Game Industry Holding Breath Over Utah Gunman

Submitted by James Munn on February 13, 2007 – 12:00 pm10 Comments

newt1.utah4.tues.ap.jpg On Monday evening, an unidentified teenage gunman in a trench coat, carrying a shotgun and a handgun, opened fire in a historic shopping mall in Salt Lake City, Utah. When the dust settled in Trolley Square shopping mall, five people are dead and four more were wounded. It’s a tragic event that forces us all to reach for those closest to us and squeeze them for just a moment longer; this is something the families of the victims in Utah have been denied of for the rest of their lives. My heart goes out to them.

After the initial shock of a horrid event such as this subsides in the media, the focus will turn towards the gunman. Sadly, this is a storyline we’ve all seen unfold in recent years. An expressionless teenager in a trench coat, with weapons he had no reason to carry, firing blindly into a crowd. The masses will be looking for a reason why such an unthinkable act has taken place.

The gunman’s life will be examined, piece by piece, looking for clues to this senseless crime. It will unfortunately go far beyond how he acquired the weapons of death that he wielded on the Utah shopping mall. We will eventually be seeing journals and sketchbooks, anything and everything the media can get their hands on they will broadcast for the world to see. We’ll find out what was his favorite food, his favorite music but none of that will be assumed to blame. We’ll find out the medication he might have been prescribed but even that probably won’t garner any of the blame. I’d love to blame the media for all of this but I simply can’t, the masses obviously want to hear all of this.

Then maybe there will be a sketch or a note to a friend. It might be a passing remark or an empty threat to a schoolmate. Chances are a teenager of modern times in middle-America, has played a video game at one point in his life. We’ll find out soon enough if a particular game was his favorite and it’s hard to believe that the video game industry is looking forward to that report. Politicians will once again get involved, possibly leveraging this story along with their personal agenda. I’m sure they’ll blame the video game industry for corrupting our youth. Expect names like Hillary and Lieberman to grace your television screens soon.

This might be yet another moment when the video game industry and their gaming community will need to stand together to condemn this young man

The Brain

Oh, poor Capcom if this kid ever came anywhere near Dead Rising.
http://www.infendo.com Jack

You know, I hate Jack Thompson and his ilk as much as the next gamer, but after a while, you have to stop blaming people like him for the negative backlash against gaming (believe me, he specifically deserves it) and look for other causes. That includes looking at violent video games as the cause of the problem. If this is the case with this string of violence as well, well then gamers might have to get off their high horse for once and face the new reality. I hope that this is not the case.
http://www.aeropause.com George

Since I live in Utah, I can pretty safely say that video games are the furthest thing from everyone’s minds right now. Granted, this may change in a few months, but right now the communities around here are in a kind of haze… We’re too busy thinking “OMG, that could have been me…”

IF video games come up as a reason for this kind of crap… seriously… I’m at a loss for words to describe the kind of disrespect that kind of statement would require.

But thanks for posting this, James. I wasn’t sure anyone outside of Utah would want to hear about it…
Maxathon

No, Jack. I will not begin “looking at violent video games as the cause of the problem.” Violent video games are not the cause of adolescent men lashing out violently in real life. Art forms of all kinds portray deviant acts, whether violent, sexual or otherwise in nature. Yet, aside from video games, people generally realize that these art forms are reflecting–rather than causing–similar acts in real life.

Video games are singled out for one simple reason: the medium is young. Comic books were censored for decades based on the same shallow arguments we see advanced against games. Only as people became more accustomed to comics did they realize that the form did not hold some magical power over the minds of the young, as its critics had claimed.

The same will in time prove true of video games. I can only hope that we will not have to suffer through a “Games Code Authority” before reaching that point.
DRINKxREDxBULL

Thank you Maxathon for that excellent response.

Jack Thompson is probably having an orgasm right now thinking about how much this will help him end violence.

On the other hand, he might be sad that the timing wasn’t better, like right before GTAIV launches.
Dannyboy

Yeah sure videogames have violent themes and content, but please, people who go out and unrelentingly kill people have something wrong with them. A video game won’t make you to behave like this, it has to be in your psychology. Normal people know the difference between reality and make believe.
Mac

I have one question for everyone, if video games were the problem, what would you do? some things are more important, people’s lives. instead of caring about the negative backlash this will cause the industry, lets think about how we can prevent this.

My heart goes out to the victims friends and family
Maxathon

You want to play this hypothetical “what if video games were the problem” game? Fine. Let’s play.

If video games were the problem, then movies, music, visual and performance art, plays and books would also be the problem. You cannot single out one without indicting all artistic forms of expression that deal with violence. And if all these things were “the problem” in the sense of somehow acting as catalysts for violent behavior in individuals who were already troubled, then–get this–I would still not censor video games.

Instead, I would up public funding for social services dealing with education and mental health. Because I believe that stifling all those forms of artistic expression is bad, and that people so deeply troubled as to murder strangers would act out similarly regardless.

But I don’t believe that video games are the problem, and lord knows you don’t have the evidence or cognitive capacity to prove it. There have always been sick people. Elisabeth Bathory, Vlad Tepes and Gilles De Rais didn’t play video games. In the aggregate, our world and society is probably less violent now than it has ever been in the past.
http://www.infendo.com Jack

Max, you make good points, but sound angry, or full of angst, or both. I suggest you stay away from violent video games for the time being, just to be safe.
Maxathon

Begone, troll.