Attitude manipulation of children through play

Nature

Games may teach children to act aggressively by rewards for such behaviour, or instil in them a value that competitiveness is a virtue. Games may reduce children to accept violence as a norm, and to use force themselves. Children's play, and in particular manufactured games, teach deception, bluffing and lying, placing considerable value on cunning or trickiness.

Claim

In children's play, especially as devised by manufacturers, there is too much of the attitude 'winning is everything'. In play designed and supervised by figures of authority (parents, teachers, recreation workers), fear and respect of the hierarchy is reinforced and the concept is instilled that one 'must follow the rules'. Many ideological movements seek to control children's development and see an opportunity, especially in their recreation, to indoctrinate political ideas.