The South Korean Netflix series has broken numerous streaming records. One study suggests that young people in particular have fewer problems with violence.
Frankfurt – The Netflix series “Squid Game” is only around two months old and is already considered a kind of cult. The South Korean concoction has recorded more than 100 million views and was number one on the streaming service’s charts in numerous countries. And the social satire that lets 456 highly indebted people around the main character Gi-hun compete with and against each other in deadly “games” has long since seeped into everyday life.
In numerous schools and even daycare centers, for example, children not only re-enacted the “games” shown in “Squid Game”, but sometimes also punished losers with beatings. Among other things, this led to school and Kita administrators calling on parents not to let their children watch the sometimes bloody series. Psychologists warned against trauma. And a woman in South Korea was showered with dozens of calls because her number happened to appear in “Squid Game”.
According to the K-Drama page KBizoom, the person concerned has already had to delete more than 4000 different numbers of the uninvited callers, the phone’s battery groans from the frequent calls and messages and regularly runs empty. This led Netflix to offer the woman a million won as compensation. This sum currently corresponds to around 725 euros.
Study: 93 percent consider “Squid Game” to be “brutal” – and yet give it 4 out of 5 stars
The Institute for Generational Research in Augsburg provided the Frankfurter Rundschau exclusively with the results of a wide-ranging survey. A total of 2025 people were selected as a representative and surveyed according to various criteria. The data collected in this way show some astonishing trends.
Although around 93 percent of those surveyed classify “Squid Game” as “brutal”, the series achieved four out of five possible stars. The following applies: the younger the respondents, the better the series was rated. In general, the younger generation seems to have fewer problems with the violence shown in the Netflix series. But there are also significant differences between the sexes. While 83 percent of women over 50 when asked whether they would describe “Squid Game” as “brutal” “fully” agreed, only 40 percent of men of the same age agreed. In the age group under 26, 69 percent of women and 56 percent of men “fully” agreed.
Psychologist Rüdiger Maas, head of the Institute for Generation Research, sees this as a consolidating trend: “As early as 2018, in the Generation Thinking study, we found that the attitudes of the sexes in the younger generation are increasingly converging. This survey also shows that the younger the respondents, the smaller the difference in response behavior between the sexes. “
Study leader Maas on “Squid Game”: “Youth emotionally dulled”
Further questions confirmed that older people in particular associate negative things with “Squid Game”. For example, 41 percent of those over 50 stated that they found the Netflix series “stressful”. In the age group of 40 to 49 year olds, still 35 percent, whereas only around half of 27 to 39 year olds and those under 26 agreed (17 and 18 percent, respectively).
| series | Squid Game |
|---|---|
| Streming service | Netflix |
| First broadcast | September 17, 2021 |
| genre | Social satire / drama / horror |
| idea | Hwang Dong-hyuk |
“Here a desensitization seems to have taken place with regard to the media consumption of extreme representations”, concludes the institute’s director Maas, “through the early use of digital media, young people are confronted with a lot of violence in the media at an early age, which may affect them emotionally with regard to such series dull. “But not only that:” Many strive for more and more extreme content. “
This can also be seen in the rating with regard to an age rating. While Netflix recommends a minimum age of 16 years, respondents of all age groups have spoken out in favor of only starting the series from 18 years of age. Here, too, there is a staircase: the older the respondents, the greater their approval of a stricter age rating. While only a little more than half of the under 26-year-olds are in favor of a release from the age of 18, it is more than three-quarters in the age group over 65 years of age.
90 percent of the study participants want to keep children away from “Squid Game”
The vast majority of respondents agree that “Squid Game” is not for children. 90 percent of the respondents are of the opinion that watching “Squid Game” has negative effects on children. 66 percent think copying the series among children is “very problematic”, only 30 percent say the same about playing with toy guns. A mere five percent of those surveyed said that parents should allow their children to watch “Squid Game”.
However, there are enormous differences between the age groups on this issue as well. While around 80 percent of those over 40 said that watching “Squid Game” would make children “dull”, only 48 percent of those under 27 agreed with this statement.
And the study produced another amazing finding. 93 percent stated that they did not want to take part in a “game” like “Squid Games” themselves. The vast majority of the same respondents, however, believed that others would be able to imagine participating. Specifically, 59 percent said that they can imagine that people “would actually take part in such a ‘game’”. Another 23 percent ticked “Yes, but not in our society”.
Study leader Maas on “Squid Game”: “We would never take part ourselves, but we would like to watch others torment themselves here”
Graduate psychologist Maas takes a critical view of this result: “We are seeing an increasing drifting apart here. On the one hand, people in our culture would never take part in a ‘game’ like ‘Squid Game’, but they can imagine that others will do so. In other words: We would never take part ourselves, but we would like to watch others torment themselves here. “
The YouTuber Jimmy Donaldson, better known as “MrBeast”, seems to want to take advantage of this fact. The 23-year-old, whose channel is currently followed by 75.4 million accounts, is one of the most successful YouTubers worldwide and has made it a multiple millionaire. Overall, Donaldson has more than 120 million subscribers with additional accounts and, according to the US American Forbes magazine, is said to have earned $ 24 million in 2020 alone with advertising, merchandising and sponsorship.
Donaldson uses his wealth for various charitable projects and promised his followers on Twitter that he would donate all of his money before his death because he “refuses” to lead a “materialistic” life. His greatest YouTube successes are similar to the “Squid Game” principle. From many participants, the last one in the game wins a large sum of money. Now “MrBeast” wants to expand its “game collection” with a variant based on the Netflix hit. (Mirko Schmid)
