Site icon NuAngel.net

Let's all blame violent video games!

Well all know where this will end up. Do I even have to get in to the ring? It’s obvious where I stand in this fight. Be warned, below is an EDITORIAL blog post – it has nothing to do with the rest of this site or anything else I do with the remaining hours in my day. You’re reading at your own risk.

Violent video games didn’t make postal workers go postal (although, that whole mess did spawn a game that pushes the limits of taste). Games didn’t bully the kids at Columbine. Cyberbullying popular girls is a pitiful thing to pin suicide on – imagine what us fat kids put up with every single day in gym class? People owning guns isn’t a big problem for me, I grew up in a house with several shotguns, rifles, etc… true – I did not grow up in a house with an Uzi, but c’mon – I was in Pennsylvania – everybody had a gun. Still, when someone tells you that ‘your blood boils and you feel like more of a man when you fire a gun’ you might get a little nervous. But then they say ‘violent video games shot my testosterone through the roof and made me feel on edge’ and they think that the GAMES are the thing that should be banned? When you were saying both of those things, I’ll tell you which one made me more uncomfortable! Both had the same effect on your, right? The same effect a Hollywood movie might? Which one could have enabled you to kill people? Hint: not the joystick.

I read an article which showed that Americans spend a lot of money on video games, but countries that spend even more than we do have far less gun violence. There’s NO correlation between the two. One commenter said, in essence, ‘yeah, but America has more guns than anyone else – this article doesn’t make sense.’ Which was the whole point of the article. The two statistics are so far out of whack and so completely unrelated that it doesn’t make sense to blame video games, and the commenter made the argument for the anti-gun people in his own words: America has more guns. Maybe if there were fewer, there’d be less violence? Or at least less violence that enables killing sprees? Sure, people would bash each other with baseball bats all day long, but you can’t kill 20 people with a bat without someone stopping you first (note: this is not a challenge to anyone).

I don’t have the answers. And I don’t really care. I’m not picking my politicians based on where they stand on an issue about guns. It doesn’t impact me. I don’t own any guns, not interested, I know how to fire them should the need arise. More guns, less guns, I don’t care. I don’t think banning guns is a solution, they’re already out there. It’s pointless to try. I’m sure tomorrow’s statement from the NRA will blame video games, but I don’t blame the NRA for the shootings. It comes down to people. That’s all there is to it. If someone took a PS3 disc out of their console, broke it in half, and started slashing people as they ran down the street, then you could blame video games. But, last I checked, that wasn’t the murder weapon of choice for… anyone. Ever.

Call of Duty doesn’t make me want to kill people. And Leisure Suit Larry never got me laid.

Exit mobile version