So the arizona shooter was a gamer

ANGRYWOLF

ANGRYWOLF

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http://gonintendo.com/viewstory.php?id=147050


I hope that doesn't mean we're all potential assassins.

rotfl.

I don't know what kinds of games he played. Don't really care.

It might be a noteworthy topic of discusssion as to whether mentally ill people gravitate to the hobby and if anyone here has ever known someone like him.

:holyshit:
 
For now I won't even touch the political side of this.

Still; the video game thing is crap. I play excess amounts of Heretic, Doom, and other FPS games, but I can easily say I've not felt the slightest urge to go on a murder rampage.

Hell, I don't even fantasize about shooting my boss of five years whom I deeply dislike. He's a pain, but I don't feel like going out and hurting him, even if I do enjoy Doom to an excess.
 
I can care less of what the media and lobbyists against violent video games have to say whenever they do decide to make a big issue about this. Video games always end up being an easy scapegoat whenever tragedies like this occur, there are always going to be debates about this and they usually come round full circle and go nowhere. Is there any real evidence - let alone proof - that games unlock violence in people? No. Not yet as of now. Otherwise you'll be seeing a lot more of this kind of violence then around the world.

Or maybe the majority of us just aren't exactly batshit insane people who decide that shooting politicians at point blank range as well as killing several others including a little girl would be in any way a just thing to do. Loughner is certainly one of these batshit insane people whose motives are still not actually clear at the moment. Many Democrats pin the blame on the vitriolic hate of the right wing, and inevitably some people are pinning the blame on violent things in the media. It's just jumping the gun here. We don't know yet. All we know is that he's just fucking insane, probably already warped before getting into contact with certain games. If violent games do have an effect, would it be exactly fair to, I dunno, impose harsh restrictions on them just because a tiny minority have their screws loose? That depends on what kind of principle you follow, but I'm certainly not buying this link between Laughner and video games that seriously.
 
Fleur said:
I can care less of what the media and lobbyists against violent video games have to say whenever they do decide to make a big issue about this. Video games always end up being an easy scapegoat whenever tragedies like this occur, there are always going to be debates about this and they usually come round full circle and go nowhere. Is there any real evidence - let alone proof - that games unlock violence in people? No. Not yet as of now. Otherwise you'll be seeing a lot more of this kind of violence then around the world.

Or maybe the majority of us just aren't exactly batshit insane people who decide that shooting politicians at point blank range as well as killing several others including a little girl would be in any way a just thing to do. Loughner is certainly one of these batshit insane people whose motives are still not actually clear at the moment. Many Democrats pin the blame on the vitriolic hate of the right wing, and inevitably some people are pinning the blame on violent things in the media. It's just jumping the gun here. We don't know yet. All we know is that he's just fucking insane, probably already warped before getting into contact with certain games. If violent games do have an effect, would it be exactly fair to, I dunno, impose harsh restrictions on them just because a tiny minority have their screws loose? That depends on what kind of principle you follow, but I'm certainly not buying this link between Laughner and video games that seriously.
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This, exactly. The only person responsible for what he did was him. Why can't people just stop tossing blame around, honestly, I'm so tired of seeing people not recognize that individuals are responsible for their own actions :ffs:

TBH I'm not sure whether he's actually mentally ill or not though, because a lot of times people will call "mentally ill" on someone who just doesn't care about what happens to other people. It may seem crazy to most people in society, but I think that's also because we have a standard of not going around being violent towards others, because of the pain it can cause. Some people on the other hand, could be technically "sane" and just not care about others, which I have a feeling may be what happened in this case. It would be better if they could make that connection in this case, so that he can't just plead insanity and get off easier than he might otherwise :jtc:
 
I can't even really form a proper debate about this, the media use games as an excuse for peoples behaviour because something has to take the blame and gaming is an easy excuse. We might as well argue that violent people are violent because of the programs on TV, just an equally valid and stupid excuse as blaming games. :ffs:
 
Apparently Loughner had been in an online game called Earth Empires:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70B5ZL20110112

http://www.earthempires.com/

Apparently he was disruptive while a member and was kicked out.

I don't like mmo games.
shrugs.

I don't blame games for psyhotic behaviors.Of course some members of the media do as do certain so-called experts.

My guess is the guy is a psycho, and his parents probably should have sought help for him and they didn't.I don't blame them though. It's hard to know when to intervene.

I am sorry this sad event happened and my heart goes out to the victims.
I do believe in the death penalty, a topic for a separate discussion.
 
They've also tried blaming it on WikiLeaks and even tried doing the whole 'oh he listens to this music so that must be the blame' thing, ala Judas Priest, Marilyn Manson, etc.

Yet KNOBODY has put a gun to the head of Justin fucking Bieber and pulled the god damn trigger! American assasins need to get some perspective on their kills, srsly.
 
I find it irritating how a lot of people often blame any form of entertainment to get to provide an easy solution. My grandfather's one of those people, and he occasionally speaks to me about how if I keep on playing violent video games that I'm going to slack off at school and it'll get infested in my mind and other junk like that. Yes, I play video games and watch TV shows that involve someone getting killed in them, but they don't change my opinion that homicide is a selfish act and I would never condone it myself or to anyone else - and I know that there are plenty of other people that agree. The way I see it, saying something like "He started a shooting because he's been playing shooter games so much" is like saying "That girl is gay because she hangs out with a lot of homosexual people." There are definitely more logical causes that lead to an effect - whatever the topic may be.
​
 
Being a huge fan of literature, it's safe to say that things come up in books that games would never touch, and books are considered socially acceptable - held up as an invaluable form of media, even. Placing the blame on videogames is just absurd, and won't get to the root of the problem. As Fleur said, we're just jumping to conclusions at this point no matter what we assume about him.

Games can do a great job of blurring the line between fantasy and reality, but no more than books, movies, music, any immersion focused media. The people I know that are least mentally stable and I would consider most dangerous have neither interest in gaming, nor the creativity required for most types of it.
 
Video games don't make you do this stuff.

Why can't it just so happen to be that he PLAYED the games? Why do they have to always blame video games for this? :rage:

I play Shooter games all the time, all kinds of games like God of War. But I won't go out with weapons like Kratos' and rip people apart or scream at the gods for visions I have of the past.

And heck, I've read some pretty gruesome books and seen some really gruesome, killing shows. Yet they aren't blamed.

Well, Invader Zim was....sadly. :(
 
Wow he was a gamer? What were his other hobbies? Did he enjoy cooking? If so, does that mean everyone who loves to cook is a potential assasine? They do work with large knives and cut up meat on a daily basis. How about exercising? Would that make everyone who goes to the gym a homocidal maniac just waiting to snap?

That is just stupid. The guy was clearly mentally ill and lacked any compassion for another human being. I heard that he was obsessed with the senator and collected pictures of her. Whether or not he played games would not have affected his probability of shooting at a grocery store.
 
You know, in the article I read, the reporter seemed to be trying to scrap together whatever information they could find on the guy, and they seemed to think that this was important: someone who knew him said that he "smoked pot" and "wore dark clothes" :gasp: OMG, holy shit. Profiling, anyone? :ffs: So now what, people can't be racists anymore, so instead they're going to do the next closest thing possible by picking on lifestyle details? It's absolutely pathetic, it's the same damn mentality. Go back to the 1600s you wankers, and burn some witches while you're at it :jtc:
 
Gamingway said:
someone who knew him said that he "smoked pot" and "wore dark clothes" :gasp: OMG, holy shit. Profiling, anyone? :ffs:
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("Wankers" :P)

Oh poopey, half the population where I live are murderers! I should have known by the dark clothes and knew it wasn't for personal taste in clothes.

I hope that I'm not going to be a killer 'cause I wear blacks and dark blues that. :(
 
Well I smoke a lot of pot, play video games, and like to wear dark clothes. I guess I'll get my pistol and shoot some people.
Oh wait, I'm not psychotic. Nevermind.
 
the things people come up with are just like "wow do you get paid for this? because I could just make some shit up and do a better job than you."

this guy did cocaine and snorted it off the asses of strippers. give daddy his meal ticket prz
 
Media is always looking to blame dangerous acts on something. Video games are an easy target because they're more violent and gory than they used to be. It was like when some kid burned his house down and they blamed it on him watching Beavis and Butt-Head. As a result, Beavis and Butt-Head were toned down a bit and the show was moved from 7pm to 11pm, because kids are asleep then. It's all bullshit.

I heard this dude was rejected from the military because he was tapped, and for the same reason the school he attended wanted him out. This dude was sick in the head already, it had nothing to do with games or entertainment. It may have been politically driven, but that might be a stretch too. Then again, he was a hardcore lefty, from what I heard... :hmmm: I'll leave that alone though because I don't really know.
 
nah he was more of a righty as he hated the government and was always looking at his constitutional rights.

shrugs.

I hope we find out more about him as time goes by.
 
I think this is a little freaky as well, this is a map that Sarah Palin had up for a while online until this happened:

sarah_pac_crosshairs.jpg


Putting gun crosshairs on these people? O_O Note that Giffords, the woman who was targeted, is one of the people on here. I've heard it suggested that the gunman was perhaps a fan of this and maybe took it too literally--who knows, it does seem kind of tacky for a political figure to do this but that's a debate for another thread -_- (From what I can tell it's been taken down from the site at this point, naturally.)

There's no evidence to suggest that there was any sort of communication between Palin and the criminal, or that he had seen this, but if he "rambled about unusual political views" like I've also heard, then if I were going to try to place the blame on some sort of media influence, wouldn't something like this be a lot more suspect than his history of playing games, smoking pot, and wearing dark clothes etc? o_O
 
We were talking about this at work earlier this week. One of my co workers said that he had met and talked to the senator at some political thing some time before this happened. Later he became extremely obsessed with her and would collect several pictures of her. I haven't gone out to confirm so sorry if I just made an ass of myself.

But if it was true, I wonder what she said to him that would set him off like that. That's more behavior of a serial killer, who after obsessing over someone for a long time, and then realize that they can't have them, decide that no one else can and go kill them.
 
The Arizona shooter was mentally unstable. Him playing video games has nothing to do with his choice to go and shoot nine people outside of a supermarket. Our actions define us...not the labels other people give us.

I hate the profiling that people do nowadays...and people continuing to do it only adds to the social stigmas that we have. "Ohh that person is crazy, they are seeing things" = Stigma and it sounds so much worse than calling them by the appropriate term, which is Schizophrenic. "Ohh that person is huge, she's so fat" = Stigma ...and it sounds so much worse than saying that person's BMI is >40 so they are clinically overweight. And :blah:

(In Jan Brady voice) Stigmas stigmas stigmas :gasp:
 
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