It's nothing new. They went after our books, our movies, our TVs, our games. Mainstream media, the forces that don't really understand the different entertainment mediums, continues to lay blame on external factors in an effort to make sense of tragedy. With the recent Florida High School shooting, once again the spotlight turned to gamers and the tales they play.

United States President Donald Trump recently met with psychologists, gaming professionals, the ESRB board, and more to "get to the root" of this issue, and it turned out to be not as organized as it should have been for such a serious topic. There was a cluster-filled video showcased to show how "violent" video games are, but it was clear that it was pure propaganda and ironically, didn't have an age gate on it - which seems to be the root of the issue that many are claiming.

There have been many tests conducting regarding video games and its correlation to violent behavior and most studies have actually concluded that there isn't a proven correlation between these two factors. Because the topic is once again back center stage, a new perspective has come to shed some light on what the hell is going on.

According to recent reports, psychologist Patrick Markey adds his research into the mix stating that there just isn't data there to support the theory that video games are to blame. In fact, his studies show that over 80% of mass shooters had absolutely zero interest in video games all together.

"It seems like something that should make us safer so it's a totally understandable reaction," Markey said on this findings. "The problem is just the science, the data, does not back up that they actually have an effect."

A common argument is that specific guns seen in video games inspire young adults to seek those out in real life but in this day and age, is that a viable argument? We have more information at our fingertips via smartphone than ever before. Every gun ever created is right there at a simple Google search. Television shows show hyped up scenarios, books describe them in detail, ... all of these have been used as a scapegoat in one way or another. With esteemed people in our government, in our infrastructure, it's important to keep perspective. By that common argument, we should be banning Google because it's "right there."

It's definitely a hot topic and one that we are not stating either way what the cause is, could be, or what we think it is. But the gaming community is under fire once more and it is important that we look at studies objectively and for those observing our community looking to use our medium as an easy target to realise that the data is just not there to place the blame solely on the video game experience.

Posted: Mar 11, 2018 8:15 am
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: http://comicbook.com/gaming/2018/03/10/violent-video-games-mass-shootings-findings/