# Don't we have an obligation as a society to look at ways to ban violent computer shooter games? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 16, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210 "2012-12-16T19:49:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/101 "2012-12-19T00:52:53Z")
**aceplace57** , Buddy, Pal… Wha…what are you doing?? You admit that you haven’t read the studies, that you are unfamiliar with the science, that you argue from ignorance. Many folks here _have_ read the studies and understood the math. They seem to agree that the connection you _expect_ to be there …just ain’t there. It has been debunked. There have been links proving that rampage killings predate video games. These links show that rampage killings have happened in schools, places of worship, places of business, various modes of transportation, homes and neighborhoods…they have used bombs, grenades, knives, sickles, flamethrowers, cars and of course, guns. These have happened all over the freaking world. Lots happened before video games were invented. Lots committed by people who have never seen a video game. Why would you hold on to that assumption in the light of convincing available evidence to the contrary? Do you have an emotional investment? Do you just not like violent video games? ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/102 "2012-12-19T01:02:13Z")
I’m still waiting for someone to show me one single example of a person committing murder with a violent video game. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/103 "2012-12-19T01:45:41Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Something is going on. Americans have owned guns since the American Revolution. They didn’t walk into movie theaters or schools and just start randomly shooting until the last fifteen years. The abhorrent behavior needs to be studied and hopefully some solution found. The man who carried out the worst attack on a school - the one with the highest body count - in US history **never** played a single video game. Why? Because when he killed 45 people and wounded 58 others, it was back in 1927. People leave it off the list of “worst school shootings” because the fellow decided he needed something more effective than a gun; instead over the course of several months he surreptitiously put explosives in the school, and detonated his bombs one morning after murdering his wife at home and blowing up his own house. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/104 "2012-12-19T02:05:43Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I’m still waiting for someone to show me one single example of a person committing murder with a violent video game. Lots of murders are committed using violent video games. Of course they’re all virtual. ---
**Author:** ![Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/aca169/32.png) [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inbred_Mm_domesticus)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/105 "2012-12-19T04:11:31Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Lots of murders are committed using violent video games. Anyone who saw me play would also blame lots of suicides on violent video games as well. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/106 "2012-12-19T04:18:11Z")
Lanza was a gamer after all. I wonder who the prominent gamer is that called for a national day of “ceasefire” ? [http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8](http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8) > [@](#): > > As scrutiny of the Newtown, Conn., massacre continued on Capitol Hill Tuesday, Democratic lawmakers pointed fingers at another culprit in addition to the nation’s gun laws: Violent video games. > > Reports that school shooter Adam Lanza played such video games as “Call of Duty” and “Starcraft” led some members of Congress to call for more scrutiny of an entertainment culture they say glorifies violence, as one prominent gamer called for a national day of “ceasefire” for those who play online shooting games. > > “I think we need to do everything possible we can to prevent such tragedies, including addressing the culture of violence that may be spawned by video games,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) told POLITICO Tuesday. > > From the floor of the Senate on Tuesday, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), meanwhile, called for a national commission on violence that looks not only at gun laws but the entertainment industry to examine the underlying reasons behind shootings such as those in Newtown. > > “Everything has to be on the table, including our gun laws, but a commission also needs to examine the effect the entertainment industry has on our culture,” Lieberman said. > > “Very often, these young men have had an almost hypnotic involvement in some form of violence in our entertainment culture, particularly violent video games, and then they obtain guns and become not just troubled young men but mass murderers,” he added. ---
**Author:** ![shijinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@shijinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shijinn)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/107 "2012-12-19T04:24:15Z")
Starcraft is a violent video game? these particular members of Congress is even more out of touch than you are. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/108 "2012-12-19T04:24:23Z")
Found it. Guess this guy is known in the gamer community? [http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8](http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8) > [@](#): > > Meanwhile, GamerFitNation founder Antwand Pearman issued a national call for a one-day ceasefire among players of online shooting games. According to reports on gaming sites, Pearman wants gamers to “just put your controller down and show your love” on Friday for a “day of ceasefire for online shooters.” > [@](#): > > Even David Axelrod, President Barack Obama’s political consultant, spoke up about the matter. > > “[S]houldn’t we also quit marketing murder as a game?” Axelrod tweeted on Sunday, apparently disturbed by an “ad for shoot ‘em up video game.” ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/109 "2012-12-19T04:45:12Z")
nn ---
**Author:** ![Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/aca169/32.png) [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inbred_Mm_domesticus)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/110 "2012-12-19T04:50:02Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Found it. Guess this guy is known in the gamer community? > > [http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8](http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/hill-eyes-video-game-use-by-shooter-85255.html?hp=l8) He’s a household name among gamers actually. I have his poster on my wall. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/111 "2012-12-19T05:07:18Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Lanza was a gamer after all. That was already established upthread. Starcraft is not a first person shooter game, and Lieberman has been peddling the blame-the-games bullshit since Columbine. I’m glad he’s leaving office. To be honest about this, people in the upper levels of the federal government haven’t played current videogames. Lieberman is 70. Axelrod is 57. There have to be some people in those age groups who play games like Call of Duty, but not as many as in younger age groups. So it’s easy for them to talk about the supposed deleterious effects of something they have no firsthand experience with. That’s pretty much the same thing that happened with comic books, Dungeons and Dragons, violent movies, rap, metal, and everything else: older people get scared of some new form of entertainment, say it’s different and worse and scarier than anything that ever came before, and it must be bad for kids and causing all kinds of problems. Then little or nothing happens and life goes on because even if people who are predisposed to violence are attracted to violent entertainment, the entertainment is not the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/112 "2012-12-19T05:09:15Z")
> [@shijinn](#): > > Starcraft is a violent video game? these particular members of Congress is even more out of touch than you are. Actually, if your idea of how to wage war is to sit someplace far removed from the fight and send your troops in to commit mayhem and get slaughtered, Starcraft is pretty freaking realistic. So, for some members of Congress, maybe… ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/113 "2012-12-19T05:11:42Z")
I hope Congress looks at games, entertainment, guns, law enforcement and of course mental health issues. Look at everything and try to find a solution. Assuming there is a solution. There may not be one. I realize games won’t be banned. Neither will guns other than renewing the assault weapon ban. Maybe the ratings on games could be strengthened? Restrict the violent ones to adults over 18. \ I know kids will still get their hands on them. Just like they get cigarettes and booze. It’s pretty hopeless isn’t it? We will have more killings eventually no matter what. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/114 "2012-12-19T05:16:25Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > I’m hope Congress looks at games, entertainment, guns, law enforcement and of course mental health issues. Look at everything and try to find a solution. Let’s have some evidence games and entertainment are part of the problem before we start “solving” them. > [@](#): > > Maybe the ratings on games could be strengthened? Restrict the violent ones to adults over 18. That’s already how it works. And if the ratings system isn’t that effective, I’d say the MPAA ratings system isn’t either - and it really shouldn’t be. Those are recommendations, not the law. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/115 "2012-12-19T05:18:32Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Maybe the ratings on games could be strengthened? Restrict the violent ones to adults over 18. Why? You’ve yet to demonstrate they are dangerous in any way. Heck, with digital distribution, you can’t even swat someone with the CD case! ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/116 "2012-12-19T05:49:43Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > I hope Congress looks at games, entertainment, guns, law enforcement and of course mental health issues. Look at everything and try to find a solution. Assuming there is a solution. There may not be one. Unfortunately, on this subject, Congress is very nearly as ignorant as you are. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/117 "2012-12-19T10:58:22Z")
> [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](#): > > Anyone who saw me play would also blame lots of suicides on violent video games as well. _ **Inbred Mm domesticus** fragged his own dumb self_ 😛 I just love when they don’t even understand the kinds of games they’re trying to blame. ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/118 "2012-12-19T11:17:14Z")
When I was playing minecraft for days at a time, I started “seeing” the real world like minecraft. I kept thinking how cool it would be to go around and mine a block out of a street lamp post, or the corner of a building. We can all be thankful I just wasn’t in possession of a pickax, or lord knows what would have happened. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/119 "2012-12-19T12:15:47Z")
I admit, Oblivion did give me the urge to pick random flowers “for alchemy”. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2012, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210/120 "2012-12-19T12:39:44Z")
And you don’t want to go Christmas shopping at the mall after playing Dead Rising, because combining a paddle with a chainsaw starts looking like a good option after the third person runs right into you while not paying attention. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dont-we-have-an-obligation-as-a-society-to-look-at-ways-to-ban-violent-computer-shooter-games/644210.md?page=7)