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Video game addiction on Intervention
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A&E has given American audiences a mixed bag of entertaining programs. They received acclaim for their Biography series in the past, but now boast reality programming revolving around Gene Simmons and MC Hammer. Not at the same time, of course, that would just be considered tasteless. They also made a lot of money off of a show about a family of redneck bounty hunters, but that was before the name sake of Dog the Bounty Hunter was caught using racist slurs on phone call to his son. But one of their most watched shows right now has nothing to do with celebrities or bounty hunters on the road to redemption. Intervention is program that deals with addiction and rehabilitation. The addicted parties on the show can have unhealthy relationships with anything from food to crystal meth. In the seventh episode of Intervention, the issue of video game 'addiction' was dealt with.
Peter was the video game 'addict' of this episode. He shared air time with a bulimic housewife who took water pills and laxatives to counteract the massive amount of calories she was consuming in a day. Now, for Peter the term 'addict' is surrounded by quotation marks because video game addiction has still not been categorized as such by the authorities on the subject: The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
At the time of filming, Peter was a 21 year old unemployed but aspiring actor with a passion for Kung Fu and Halo. He averaged about 6-8 hours of game-play a day, but suffered no physical deficiencies due to the gaming. In fact, he was in such great shape that he taped himself playing Dance Dance Revolution for twenty-four hours in hopes of having his name placed in The Guinness Book of World Records.
Peter obviously used video games to escape reality; a behavior that was cultivated in an attempt to overcome the pain of being abandoned by his mother. Video games made Peter feel happiness and accomplishment, but most of all they allowed him a means of escaping a pain that nearly forced him to commit suicide. The program tried to make Peter look as if he were a hermit with no interest in the outside world, but this is obviously a falsehood given his interest in acting and participation in Kung Fu classes. And after pairing him with a woman who legitimately needs help to survive, the message starts to feel a little forced with Peter. It seems more that he is depressed and not being given the proper care for that problem. Add to the depression an absent mother and a pushover father and it's no wonder that Peter has no reason to move on from his hobby and get a job. He has no motivation.
The entire episode calls into question the nature of video game addiction: should Americans truly look at it the same way as an addiction to alcohol or hard drugs?
Many opponents of video games would like to see this happen. Every year studies are given grants to determine whether or not video games are as detrimental as compulsive gambling. There are even treatment facilities available to send the video game 'addicts' once they've accepted they have a problem and decide to look for help. The recovery facility didn't work for Peter. In fact the only thing that will work for Peter is parental love and guidance, pushing him to get a job and enter society.
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Intervention has had many episodes full of both successful rehabilitation and unsuccessful rehabilitation. They offer rehab at no cost to the addicts or their families and have managed to save many lives with this program. They have also made a great deal of money for A&E with the exploitation of the very addicts they are saving. It may not be a pretty fact, but it is a fact all the same.
The problem with this episode of Intervention is that it falsely represents a non-life threatening hobby as an addiction. Thus belittling legitimate addictions and causing panic over an issue that has not been deemed a threat by the proper authorities.
Peter was a kid that was never forced to grow up. He was hurt at a young age by his mother's abandonment and allowed to shirk off employment by a caring, but misguided father. Video games are his means of relaxation and escape. Intervention would have done well not to ineffectively try to make it seem as though his problem were as serious as that of a chemically dependent person who is literally killing themselves with their form of escape.
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