Video Games

[harleypower69]

Just had this discussion with my family and we arrived at the same conclusion.

[SweetKnuckles]

Hell, in the 80s we shot at each other with BB guns, and it didn't make me want to shoot up my school.

"NO MORE THAN TWO PUMPS!!"

I'm sure a link can be made with video games, but pardon me for saying, I feel it's more the aggravation of circumstance. i.e. Sooooo much focus on Bullying and how it's insurmountable rather than teaching a kid to stick up for himself with the knowledge that sometimes you'll get your ass kicked, even when righteous.

Sure, bullying is a thing when it's extreme, but that word is tossed around so casually, it's lost its meaning IMO.

As far as every shooter being a gamer, I think that's due to a vast majority of kids being gamers. I'll bet if you spoke with 100 public school kids, 96 would answer yes to "do you or have you ever played video games".

[Jack Dupp]

I largely agree with SK. Every time I hear stories of 'bullying' and 'shaming' for stuff we would have laughed off when we were kids I want to puke.

Heather teased me for having curly hair and told me to go buy a brush! OMG! I'm going to kill myself! Stand by for the live FB feed of me hanging myself!

[Basher]

I'm with SK on the fact that a majority of kids game. I, along with all of my friends, grew up with 5hr marathons of Counter Strike, BattleField1942, and a host of other first person shooters, and not one of us had any inclination to go shoot the masses... That's not to say that it doesn't have ANY correlation, but in my mind, it would merely be a small piece of the puzzle. There are more than a few screws loose elsewhere for you to go on a shooting rampage, and I hardly feel a game is the catalyst.

[AZ1]

every school shooter drank water. Correct me if I am wrong

[samnev]

I am probably going to get a lot of flack for this.

I truly believe video games with violence, coupled with piss poor parenting are the reason we have these school shootings. IIRC, every school shooter was a gamer. Correct me if I am wrong

I have to agree with waterdog that these two things are part a bigger of the problem.

[harleypower69]

I recall that in school disagreements were settled with fists in the bathroom and the argument was settled toe to toe. Now, to be fair video games were not yet in existence then. Bullies did what they did and sometimes got beat down. Nobody cried to the teacher. Different world today. Issue is parents that don't parent, mental health issues unaddressed and technology that makes killing look painless and shows these kids the reset button fixes all. We have a country full of fat kids, lazy kids and parents that let the little fockers sit on their butts and game instead of getting outside and playing / burning up energy and getting fit. Ask me how I know - I now have 3 grandkids moved in with me between the ages of 3 and 8. When they arrived all they did was game. I sorted that at the router level. Got them bikes and a trampoline and the game fixation is gone, the energy levels lowered at bed time.
I am sure there are many causative factors with this shooter phenomenon. We all know it sure as s*** is not the gun's fault.

[guardyan_angyl]

Read “Assassination Generation” by Lt Col Dave Grossman. Great read that addresses this very thing. I have had the opportunity to sit through several of his seminars as well as spent some time chatting with him. He has some very strong opinions on this subject.

[Berd]

Blaming video games is right up there with blaming guns.

I played shitloads of violent video games growing up with my friends.

Played "guns" with my friends too, running around the neighborhood park and our parents' yards trying to kill my friends with toy guns.

Watched tons of graphic and violent movies depicting gun violence with my dad and my friends.

I'm 34 now, never shot up a school. Never even thought about taking a gun to school.

Even when I was in college and started carrying a gun. I never did on campus, I wouldn't even leave one in my truck. Just left it locked up in my safe at home.

Weird huh?

[AstonMiura]

Little experiment. Find out how many students were killed by shootings in schools in the last 10 years.  (About 300)   Then go find out how many students committed suicide during the same period of time.  (About 60,000)

The real question, NO ONE IS ASKING. What is so wrong in our society and in our system of education that so many children are choosing death? Those committing suicide are making the same choice as most shooters, they are just not taking others with them. This is why only a couple times we have a mass school shooting with the shooter taken alive.

Most of these shootings are a sick and twisted form of suicide by cop! So the question here is not do we ban guns, or mags, or do we put an armed guard in every door way?  But how have we changed so abruptly in the last 30 years to make so many children wish to kill themselves and others and what do we change in the system to reverse it?

[SweetKnuckles]

Read “Assassination Generation” by Lt Col Dave Grossman. Great read that addresses this very thing. I have had the opportunity to sit through several of his seminars as well as spent some time chatting with him. He has some very strong opinions on this subject.

Mind giving us Cliff's Notes?

[Dauph]

Blaming video games is right up there with blaming guns.

I played shitloads of violent video games growing up with my friends.

Played "guns" with my friends too, running around the neighborhood park and our parents' yards trying to kill my friends with toy guns.

Watched tons of graphic and violent movies depicting gun violence with my dad and my friends.

I'm 34 now, never shot up a school. Never even thought about taking a gun to school.

Even when I was in college and started carrying a gun. I never did on campus, I wouldn't even leave one in my truck. Just left it locked up in my safe at home.

Weird huh?

Right there with you on this one.

I think everyone has good points on this and throw pharmaceuticals into the mix. I know it has helped many but I believe there has been a link to everyone of these shooters on something.

[Chico]

I think it has more to do with how quickly we medicate kids, bullying, and social media. Instead of teaching kids what is acceptable behavior and holding them to that standard, they are medicated into complacency. I worked in a juvenile corrections setting and the majority of kids that came in medicated had the amount or dosage lessened after meeting with the staff psych. Some even came off of the drugs completely because they did not need it. What they needed was structure and people around them that were invested in their success.

I put bullying and social media in the same category. When I was in school, bullying had to be done face to face and we would go toe to toe if need be. But we knew who the bully was and when the person being bullied defended themselves (or someone else defended them) it would typically stop. Now in the face of social media, more kids can gang up on someone and do so anonymously with little to no repercussions. Before social media, the bullying at school would stop when the kid wasn’t at school. Now it can be a constant bombardment of threats and insults.

Dads also have to step up and accept their role as a father. Most of these shootings are kids from single parent households and the father is not in the picture. Without a positive male role model for these young men to look up to, they miss out on important life lessons. My parents divorced when I was young and my dad travelled weekly for work, but he spent every weekend with me and my sister. They did everything they could do to be there for us as much as they could. My dad also had rifles and shotguns and they were never locked up. Hell, from the time I was 10, I kept them all in my closet. I never once had the inclination to take them out and mess with them unless he said it was ok.

We played war, had video games that were considered too violent, grew up on Stallone and Schwarzenegger movies, and our music was violent and profane enough that parental advisory labels were placed on albums but what we didn’t have were over medicated kids and social media. We also had parents and neighbors that would whip our ass when we got out of line.

Video games are not the issue.

[Dauph]

[Dauph]

FOX had this on the Parkland shooter.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/05/30/ni ... ooter.html