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NRA Condems Games In Wake of CT. Shooting

9.95

Warrior
Post from Gamespot... and boy does it make me see red...

http://www.gamespot.com/news/nra-condemns-games-in-wake-of-connecticut-shooting-6401901


During a press conference this morning, a National Rifle Association spokesperson said violent video games are partially to blame for last week's deadly shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

"There exists in this country a callous, corrupt, and corrupting shadow industry that sells, and sows, violence against its own people," NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre said. "Through vicious, violent video games with names like Bulletstorm, Grand Theft Auto, Mortal Kombat, and Splatterhouse. And here's one: it's called Kindergarten Killers. It's been online for 10 years. How come my research department could find it and all of yours either couldn't or didn't want anyone to know you had found it?"
LaPierre also pointed the finger at the film and music industries.
"Then there's the blood-soaked slasher films like American Psycho andNatural Born Killers that are aired like propaganda loops on Splatterdays and every day, and a thousand music videos that portray life as a joke and murder as a way of life. And then they have the nerve to call it entertainment. But is that what it really is? Isn't fantasizing about killing people as a way to get your kicks really the filthiest form of pornography?"
LaPierre argued that media conglomerates, like the ones responsible for the games, music, and films listed above, are caught up in a "race to the bottom," and in fact compete with each other to "shock, violate, and offend every standard of civilized society."
Complicit in this behavior, according to LaPierre, is the national media, their corporate owners, and stockholders, who are "silent enablers" and even "co-conspirators." He claimed media "demonize" lawful gun owners and "fill the national debate with misinformation and dishonest thinking."
Earlier this week, West Virginia senator Jay Rockefeller introduced a bill to Congress that would direct the National Academy of Sciences to investigate how violent games and other such programming affect children.
The Entertainment Consumers Association issued a statement on the matter today, pointing to "volumes of scientific research" that indicate no link between media violence and real-world violence has ever been established.
"We agree with the Supreme Court's decisions, and the volumes of scientific research, which all clearly state that there is no causal link between media violence and real life violence," said the ECA's vice president & general counsel Jennifer Mercurio. "As we are all learning increasingly through the news, this is a situation of the perpetrator's mental disorders, and his family's inability to adequately deal with them in time. Our hearts remain with all those suffering in the aftermath of this horrendous crime."
 

9.95

Warrior
Here's something I'll never understand. Videogames have always been an easy target for politicians and bureaucrats, especially when it makes their own hobbies look bad.

Did he take the time to admonish the parents, who need to be present to in order for kids under 18 to purchase and play most, if not all FPS games, and ESPECIALLY games like Mortal Kombat?

Nevermind the fact that this kid's mother took her SPECIAL NEEDS SON to a gun range. In order for him to know how to commit the atrocity he committed, he needed to learn how to load, aim, fire and deal with the kickback that a gun gives. He didn't learn all this by himself.

I applaud the fact that someone FINALLY mentioned that the movie and media industry as a whole are all partially responsible for the desensitization of us as a society to things such as violence...but I digress. I'm a child of the 80's, when NYC was one of the most crime ridden cities in the USA. I lived through that violence and that time frame. I have played fighting games my entire life, with Mortal Kombat being my favorite game of all time... yet I have never once considered going out and ripping someone's head off or unloading a clip from an uzi into an unsuspecting busload of nuns. My parents taught me better than that. They monitored what I played and what I watched. Blame Lanza's mother...she obviously didn't do her job so well...if she had, there would be 20+ children still alive today, not to mention herself and her son.

Lets now talk about something that Politicians LOVE to ignore. How about the fact that on NETWORK TELEVISION you can watch all the blood and gore you can see on network TV News? Don't we encourage our children to keep up with current events and know what is going on in the world? Well, news has become sensationalistic, and these TV companies want ratings, so when it comes down to it, violence and sex sell, so they will show them on their news broadcasts.

Not only are these on network TV, but they're also readily available to watch, and COMPLETELY unregulated for children...meaning that any child can turn on the TV and watch Network TV news with all the violence and sex they can cram into a broadcast... There is no consistency: Network TV News and shows such as CSI and NCIS are all available with all the gore and sex you can get in any of them... without ever having to show ID to get that imagery. Yet, the ESRB still forces under-18 customers to show ID to get that same imagery from video games.

So, it's ok to show that stuff as long as it perpetuates your propaganda, but the moment it makes your personal hobby(I'm looking at you, NRA) look bad, you cry foul that the video games are ruining our society? Gotcha...

May the Elder Gods have mercy on them and their ass backward train of thought.
 

9.95

Warrior
Always blaming something else besides the assholes who commit these atrocities, humans have always been the same
The problem is, I don't blame Adam Lanza entirely. Yes, what he did was HORRIFIC. However, he used his MOTHER'S GUNS AND AMMUNITION.

I mean... lets think about that for a second... if she had taken 10 minutes to lock up, hide, and keep the key with her at all times, none of this would have happened.
 

rev0lver

Come On Die Young
Contrary to what a lot of us want to think, violent video games are linked to rises in levels of aggressive feelings/behavior. However, saying this is a primary cause of anything like a mass shooting is crazy.
 

STORMS

Co-founder
Owner
Administrator
Founder
wasn't this person kinda "slow"? I had the impression that he thought his mother loved her children at her school more and was jealous.. from there, the horror...

Regardless, may they R.I.P. We are so close to the holidays and for something like this to happen... the holidays aren't the same.
 

Mikemetroid

Who hired this guy, WTF?
Lead Moderator
man that video games excuse got me right in the jimmies.

I sat there and said "really? are they still using that excuse?"
 

Mattman

Warlock Nerd
.... Guns kill people....
bullets kill people. chris rock had a great plan. all bullets should cost $5000 each. that way there would be no more innocent bystanders. when a motha fucka gets shot, he deserved it lol. not to make light of the situation but that shit was funnier when chris rock said it
 

9.95

Warrior
The NRA is one of the largest lobbying groups in America. They get paid by gun manufacturers to spew to the nonsense they do. They will blame everything for the shooting but the guns. So no reason to take these fools seriously.
Right, but if it wasn't the NRA, then it would be some other group jumping on that bandwagon. Video games are a very easy target and likely will always be.
 

rev0lver

Come On Die Young
wasn't this person kinda "slow"? I had the impression that he thought his mother loved her children at her school more and was jealous.. from there, the horror...
No, early reports said she was a teacher at the school but that wasn't the case.
 

9.95

Warrior
wasn't this person kinda "slow"? I had the impression that he thought his mother loved her children at her school more and was jealous.. from there, the horror...

Regardless, may they R.I.P. We are so close to the holidays and for something like this to happen... the holidays aren't the same.
Quite the opposite... he had Asperger's Syndrome which is a mild form of Autism... it's called an Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Anyway, one of the symptoms of his "disability" is that they tend to REALLY sweat the details. The focus in on something and its like it's the only thing in the world at that moment... I believe the word is Perseverate, which means(btw, note the base word, persevere), to repeat or prolong action thought or utterance even after the stimulus that prompted it has stopped. People with ASD tend to perseverate on a subject and learn EVERYTHING there is to know about it.

In his situation, his "disability" was more of an "ability".
 

bipolar_shango

" Bros before Hoes"
No, people keep people. A gun is nothing without a wielder.

And to blame entertainment entities such as video games and movies is goddamn pathetic. Why not blame the ones who caused the deaths? If you can't distinguish between reality and fiction...you need help, dude. Seriously.
If he had a pocket knife i wonder how many kids he would have been able to kill. I honestly don't see why some people feel the need to play cowboys and Indians in a supposedly civilized world.
 

TheTetraSpirit

Kombatant
That's true, but how much damage do you think he could've done if it was a knife?
An innocent death is still an innocent death, and this situation wouldn't be much easier to swallow any way you put it.

Blake is right, though. A gun is only one of countless different ways to hurt someone. Something bad can always happen with or without their involvement.
 

9.95

Warrior
If he had a pocket knife i wonder how many kids he would have been able to kill. I honestly don't see why some people feel the need to play cowboys and Indians in a supposedly civilized world.
Blake's logic is true though. The knife needs a wielder to do damage as well. It's not a matter of how many were killed... or even if they were only injured...

Think of it this way: Similarly to a fighting game... Fighting games don't understand thought. They don't understand codes of honor. Ultimately, they only understand winning and losing which is decided upon only by the people wielding the characters contained in them.

Weapons are much the same. They don't understand thought, or logic. They don't have bias. They don't understand codes of honor. Ultimately, they only understand their intended purpose(shooting for guns, cutting for knives)...what they shoot or what they cut, and the amount of damage done is decided upon only but the people wielding them.
 

rev0lver

Come On Die Young
I'm just saying, we can't pretend there isn't a gun problem involved. The day before there was a similar situation with a knife in China and no one died. I don't think guns should be banned and even think I might get one for protection down the line, but the level of bias by groups like the NRA is unreal. We need to think about these things logically instead of defending our own selfish interests.