Five Ways Gaming Is Changing Our World

Today we hear from Andrew McPeak again. Andrew is a writer, curriculum designer, and speaker who has served with a number of non-profit organizations (and has spoken to thousands of Millennials) over the last 5 years and now serves on our team at Growing Leaders. Today, Andrew offers his insights on how gaming has changed our world and how adults can respond. We think you will love his insight. You’ll be hearing from him on blogs and in our resources from time to time. Enjoy.

Every young person goes through a proving moment in life; it’s that opportunity when they make their first “adult” decision. I call them “adult decisions” because they come when you realize that you can make whatever choice you want, and you will be the only one ultimately responsible for the consequences of your decision. Sometimes it’s a defining moment. I remember my first decision of this kind clear as day. It wasn’t picking what college I was going to attend, breaking up with a girlfriend, or even some part of learning to live on my own. My moment was the day I decided to sell my Xbox 360 the summer after I graduated from high school, instead of taking it with me to college.

I had plenty of friends that took their gaming consules, but I knew that, with my slightly addictive personality, I wouldn’t be able to handle it. That summer, I noticed that I had played a new game (just ONE game) for over 70 hours in my free time. I poured hours upon hours into that game and at the end, when I realized how much I had given to this artificial world, I asked myself, “What was it all for?” I didn’t have a good answer to that question, and it’s left me fascinated with the gaming industry ever since. As a writer now, I spend more time watching the industry, looking at those who have been unable to (or even consciously decided not to) make the same decision that I did. Overtime, gaming culture has continued to grow, somehow under the radar of most thinkers, leaders, and authors over 30, and that’s why we’re talking about it here.

Five Ways Gaming is Changing our World

Somehow without us really noticing it, gaming has become HUGE. A couple years ago, for the League of Legends final (currently the world’s most popular video game) in South Korea, more people tuned in around the world to watch than did the NBA finals of the same year. In 2014, upon the release of the highly anticipated console game “Destiny”, developers sold a rumored 10-12 million copies of the game within the first 24 hours of it’s release, making the game’s creators more than $500 million literally overnight. This made “Destiny” the largest release of any form of media ever, more than doubling any releases from the music and movie industries the same year. But while musicians and movie stars often make the front covers of our magazines, the celebrities of the gaming industry continue to make their millions under the radar… at least in America.

So how is this hidden behemoth changing the world around us? Let me give you a few insights:

• Everyone is Playing

97% of teens play video games every single week and 50% of teens 12-17 admit to playing games “yesterday”. Not only that, but 38% of all teen boys share their gaming handle when first meeting someone they want to be friends with, a Pew survey found. Gaming is on the periphery of culture now, but its influence will take center stage in the next decade.

• Growing Female Participation in Games

Games are played mostly by males, but in the youngest demographics, females are gaming more and more often. There are also an increasing number of games that are made specifically for female consumers.

• Your Kids Could Literally Make a Career out of Gaming

Apart from just the development of games, gaming has generated a number of lucrative ‘sub-industries,’ which include Conferences, Cosplay, Game-casting, Team Merchandizing, “YouTube-ing”, and more. The most culturally significant impact of all of this? You can literally make a career out of gaming, even if you don’t play! At Growing Leaders, we know recent graduates who have gotten a tech degree and immediately moved to Silicon Valley to create games. And they make great money too!

• Mobile Gaming is the Wave of the Future

While console and computer games are huge, the largest and most profitable form of gaming is mobile, a type of gaming played by almost every demographic in the western world. Whether Tetris or Candy Crush, almost everyone (grandparents included) is helping give rise to the growth of the mobile gaming industry.

• New Celebrities

Gaming has created a new group of celebrities that your kids probably already know. Some of them are players, others are YouTube creators, and still others are marketers, riding the wave of gaming popularity. It’s probable that, in the near future, these gamers will be on the covers of magazines that once only held professional athletes.

The Games We’re Playing

If you think that gaming in America has reached a troubling level then you may be starting to ask the question, where is this gaming shift taking us? There is an answer to this question for us in the robust gaming culture of South Korea. In South Korea, gaming celebrities are as popular as sports stars and young men and women are starting to show signs of gaming addiction. While the U.S. has yet to recognize gaming as a possible subject of clinical addiction, South Korea has gone so far as to create laws banning underage gamers from playing past midnight, and building health facilities specifically dedicated to helping to resolve internet addiction. If you have the chance to view about five minutes of this YouTube documentary it will give you some fascinating insights into the problems that could be in our future.

On top of that documentary, here are other suggestions on how to remain familiar with the changes coming to our world through the gaming industry:

1. Talk to your kids or students about which games they are playing and review those online.
2. Check out what’s happening on sites that show live gaming like twitch.com or gaming.youtube.com.
3. Read this article from the Guardian about 16 gaming trends. Its’ fascinating!

When it comes to gaming, there is a lot to be fascinated about, if you’re into that sort of thing. Sadly, there is a lot to be worried about as well. Studies show that heavy gaming can slow the development of morality within young men. Gaming is also changing the norm of social interactions, especially among young men as most of their friendships are maintained by gaming together as opposed to physical interactions. And perhaps most concerningly, as the number of heavy gamers increases, there is a growing trend towards a cultural acceptance of wasting large amounts of time consuming media via gaming or binge-watching television. These changes are a part of a culture shift that we must be watching carefully. If we don’t we are, ironically, playing games with our future.

We are at war: 2 lessons from the Paris massacre

https://vimeo.com/54623402

Category: Cultural Commentary

Published: Monday, 16 November 2015 05:00

Written by Jim Denison

“Friday’s Paris strike is not just another in a growing cavalcade of terrorist assaults; instead it signals a tactical change in Islamic terrorist strategies—one that militants have been moving towards for years.” Newsweek‘s Kurt Eichenwald is right.

In 2008, coordinated terror attacks in Mumbai killed more than 175 people. They showed that a small number of suicidal jihadists with sufficient ammunition and preparation could devastate a confined urban area. Militants used the same strategy five years later in Nairobi, Kenya, killing sixty-seven people at a shopping mall.

Last month, a double suicide bombing at a peace rally in the Turkish capital killed more than 100 people. The day before the Paris massacre, a double suicide attack on a crowded urban area in Beirut, Lebanon killed more than forty. Authorities believe a jihadist arrested last week may have been planning a similar attack in Istanbul. Now we have seen the effectiveness of this barbaric strategy in Paris.

What do France, Turkey, and Lebanon have in common? They have recently escalated attacks on Islamic State forces in Syria. Now the jihadists are striking back. In their view, we are at war with Islam. Since the Qur’an requires Muslims to defend Islam (Sura 2:190-192), these militants believe they are obligated to attack us. And since the West is composed of democracies, where citizens elect their leaders and support their military financially, ISIS believes we are all complicit in this war. (For more, see my The Islamic State: What You Need to Know.)

So we can expect more attacks like the massacre in Paris. Any urban center could be the terrorists’ next target. There is no end in sight to what The Wall Street Journal calls “the Long War Against Terrorism.”

What should we learn from the Paris tragedy? How should we respond?

First, the Paris massacre shows that no one is promised tomorrow, that we must “make the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:16, NIV). What happened in France could happen anywhere.

So surrender this day to the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18), choosing to live and serve in God’s power for God’s glory. Pray for your non-Christian friends and share Christ with them, because every soul deserves to hear the gospel before it’s too late. Live each day as if you would meet Jesus today, because one day you’ll be right.

Second, the spread of jihadist violence shows that Satan is threatened by the advance of the gospel. Radical Islam has arisen at a time when more Muslims have come to Christ than ever before in Islamic history. And Paris has been attacked at a time when the church in France is experiencing a remarkable resurgence. Friends of mine who work with European Christian movements say a genuine revival is at work in this secular nation.

So expect the enemy of God to attack the children of God, and refuse to be afraid. Jesus warned us, “In the world you will have tribulation.” Then he called us to “take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Know that “he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). And your joyful courage will be your witness to a frightened world.

Hours after the attacks in France, Parisians came outside bearing signs that proclaimed, “We are not afraid.” Let us join them.

http://www.denisonforum.org/cultural-commentary/2077-we-are-at-war-2-lessons-from-the-paris-massacre