We’re all aware of the horrific shooting that took place in Colorado a few days ago during the midnight screening of Dark Knight Rises. The event left 12 dead and 58 injured in one of the most catastrophic shootings in the US. Many peoples lives were changed in a matter of seconds and most will be left mentally damaged forever.
CNN has reported on the events of the shooting in complete detail and had many guest speakers to help try to come to terms with what has happened. One of the guest speakers that was on CNN was a criminal profiler named Pat Brown. Pat Brown theorized that 24 year old Colorado gunman was driven by an addiction to video games. Pat Brown stated that given his age he likely fits the age of someone who has “gotten into killing mode” with the aid of video games and their violence.
“He’s probably prepared for this for a long time, just obsessing over it, gathering his weapons. [He] probably spent a lot of time in his apartment, playing one video game after the other—shooting, shooting, shooting—building up his courage and building up the excitement of when it’s going to be real for him. And it’s made his day.”
“This has been something he has really been into. And now we’re going to find, probably on [Facebook] or anybody who knows him will say, ‘Yeah, he did have a lot of interest in that. He was always playing the video games. And I’m not saying video games make you a killer. But if you’re a psychopath, video games help you get in the mode to do the killing.
So it is a problem in our society with teenaged psychopaths, that they do get inspired by this and want to make it real. So it is a danger but it doesn’t make you a psycho.”
The quotes above are directly from Pat Brown while on CNN.
I’ve noticed that it seems every time a terrible act of violence is committed, video games appear to be blamed more than anything else. The Colorado shooting is not the only event to have the finger pointed at video games. Dr. Phil blamed the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007 on video games and their ability to program kids into killing machines. I think we’re all familiar with Jack Thompson and his vendetta against any violent video game.
My question is simple, why are we trying to make excuses and deflect blame for an individual that is clearly deranged and unfit to live in society. What is about video games that makes it so easy to make them out to be a brainwashing psycho path creator. The individuals involved in these types of mass shootings are already gone psychologically before playing a video game or watching violence on TV. To me if your going to blame video games you might as well blame all types of entertainment that may include violence.
Blaming video games for these types of events is just strengthening the prejudice that video games will turn kids into psychotic killing machines. My message towards the uninformed media anchors is simple: until you can climb into a shooters mind and see exactly what the cause is of their violent behavior, stop randomly spewing crap and blaming video games and making us gamers look like bad people for enjoying good games.
