“If you don’t feel like blowing stuff up, you can jump in a cop car and run over criminals.”

So if 20-something guys aren't all the babe-chasing, Xbox-playing caricatures that haunt Kay Hymowitz's fevered dreams (see previous post), who exactly are they?

Stay tuned for some interviews.

In the meantime, it turns out that contrary to what Hymowitz might suspect, at least some young men playing Xbox are indeed married with children--and just looking for some escapist fun. An article in last Monday's Times, about the new release of the videogame Grand Theft Auto IV, quotes one 27-year-old Oklahoma man, a floor manager at a tribal casino. J. R. Jobe has says he's been putting aside a little bit from his weekly paycheck--after the rent, the gas, and the kids' lunches--for a $60 escape.

“My wife wants me to go shopping or go to P.T.A. meetings, and sometimes I don’t want to do that,” he said. He thinks he is entitled to something in return. “I explain to her: When I get off work, it’s my way to calm down. It’s like my cigarette.”

This guy clearly feels that some major aspects of his domestic setup don't give him time for himself (I think: welcome to parenthood, buddy). I also wonder if he thinks something about P.T.A. meetings and shopping are feminizing. If so, he'd join a loud chorus of people who talk about all the ways in which contemporary culture, education, and religion are feminizing (and thus alienating) for men.

In the meantime, I want to blog more in another post about the lure of videogames themselves. I mean, clearly they are a component of young men's lives. Apparently, sales of the $60 game will top five million within two weeks of release--this at a time when large chunks of the third world are rioting for their next meal and the cost for a tank of gas brings up thoughts of a second mortgage.

One business school professor in the Times points to the "superstimulating artificial environment" in which "players face constant challenges and receive instant feedback."

Our casino manager puts it another way: “You can go along with the stories, which are pretty good, or you can just play around and blow stuff up...[i]f you don’t feel like blowing stuff up, you can jump in a cop car and run over criminals.”

And if running over criminals isn't superstimulating enough? I shudder to think.