Why do people think video games are a waste of time? (1 Viewer)

[Sam Posten]

Also off topic: what's the point of coherent, non-trolling spam? Or were they trolling elsewhere?

Likely the person involved genuinely has an interest in the topic of gaming. The 'services' they were promoting were gaming related. Any time you see an 1-10 post count user putting blue text in indicating a link it's probably link spam for their dinky web site.

 

[Edwin-S]

I think people who shoot animals for pleasure or to hang a head on their walls are assholes, so if someone wants to think I'm low IQ for playing video games I guess I can't complain, even though their opinion is worthless to me.

 

[Sam Posten]

<- both hunts and plays games. Why not both? =p

 

[Bryan^H]

Told ya.

The video games are a waste of time stigma. Will never get past that. Many, many people will go their graves thinking video games are pointless, and stupid.

People just can't seem to accept video games are about as much a "waste of time" as reading a book, building a model airplane, rock collecting etc. Oh well.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Ironically, I think listening to Joe Rogan is a massive waste of time, but who am I to judge?

 

[Ruz-El]

Ironically, I think listening to Joe Rogan is a massive waste of time, but who am I to judge?

I was going to say pretty much the same thing. Considering who Joe thinks is worth his time to talk to? Yeah, I'm not to worried about what he thinks about anything.

 

[Bryan^H]

I was going to say pretty much the same thing. Considering who Joe thinks is worth his time to talk to? Yeah, I'm not to worried about what he thinks about anything.

The video was recommended to me because I watch a lot of video game clips I guess.
I'm not a fan of his. Most of his guests I have no idea who they are (comedians?) the others I don't really care about...except I did listen to his 2 hour interview with Rick Baker, but I would listen to anyone interview him.

 

[Bryan^H]

And the reason I revived this thread wasn't solely because of Joe Rogan, his guest, and their damaging comments about games.

It is because I have experienced many more comments like those since I left this thread. I guess the prejudices about this hobby will never go away, but like I have stated earlier, the sheer contempt, and scorn against video games is so real, and Joe Rogan just exposed what most adults think about it.
Pathetic.

 

[Jim517]

I haven't gamed for decades, but it's no different than watching a TV show, movie, etc. The only problem I see is if parents are letting their young kids play them for hours every day. Hence they're not getting exercise and getting fat !

 

[Bryan^H]

The only problem I see is if parents are letting their young kids play them for hours every day. Hence they're not getting exercise and getting fat !

Game addiction is a problem. Children should have limits just like TV watching if they can't manage their time better.

 

[Ejanss]

Game addiction is a problem. Children should have limits just like TV watching if they can't manage their time better.

Like any other brain stimulant, gaming only becomes addiction when the games psychologically substitute some void in the user's life, and then that's not the game's fault.

Before I got a PS3 (back when they were the only Blu-ray players that worked), I hadn't owned a console since a Sega Genesis in college, and then after upgrading to PS4, curiosity finally got me hooked on the cute motley crew of Overwatch.
Thanks to my built-in PS4 camera, I now have a microphone, but I'm not one of those core gamers who only plays co-operative group games tied to a mic headset so he can scream instructions or trash-talk the other players...Once in a while, we've got a team who provides a bit of chatter to keep the strategy going, but if I find myself getting into that, it's for the sake of the game, not my own need for personal catharsis.
All things in moderation.

(And Rogan's comments aren't new, as I remember Roger Ebert, on his blog column, making a snobby comment about the rise of video games vs. the decline of school literacy and claiming that "video games weren't art". The usual suspects complained for months, and Ebert heckled them endlessly, before joking that he had played video games, back when he and Gene Siskel reviewed Nintendo's "Duck Hunt".
Sometimes, you have to research before you condemn.)

 

[Sam Posten]

And the reason I revived this thread wasn't solely because of Joe Rogan, his guest, and their damaging comments about games.

It is because I have experienced many more comments like those since I left this thread. I guess the prejudices about this hobby will never go away, but like I have stated earlier, the sheer contempt, and scorn against video games is so real, and Joe Rogan just exposed what most adults think about it.
Pathetic.

I dunno who you are hanging out with but I have NEVER ONCE heard a friend, colleague or parent call gaming a waste of time. Even my own father who personally refuses to play video games and mocked them as 'beep bop boop' in their infancy admits they are technically fascinating and appear to be fun, just not for him.

 

[Bryan^H]

Then I guess it all boils down to who you know, and how they feel about video games.
I heard it as a kid from adults, I hear it as an adult from adults.
”Video games area waste of time”.
Maybe hearing it so much in my life has me paranoid, thinking most people think that way.
I‘m most likely wrong though.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Then I guess it all boils down to who you know, and how they feel about video games.
I heard it as a kid from adults, I hear it as an adult from adults.
”Video games area waste of time”.
Maybe hearing it so much in my life has me paranoid, thinking most people think that way.
I‘m most likely wrong though.

Probably depends a lot on one's surrounding dominant culture, but I'd say most are evolving towards general acceptance... even if some may be much slower than others...

In my neighborhood, there are apparently even grown men in their mid-life playing old school Dungeons & Dragons (and not just via the net or something), LOL... and I was even invited to join them by a wife who's a middle-school teacher, hahaha... And I'm probably more interested in something like that than most video games -- I did my fair share of both once upon a time...

IF your social circle is still too intolerant of gaming (as it sounds like), maybe it's time to seek out and adopt a different social circle instead, if at all feasible... Of course, this pandemic probably doesn't make that easy...

_Man_

 

[jcroy]

In my neighborhood, there are apparently even grown men in their mid-life playing old school Dungeons & Dragons (and not just via the net or something), LOL... and I was even invited to join them by a wife who's a middle-school teacher, hahaha... And I'm probably more interested in something like that than most video games -- I did my fair share of both once upon a time...

(As an aside).

Back in day I remember when Dungeons & Dragons and other similar pencil/paper rpg type games, were held in contempt and thought of as a "waste of time".

A generation earlier before that, it was Avalon Hill and SPI wargames (with chits and maps) which were similarly held in contempt and considered a complete waste of time.

 

[Sam Posten]

I dunno if you guys heard the news but the nerds won...

 

[Walter Kittel]

Haven't been following the thread, but just popping in to say that video games are one of the things that have really helped pass the hours during these trying times. Viewing programs can be a bit too passive at times, and games really help take me out of myself; which is good thing most of the time.

- Walter.

 

[TJPC]

I was listening to a podcast on the history of games and when cross word puzzles were invented, there were worries about them taking youth away from serious matters at school and having them take too much time in frivolous pursuits.

 

[Jeff Cooper]

Well it seems the HTF also views games as a waste of time, as this forum has been moved from the 'Entertainment' section to the 'Other Diversions' section.

 

[DaveF]

I dunno who you are hanging out with but I have NEVER ONCE heard a friend, colleague or parent call gaming a waste of time. Even my own father who personally refuses to play video games and mocked them as 'beep bop boop' in their infancy admits they are technically fascinating and appear to be fun, just not for him.

This.

I'm an '80s kid. I grew up playing videogames. My uncles played games in the arcade back then, when they were in their 30s. All my friends played games. Thirty-some years later, my adult, college-educated, mid-career, 40-something coworkers play videogames. They talk about them at work. They play Nintendo Switches in the vanpool ride to work. They buy a Switch for their kids who are super into Minecraft and Super Smash Brothers. My 20-something coworker stayed up late to get SSB downloaded before a cross-country business trip. I have a 40-something *female* friend who is managing her pandemic stress by playing Animal Crossing. A no-nonsense, smartest-guy-in-the-room colleague plays some online freemium navy-theme game and *loves* schooling the 20-somethings with his superior strategy.

I'm not really sure this "people think video games are a waste of time" issue is real. Maybe it's regional. But my experience in multiple states, and working (to be blunt) with highly educated, high-achievers over decades, is videogames are core culture and have been for decades.