British Minister Wants Kids to Play Video Games

Video games aren’t really met with a lot of appreciation, neither from the media nor from a big part of society. That is largely due to the fact that anti-game protesters, like Jack Thompson or other public institutions, say that these means of entertainment have a negative influence on children, teaching them to be violent and anti-social.

In this context, a few days ago we reported about an FCC commissioner who accused World of Warcraft of being one of the primary causes for which students dropped out of college. But that was in North America, because, as it seems, in the United Kingdom officials have a different view on video games, as we reported some time ago about a politician who advocated that companies in the gaming industry needed to be helped in this financial crisis.

Now, Cabinet Office Minister Tom Watson, a high ranking official in the British Parliament, talks about video games and how he thinks that children should play them, even the violent ones, because they can learn valuable lessons. He goes on to say that video games are better than television, as a lot of nonsense and gratuitous violence is shown in that particular type of media.

“Basically, I think playing games is a good thing. I'd rather my boy be playing on his Wii than passively watching telly,” says Watson. “Most games are educational. They make you think, focus, challenge and change – 500 years ago a medium that did this would be called art. Even the fun stuff has serious real-world applications.”

Watson then goes on to exemplify his statements through his own three year old son, who learned to count thanks to a game based on the popular Telly Tubbies characters. He further adds that, thanks to Runescape, one of his friends' eight year old boy learned how to make bronze, by mixing copper with tin, a procedure that his character needed to do in the game.

All in all, it's really nice to hear that politicians do recognize the merits that video games have in today's society, and that they don't go off against them without solid knowledge about them. Let's just hope that more and more state officials start thinking like Tom Watson.