Videogames don't cause real world violence. Therefore, videogame developers don't have an obligation to mitigate or censor their violent content.

It's an airtight conclusion that has grown in popularity in the electronic entertainment business. It's also the sort of dogma that the industry will grow to regret if it continues to toe this defensive line.

The problem with this proposition has nothing to do with its accuracy. Certainly, there is a dearth of any sort of evidence supporting the notion that someone who plays a violent game then heads out to transmute their fictional experience into real world bloodshed.

The problem with the argument is that it simultaneously cuts deep into the videogame medium and tears out its heart:

If videogame cannot incite someone to any sort of action, then truly games are medium void of interesting content. Videogame become to the more mature arts what candy is to nutritious food--pleasant junk.

Videogames are an adolecent medium, one that still has much opportunity to grow and mature. But to the players who enjoy them, not to mention the artisans who create them or even the academics who study them, videogames are a vibrant young medium that promises to provide the depth of experience seen in other art and entertainment forms.

Arguing that videogames have no impact on people--which is the nut of the videogames don't cause violence argument--is short sighted and, well, simply wrong.

Media, including videogames, may not have the casual influence to send someone into a violent rage, nor to cause them to fall in love or dip into depression. Then again, we know that media can get us to laugh, cry and scream with fright and delight. Media does have a power to influence.

Videogames should not face special censorship because of their content. At the same time, videogame creators should look at the price the comes with freedom of expression--the responsibility to create a range of experiences. To my mind, film has earned the right to produce violent dreck and sappy romantic triffles because the medium also creates great and important works as well. Videogames need to continue to expand the artistic palette of interactive entertainment as the best insurance against censorship.

In the meantime, humility and responsibility are in order. The violent content of games will not create a nation of murders. But let's be on guard that we also don't create a generation of soulless, mindless vidots either.