Video Game Group Blasts U.N. Report About Online Harassment as "Flawed" and "Misguided"

The Entertainment Software Association, the body that represents the video game industry's interests in Washington and puts on E3 every year, has spoken out to criticize what it's calling "flawed" and "outdated" research about video games in a new United Nations report regarding online harassment against women.

The ESA takes issue with the report, "Cyber Violence Against Women and Girls," for the way in which it "utilizes hyperbolic, outlandish, and outdated notions of video games and gamers."

Specifically, the ESA points to a opinion article written in 2000 that the report cites. This article, called "Programmed to Kill: Video Games, Drugs, and The 'New Violence," is "rife with antiquated views from noted and debunked anti-video game figures," the ESA said.

The cited passage in question reads, "Recent research on how violent video games are turning children, mostly boys, into 'killing zombies' are also a part of mainstreaming violence. And while the presentation and analysis of this research is beyond the scope of this paper, the links to the core roots of the problem are very much in evidence and cannot be overlooked."

However, the ESA took issue with this. The organization said one of the article's contributors, Helga Zepp LaRouche, "Mistakenly reports that children as young as two abuse digital entertainment."

“This is an uninformed, misguided, and unfortunate report," ESA president and CEO Michael Gallagher said in a statement. "If the overall issue was not so serious, it would be laughable that the U.N. is citing this work. It is willful ignorance to utilize such incredibly outlandish and outdated data."

He added: “ESA strongly supports empowering women and minorities and creating an inclusive digital environment that welcomes all perspectives. However, the U.N. does this important issue a great disservice and undercuts its credibility by spreading ridiculous stereotypes and false opinions."

The ESA went on went to say that medical professionals, researchers, and courts "all debunk the fundamental thesis" of the article. The organization pointed to a US Supreme Court ruling that found that “psychological studies purporting to show a connection between exposure to violent video games and harmful effects on children do not prove that such exposure causes minors to act aggressively."