth factually and correctly, with excellent research behind it. Presenting violence, in its attractive multi-media trappings, to our youth is not a First Amendment priviledge. No more than is promoting any other form of violence that results in serious injury or death. I'm tired of cleaning up the mess. I'm tired of dealing weekly with the effect. Thanks to the authors, I know now, based on facts, what I often felt about the roots of youth violence. And, I know now what to do about it. Read this book and you'll know, too.
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Summary: "You know that something's happening, but ..."
Review: The authors of "Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill" point out that children and adolescents are fascinated with flashy action scenes, many containing unrealistic or imagined or graphic violence, much like babies are enchanted with bright-colored objects. Visual input is received and retained by the brain much more readily than written or spoken information and occasionally sparks or influences some later action. Here's a personal example: When I was about six I sat playing with some toys and a small alligator clip I'd found on the floor by my father's workbench. My two year old brother walked by. I remembered the almost daily TV cartoons where a character sat on a thumbtack or nail or was bitten on the rear end by a dog, turned redfaced and yelled, "EEEYOWWW! ", then went on as though nothing had happened. With these images in mind I walked up behind my brother, pulled down the edge of his diaper and fastened the clamp on the skin of his bottom, fully expecting the reaction I'd seen so often. To my surprise he screamed and rushed around crying and trying to get away from whatever was hurting him. Then my mother ran in, picked him up and did her best to fix things. This is a small example of the way pseudo-violence and inappropriate violence shown to certain age groups can warp the perception of reality children have. In some it can even go to fatal extremes like it did in Jonesboro, Paducah and Littleton. Often, just as I was surprised at my brother's reaction, the killers are surprised REAL death results from just doing what they see so often on the screen. It would be wrong to say every person in this country is turned into a bloodthirsty killer by TV, movies, and videogames. Lt. Col. Grossman and Ms. deGaetano don't say this, and they don't condemn TV, movies or videogames themselves. Nor do they advocate some blanket censorship or deny the fact that parents have access to an ON-OFF switch. They point out though that all the precautions in the world do no good to the parents of a hundred or more kids if one or two kids in the same school aren't supervised and decide to mimic the actions of their screen heroes on their classmates, like happened in Littleton and other places. Wouldn't it make a lot of sense to stop all this at its source? Just by the fact that Ratings Systems have been self-established, the video industries have admitted there's a problem of some kind. They've shown they can produce enjoyable, nonviolent material. So why don't they? "Youngsters like the thrills and kills and pay big money for them!" isn't much of an excuse when inappropriate, inaccurate violence that duplicates the firearms training methods of the police and military is presented to kids. It's even been called a Public Health problem like drugs and tobacco by the Surgeon General, President, and various Medical Associations. The fact that schoolkids like drugs and tobacco would be about as much reason to allow them to be sold to youngsters as it is for violence to be.
Rating: 
Summary: Poorly researched and paranoid.
Review: While it has been proven that observing acts of violence does increase the possibility to commit violent acts, the author of this book ( a retired military-type, I believe) jumps to a lot of mistaken and rash conclusions and mows down evidence that goes against his arguments without as much as a wince. - he claims that violent games are the ones that attract youth, and, in turn, increase their likeliness to commit violent acts. Fact: only two out of the most popular video games last month had Teen and above ratings. - he claims that video games are an ultra-effective way of teaching gun and weapon skills. He brings up the Paducca event where a child gunned down a group of students with carefully placed head and chest wounds. Fact: it was well known that the child received firearm training and even had the chance to practice his aim in his neighbour's yard. - he claims that even the military use FATs (fire arms training) and ACSs (arcade combat sims) to "desensitize" the military to acts of violence. You can read any paper that deals with the topic to find out that such machines teach purely target contol and gun proficiency. - he claims that violent crime levels are on the rise in step with the popularity of video games. Fact: violence levels have been falling for the past five years. Naturally, the author dismisses this as too small of a change. Grossman acts on parent's concern for their children to spread libel and misinformation about what just may be the trend of the generation. If you are concerned with vioence levels in your house, you are free to monitor them. Talk it over with others, familiarize yourself with the current standpoints. Avoid those who make the decision for you.
Rating: 
Summary: Grossman ignores the scientific method in favor of kneejerk
Review: Like Ret. Col. Grossman I too served in the military and utilized the MACS, a Super Nintendo Title available to military units that emulates the experience of firing an M16A2 rifle at a telivision monitor. What Grossman calls in his book a murder desensitiser we call a zeroing tool.Zeroing, for the rest of the non shooting community is a term for adjusting the sights on a standard weapon so that the sight corresponds with the view a shooter has so that when they aim they can hit the target. Mr. Grossman would have you believe that this process numbs the soldier to killing human beings. Not only is this preposterous as you are shooting at little green silhoettes which do not behave in a human fashion (they pop up and then pop down) but they do not pose any threat to the firer. I can understand that Grossman and concerned parents want answers as to why these horrific acts of violence are occuring. But Grossman blatantly ignores the facts resorts to fantasy and molds statistics in a way to prove his political agenda at the expense of portraying reality in a fair light. I wish that Grossman was right because then you could end teenage violence by removing a few intergers here and a few intergers there. But Grossman is not right in his stance or his calculations. He will make money off of this book by selling fallacous arguments to concerned parents, working them up over the fear that their children are becoming trained murderers by using a joystick and shooting at ghouls on computer monitors. The fact is that parents have a responsibility to control what their children are exposed to, but crime has gone down since 1990 and he ignores this fact and makes claims that children are out of control- blaming video games for the lackadaisacal parenting that is going on in America. What next? A call to get all women back in the house? Please, save your money.
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Summary: Not the only cause...BUT
Review: Some people dismiss Grossman and de Gaetano's research by asserting that since all children are not mass murderers, video game and television violence must be OK. Neither author claims that TV and video games are the ONLY cause of violence. Rather, they are a powerful contributing factor, especially in the case of already-troubled youth. Unfortunately, in a free society we have no way to identify inadequately-parented, sociopathic children and protect our children and ourselves from their actions. Our best hope is to carefully evaluate the media messages we want ALL our children to receive, and act accordingly. Grossman and de Gaetano provides well thought out, reasoned information to guide parents and signficant adults in helping our children make choices about how to spend their time. Read this book!
Rating:
Summary: Authors make huge mistakes
Review: Lt. Col. Grossman has some tall explaining to do. The violent, interactive video games he postulates as dangerous were introduced in the early 1990s: Mortal Kombat (1991), Doom (1992), Quake (1996), and their sequels. The teenagers most likely to consume these games, by the millions, were White (non- Hispanic) boys. Therefore, if Grossman were correct that violent games (and violent TV, movies, metal and gangsta rap music, and Internet sites, which also grew during the 1990s) cause real-life violence, we would expect to see large increases in violence among their biggest patrons, White teenage boys. Did that happen? No. Unfortunately, the FBI doesn't keep statistics for White, non-Hispanic youths separately, but states that do show dramatically OPPOSITE effects than Grossman predicts. For example, from 1991 through 1998, California white teens showed large DECLINES in murder arrest (down 52%), rape (down 43%), felony arrest (down 27%), gun deaths (down 43%), suicide (down 41%), and violent deaths (down 34%). These declines are based on standard crime and death figures from California's Department of Justice and Bureau of Vital Statistics adjusted for population changes to produce rates; readers are invited to check them. In sum, California's White teenagers show the biggest declines in violence during the 1990s of any age or racial group and are now at their least violent levels in 25 years. White teens in New York, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Oregon, Minnesota, and other states show similar improvements, as do teens of all races nationally. Finally, violent crime of all types fell during the 1990s. FBI figures show aggravated assault (the measure whose increase since the 1950s is cited by Grossman as proving the bad effects of media violence) reversed in 1992 and declined 17% through 1998 -- exactly the period violent video games were proliferating. Now, one could argue more convincingly that media and video- game violence caused the teenage violence DECLINE, but that would be as unwarranted as Grossman's claim. Or we could argue that media violence is okay for most kids but incites a demented few, but then what would we censor? At times, the Beatles, the Bible, and the Boy Scout Handbook have been found major influences on mass killers, and school shooters are as likely to be active in church as in video gaming. I suspect Grossman's gripping but poorly-generalized theory diverts attention from real causes of violence: poverty, inequality, joblessness, household abuse, and a mental disturbance that seems to afflict a small number of dissed White males of all ages. Mike A. Males, Ph.D. Santa Cruz, CA
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