As I caught up with an old friend over Spring Break back home, I realized it had been quite a while since I had played with my old Sega Genesis console.

Yeah, yeah- Sega is as old as day, but at one point in my life it created a sense of satisfaction that could only be gained by collecting the golden rings in “Sonic & Knuckles.”

I looked back at how my days were once spent walking on coal in Sega’s “Aladdin” and I realized something that put horror in my eyes. Something terrible had happened since I was six years old: video games had taken a turn for the worse.

Imagine these: a three year-old intensely playing “Mortal Kombat,” determined to kill his opponent; a six year-old playing “Golden Eye” and learning which weapon shoots best in the foggy distance; a ten year-old coaxing a street corner prostitute to enter his car only to shoot her and drive away.

If the following phrase doesn’t enter your mind- even for a second- something has got to be terribly wrong with you: “WHAT. THE. HELL?!”

I couldn’t believe what ridiculous words my ears heard when I asked my 13 year-old cousin what the big deal was about such games. The response was simple yet shocking. “It’s fun.”

Fun? Killing people for no reason is fun? No sooner had the phrase registered in my mind than the question that followed: “Why on EARTH are these games the most popular in today’s video game market?”

I quickly noted the number of games from my childhood that included such violence and came to…oh…one.

I remembered “Mortal Kombat” on Sega Genesis (though I did not own it), but also recalled its less violent nature. Less blood, less brutality, less everything.

Maybe that’s why everything has changed. Maybe kids just needed that extra kick in their day- the extra blood splatter to ensure happiness in life. No, no- let’s hope not.

Today, games such as “Halo,” “Call of duty,” “Grand Theft Auto,” and their many predecessors and successors take the cake.

Though all of these games are rated for mature audiences only, it’s difficult to ignore the large amounts of youth playing such games.

So what’s the big deal? One person tells me this behavior is absolutely harmless and is just clean fun for the youth. Another person tells me that such behavior can have consequences that are unthinkable.

While I’d love to believe the former, I just can’t help but align with the latter.

An eight year-old boy sent shivers down my spine when he told me, “In Grand Theft Auto, all you do is shoot people and crash cars. You have to make sure your drug deals run okay, though. And then, in the end, you just get high and die. It’s awesome.”

Awesome. The word used to describe the act of killing and causing pain to others for absolutely no point is apparently “awesome.”

If you’re walking on the street and a six year-old points his two fingers at you to form a gun, you would just continue walking and perhaps even chuckle to yourself.

Envision, then, that same six year-old twenty years later and, this time, as you walk past him, it’s not his fingers he’s pointing at you but a real gun. Would you still chuckle? Is it still harmless?

Youth don’t just see violence on their television sets or in movies anymore. They see it on their computer screens and the gun in front of their eyes doesn’t belong to Sean Connery anymore- the gun belongs to them. They are the ones to pull the trigger this time.

If we aren’t careful about the amount of violence in the media available to the youth today, we could end up fighting a war with the ideals we, ourselves, put in their heads- and who knows who will win.

Nureen Gulamali is a freshman advertising and sociology double major. She can be reached for comment at [email protected].