Does hack-n-slashing desensitize us to violence?

[mxyzplk]

The thing about this is: if you're role-playing negotiation, while the person you're negotiating with might be a fictional construct and the things you're negotiating about don't actually exist, you're still more-or-less negotiating and the actions you take are very similar to actual negotiations.

If you're role-playing violent acts, the actions you are actually taking are not particularly violent. You're talking (and possibly marking things off on sheets and rolling dice). It's more like writing a violent scene in a screenplay. I don't think I've ever come across a claim that people who write screenplays for violent movies are desensitized to violence.

Yes, role-play can affect you to some degree, but with entirely abstract actions, the influence is pretty small. If RPGs are enough to desensitize you to violence you've obviously got other issues.

But in the real world, for every one person who actually carries out, for example, the victimization of someone else, there's usually a pretty big set of other people who are ordering it, or just letting it happen. Clearly playing RPGs doesn't turn you into Charles Manson (I think a lot of the people here don't realize I've played way more RPGs than they have) but even a lot of modern war is "abstract," right, hence the term "video game war?" It's less video gamey for front line infantry but then again they're not the ones making a lot of the decisions.

Subtle changes to abstract reasoning aren't going to make you go on a kill crazy rampage. But can, say, shift your reaction a bit to how "bad people" are treated, right? If you are happily torturing orcs a lot in your game, how sure are you that doesn't make you look at a news report about waterboarding terror suspects and be a bit more likely to say "Eh, they're evil anyway, and it doesn't really hurt them, so whatever." Sure, you'd never have the balls to look a prisoner in the face and do it yourself, but the more "abstract, subtle" attitudes empower those who would.

And I'm not saying "you should never torture an orc." Far be it from me to deny anyone that pleasure. All I'm saying is that everything anyone knowledgeable (not message board people, researchers) understand about role-playing is that it's an effective developmental tool to shape both skills and attitudes. Thoughtful people engaged in the role-playing hobby should understand that and see that "it's just a game" is a meaningless statement, and that it has potential to teach in both a positive and negative way.

Even if you play a more, ahem, board-gamey RPG, there's a lot of research on how games like chess and sports like baseball or football also teach skills and attitudes (patience, teamwork, aggression...).

All I'm saying is that there's instructional content to running an RPG, and it's best to be cognizant of it and at least understand what it is you may be teaching.

[Edit: Please note that though the OP here uses the term 'desensitize to violence' that's not what my article says... I think the point I'm making is different.]