Harden Elkington
We are so obsessed with violence, why?
Is it because of the proximity of war for so many people—directly or indirectly?
Is it because so many movies and TV shows use violence as dramatic conflict resolution?
Is it that we don’t know any better alternatives to deal with frustration or anger?
Or is there something deeper, more ingrained in the very nature that makes us drawn to it?
The following is an excerpt from ” The Language of Emotions ” (Davidson and Begley, 2017).
“Why are we so drawn to stories about violence? We like them for the same reason that people like roller coasters: They give us a rush. They thrill us precisely because they are dangerous.
The closer a story approximates a real-life experience of danger, the more we feel drawn to it.
The more often we see violence, the more desensitized we become to its effects—the neural pathways it triggers in our brains lose their intensity.
That is one likely reason for all the rampages in recent years, with shooters trying to outdo one another with the number of people they manage to kill.
But it’s not just violence that draws us in. It’s also the aftermath of violence—the injuries, the blood, the gore, the suffering, and the anguish.
The more intense, traumatic, and disturbing a scene is, the more likely we are to sit transfixed in front of a screen.
“We see this not just with television and movies but also with violent video games, where players feel drawn to scenes that have high levels of intensity, aggression, and suffering—the very scenes that trigger the brain’s alarm system.
In fact, as you might expect, the brain’s response to violent video games is similar to its response to watching real violence.
When research subjects played a violent video game—in this case, one in which they shot innocent civilians in an airport as they walked through the terminals—the areas of the brain that generated strong electroencephalograph readings were those associated with action and attention, not emotions.
In contrast to the neural reactions in the brain to reading a sad story or even just looking at a picture of someone crying, which is linked with strong activity in the mirror neuron system and areas associated with empathy and feelings of sadness, playing a violent video game activates only the action-oriented parts of our brains.”
Why do people think violence is funny?
The answer seems to be that we find violence funny for the same reason that we find it thrilling.
We laugh at a clown, not because he is helpless or pathetic, but because his antics are so extreme they are over-the-top—and thus thrillingly dangerous.
We also revel in seeing people hit by buses or falling out of high-story windows, because the threat of danger makes us feel more alive.
Actors know that getting smacked around invokes this kind of thrill—that’s why stars like Barbara Stanwyck insisted on doing their own falls in old movies.
“When you’re up there in a wire high above the stage ten stories above the orchestra pit, you’re in a precarious situation,” Stanwyck said. “You’d damned well better do it yourself because … you know what’s going to happen.”
“Clowns and slapstick aside, we find violence funny when instead of suffering, the victim is unharmed—when he gets up and walks away with a smile.
When we see a pie thrown in someone’s face, we smile; we know the person is not really hurt and will soon be laughing along with us.
When an ad for laundry detergent shows someone slipping on a wet floor and falling down hard enough to smash a table, we laugh because even though he crashes into things, he never gets hurt.”
Why do we like watching movies and plays about violence?
The answer seems to be that we can experience the feelings of those who engage in violence without any actual risk.
We watch Romeo and Juliet, not because we hope they will kill themselves, but because it gives us a vicarious thrill—a rush of emotions that make us feel alive.
“Actors know that what makes drama compelling is not the violence itself but our own emotional engagement with it.
The director Elia Kazan once said, “The theater belongs to whoever can tell the tallest tale and make it plausible.” When we feel drawn into a story, we experience an enhanced sense of life: The more dramatic and engrossing a story, the more real it seems.
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“In stories as in life, we are drawn to those who take risks and stand up for themselves. In plays like A Streetcar Named Desire or Death of a Salesman, we see people willing to fight—violently if necessary—to get what they want.
We might not approve of their methods but we admire their determination and strength of will.
As Arthur Miller himself once put it, “The play’s the thing in which to arrest a man and hold him.”
At a time when people feel more impotent than ever before—when they might confront a boss or a spouse who is simply too powerful to defeat—the aggressive energy that fills the theater is deeply reassuring.”
We dislike violence when it is not displaced onto an innocent victim or when its purpose seems pointless.
When we see people suffer needlessly, it triggers anger and sadness—emotions that make us feel helpless and without recourse.”
Conclusion
While the cause for this phenomenon is not yet fully known, it seems to be highly dependent on cultural factors.
While violence in media might have always been there throughout all of history, it hasn’t always been considered entertainment or even allowed in certain periods of time.
It can thus be concluded that especially when trying to understand phenomena in other areas of the world, it is important to take cultural factors into account.
The article closes with the explanation that violence in media draws our attention because of its drama and potential for catharsis.
It makes us feel alive when watching someone overcome conflict without too much harm, but also allows us to experience anger and sadness at seeing unnecessary violence.
This shows how important it is to take cultural factors into account when dealing with such a phenomenon.
You can’t really deny something without understanding it first, so if you want to stop the influence of media, it’s important to understand what exactly it is that influences people in this way.
For example, even though there might be some factors that make violence in games more harmful than violence in TV series, it is important to understand why somebody wants to play them before telling him or her to stop.
Otherwise, the person will just argue with you and nothing will come out of it.
As such, it seems especially important to closely monitor children’s exposure to violence in games or books because they might not fully understand its implications yet.
Even though we can’t really compare our brains to theirs, it seems that this kind of media has a much bigger impact on the way we view violence.
This being said, it is also important to keep in mind that just because something influences us or arouses certain emotions within us doesn’t mean that it is necessarily bad at all.
The article comes to the conclusion that good drama makes us feel alive, which is why it is important to experience media that can influence us in a positive way.
