I also watched Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers somewhen around 13 and those movies deeply touched me. Yes, I was pretty much crying and trying not to vomit on the D-Day scene, but it left me with deep impression about horrors of war, something that school never gives you. I didn't become more violent because of that - on the contrary, it reinforced my wish for peace and compassion for people living in places trapped in war.
Funny. All the fake violence I saw as a child on TV desensitized me to the real violence I now see in the news.
I'm not even disturbed by beheading videos or actual raw footage of violent murders (i.e. whatever's new on LiveLeak this month). I don't seek them out directly or find them entertaining. I just don't have any more visceral reactions than to a video of a guy getting kicked in the groin.
I think some part of what my parents taught me about TV got lodged in the wrong part of my brain: "What you see on TV isn't real, it's just make believe." I do have very strong (and natural) reactions when seeing violence or cruelty in person. I just barely react to seeing these things on tape (beyond the ick factor). Except for (real) violence against animals, that is.
It's actually pretty gruelling what's considered acceptable to show on the 8 o'clock news these days. But I'm not sure whether this is a cultural thing again -- I hear American news channels have a policy of never showing dead US soldiers.
For me it's exactly the opposite - while I'm pretty desensitized to the TV violence (but not completely, I still feel bad about unnecessary killing, like poor guards getting executed because they were just in the way), I'm still extremely sensitive if I know what I'm seeing is real. The cry/try-not-to-vomit/get-angry-afterwards kind of sensitive.
I also watched Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers somewhen around 13 and those movies deeply touched me. Yes, I was pretty much crying and trying not to vomit on the D-Day scene, but it left me with deep impression about horrors of war, something that school never gives you. I didn't become more violent because of that - on the contrary, it reinforced my wish for peace and compassion for people living in places trapped in war.