On July 3, The New York Times published an article with the headline, "Why some men don't work: Video games have gotten really good." On Saturday, Kyle Smith at the New York Post decided to get in on the anti-game hysteria with a column titled, "We're losing a whole generation of young men to video games."

If you've consumed news regularly for years, you might groan and say, "Oh, this again?" You might say that either because this is far from the first time video games have been blamed for society's ills, or because you're old enough to remember any of the times pieces of new or misunderstood pop culture have been treated as folk devils. If it's not rock music, it's comic books. If it's not the way Elvis moves his hips, it's Dungeons and Dragons.

Frankly, I'm surprised the articles aren't just about fidget spinners. Give it time, I guess.

A film critic melodramatically says games are bad for society. Change "games" to "comic books" and subtract 70 years. Familiar? https://t.co/IKRYUy0UQb — Dan Amrich (@DanAmrich) July 10, 2017

The genesis of these articles is a recently-released paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research which "argues that video games help explain why younger men are working fewer hours," according to The New York Times. The paper links two statistics: The fact that men ages 21 to 30 are working 203 fewer hours a year, and the fact that leisure time spent on video games in the same group went up.

There are many potential flaws in this conclusion that the Times article doesn't fully address. For instance, you have a chicken-or-egg situation when you ask, "Are these men playing more games because they are struggling to get more desired hours at work, or do they desire to work less hours because it means they can play more games?" Correlation does not equal causation.

There is also the overlooked fact that leisure time spent on "recreational computer time" actually saw a bigger increase than "video games" among men age 21-30, according to the study, and more hours per week are spent on that as a whole, which makes one wonder why video games are being singled out.

But the Times piece at least takes data and tries to interpret it through the use of science-minded people (though, again, I think the methods and reasoning leave much to be desired). The same can't be said for the column in the New York Post.

In his piece, Smith talks about a time in the mid-'90s when he got addicted to Civilization, a turn-based strategy game by designer Sid Meier in which you craft a civilization from scratch and guide it from the Stone Age to the Space Age, constantly making decisions about research, politics, religion and more.

"After a while I realized that becoming master of a fake world was not worth the dozens of hours a month it was costing me," Smith says, "and with profound regret I stashed my floppy disk of Civilization in a box and pushed it deep into my closet. I hope I never get addicted to anything like Civilization again."

He goes on to argue that because he was happy while he was addicted to Civilization, today's young men (and he does specify men, despite the consistently proven fact that women play games, too), are so content with their virtual lives that they have no motivation to get out into the world and, say, get a job.

"Every hour spent on Ghost Recon or Grand Theft Auto V is an hour that could have been spent more productively," Smith says. And while he admits that video games aren't alone in that category (he cites golf as an example), he gives into the painful cliche of adding, "but rarely do you hear that someone has quit his job and is living in Mom's basement obsessing over putting."

Also, the telephone will end all personal relationships, and the automobile will fail because it scares the horses. https://t.co/cPgtqe5pZ5 — Seamus Blackley (@SeamusBlackley) July 9, 2017

First of all, can we please let go of the "Mom's basement" thing? Not only is it typically untrue, it's also tired. If it was ever funny, it stopped being funny more than a decade ago. Secondly, Smith should source the idea that anybody is quitting their job to go live with their parents and play Call of Duty. The research he cites (the same research from the aforementioned NYT piece) only talks about men working fewer hours, not leaving work entirely.

He's not wrong about how a game like Civilization can get its hooks in you. Last year saw the release of Civilization VI, and it can still keep you up playing for hours. What he doesn't recognize, however, is what he might have been gaining as he played the game so many years ago. Civilization in particular can teach players a lot about problem-solving and even world history, often without the player even realizing he's absorbing real knowledge.

Smith does throw video game enthusiasts a bone, at least, acknowledging that "the 1990s fear that playing first-person shooter games turns you into a violent psycho has been debunked."

The problem is that Smith assumes that he would not have become a productive member of society had he not given up Civilization. But that takes an enormous leap in logic.

I fit the profile of young men being talked about in this column and in the original study. Personally, I spent more than 50 hours in March playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and it was far from the only game I played in that time span. The majority of my leisure time, in fact, is spent playing a wide variety of video games.

Granted, I don't do a lot of the "usual" leisure activities that might eat up other hours of my time. I don't watch or play sports regularly. I don't attend concerts. I don't socialize often (especially when there's alcohol involved, as I don't drink). Instead, I play games for many hours every week.

And yet I have career. I have a wonderful marriage. I own a house. I regularly see my family and friends.

Because despite what some people want to tell you, it's entirely possible to spend dozens of hours a month on a recreational hobby and still lead a productive and fulfilling life.

None of this is to say that the video game industry is perfect. Large pockets of gaming fandom struggle with rampant sexism, racism and toxicity. Online harassment, both in-game and outside of it, is increasingly worrisome. And just like other forms of media, corporate pursuit of larger profits regularly threatens to overshadow games that are created as art.

People can be obsessed with anything. You probably know somebody who is way too obsessed with fantasy football. Others are addicted to reality TV. For some, the addiction might be trashy romance novels. Whatever the vice of choice, it's up to individuals to enjoy their leisure activities in moderation.

In other words: Video games don't kill work ethics, people do.