Think that North America has the market cornered on blaming games for heinously violent acts? Think again!

Following an Ibaraki shopping mall stabbing spree that killed one and injured seven, Japanese media outlets are reporting that perpetrator Masahiro Kanagawa, a man previously wanted for an unrelated murder, was a gamer.

Police described Kanagawa as an lonely, unemployed man who likes games and is not good at communicating with others. The day after he was put on the wanted list, Kanagawa made a trip to Tokyo’s electronics and game mecca of Akihabara, police said.

Akihabara is capable of bringing out the worst in all of us, but a killing spree?

Obviously, any incident like this is a tragedy, particularly for the families of the victims. But it is a bit of a shame that the Japanese media is following in the footsteps of outlets like Fox News in suggesting that games are a motive for murder.

Source: Japan Times

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The recent story we reported about the kids supposedly using Mortal Kombat moves to kill a seven year old girl has got me thinking: How do people go about linking videogames to real-world violence?

I read today about a woman picked up for stealing videogame merchandise from a Wal-Mart in Cocoa, Florida. The article also mentions that the 23-year-old woman was previously in trouble with the law for neglecting her son to the point where he wandered off and was found dead in a ditch.

Obviously the woman was charged with manslaughter on top of the neglect, but the case was thrown out of court due to “insufficient evidence”.

So here we have one individual that was involved in two totally unrelated crimes spaced almost four years apart. How easy would it be to associate one behavior with the other?

People like Jack Thompson and Dr. Phil love to search the history of people involved in violent acts and automatically associate their videogame activities with their real-world actions.

Exhibit C: Douchebag

It is my opinion that the aforementioned “Mortal Kombat” killers are associated with the videogames for three reasons:

1. They’re young. Thirty years ago it would have been Black Sabbath instead of Mortal Kombat.

2. The young man used videogames as his alibi, stating he wasn’t involved.

3. Money. The gaming industry is larger than Hollywood, and lawyers want a piece of that pie.

At this point in my life, I’ve read significantly more stories about violent crimes not associated with anything than I have about violence associated with rap music, heavy metal, videogames, or cartoons.

The bottom line is that I do think videogames can be “inspirational” for deeply disturbed people to do deeply disturbed things. Violent people are naturally drawn to violence, even if it’s only digital.

I also submit to the idea that videogames increase aggression, but no more so than any other competitive activity like football or even bowling, and it’s not a permanent effect.

A Fine Example of Pleasant Conversation

A normal kid is not going to kill his parents because he spent 8 hours straight pushing buttons on a controller. If anything, I think it’s quite the opposite.

I personally find videogames to be therapeutic. Whenever I may get the urge to kill people, I can take out that aggression on digital characters without the real-world consequences of guilt, jail time, physical harm to myself, or blood on my new pants.

If someone happens to do something violent and happens to also play videogames, that does NOT mean that videogames actually cause any violence.

This is a clear case of simple stereotyping, and we all know that’s a no-no. So I say to all you stereotypers out there: stop being dicks, or I will kill you.

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