Rant, continued from episode 30... (posted by Jon)
All too often these days, people tend to try and blame human criminal acts on non-human things. "He wouldn't have done that if he hadn't been listening to that kind of music," "he wouldn't have known how to do that if he hadn't seen a poorly-scripted version of it done in that one movie," and "he wouldn't have been able to do that if the English dictionary didn't explain what a sword was" are just some variations of the countless clichés people use to try to shift blame away from perpetrators.

This time around, we have Jack Thompson trying to blame the events of the all-too-recent Virginia Tech shooting on video games. Now, holding back my now-temporarily-bridled rage for the moment, please allow me to offer the following counterarguments to this claim.

Doubtlessly, Thompson will point out that both the shooting and certain video games involve guns. This is true, but it is not a logically-persuasive argument with regard to the shooting.

Allow me to being with the obvious; a video game can not provide a player with a real firearm. Imitation firearms (which do achieve a certain degree of realism), are all that any current system or game provides. In this case, the shooter had to secure his own firearm, secure his own ammo, secure funds with which to acquire his own gun and ammo (which would actually be harder to do if he blew all his money on games every day) in order to commit the shooting. No game provides a real firearm (ethics aside, it would be too heavy to play with), or real ammo (ethics aside, it would destroy the TV), or real money (ethics aside, that would be poor marketing). It is only through the shooter's free will, and desire to shoot innocent people, that the gun, ammo, and funds were acquired and used to bring about the tragedy at Virginia Tech.

To proceed further, most games involve weaponry that is impossible to acquire. The science-fiction weaponry (i.e. the gravity gun in Half Life 2, and the plasma rifle in Doom) and magic weaponry (i.e. the Dagger of Time in Prince of Persia, and the soul-summoning hammer in God of War 2), are, although fascinating and fun to play with, fictitious and, therefore, impossible to acquire. In short, the vast majority of games I've seen only have gamers handle weapons that don't actually exist. Not very threatening if you ask me...

Alright, now I'll address the next most-prominent anti-game argument: the theory that shoot'em'up games are dangerous, because they teach players how to use firearms. There are any number of things wrong with this theory, but I'd like to start with the most obvious one: motion.

Most shoot'em'up games do not require the player to hold even an imitation of a gun, just a controller that, through software, is made to represent a real or imaginary type of gun. This is the most a shooter can learn about gun-fighting from these games: "I press this button, and my gun magically reloads," "I move this joystick to change my aim," "if the software representing a gun jams, I press this button to magically fix it," and maybe "different types of ammo work for different guns."

This type of game, obviously, does not teach a person any of the technical know-how to use a gun, nor does it provide him with an opportunity to practice the body motions required to handle a real firearm. Even Red Steel, presently the most body-motion-oriented of all console shooting games, does not teach a player the motions or technical know-how required for using a real firearm; it just teaches you how to play Red Steel.

If the shooter knew any of the countless things about gun usage that are not explained by these kinds of games, he would have had to acquire that knowledge elsewhere. These kinds video games teach almost nothing about how to use a real gun.

Now, as many of you are no doubt aware, I am yet to have addressed the impact of games that have you hold imitation weapons. Fear not! I'm all over it!

It is true, that imitation guns are much more motion-oriented than the common game controller, that much is undeniable. However, even these imitation weapons do not teach players all (if any) of the necessary methodologies for handling firearms. For one thing, a plastic gun will not - no matter how well made it is - have the same feel as a real gun. Additionally, pointing a gun at a tv screen, and firing off-screen when you need to reload, hardly teach you proper mechanics. What if it jams? In real life, when there is no screen to point off of, how do you reload? There is currently no game on the market that can adequately answer either of these questions (nor any of the other technical questions I could add to that list). Pointing a fake gun at a screen is simply not sufficient training for real firearm usage.

Here's the bottom line: unless the Virginia Tech shooter figured out some was to make handling a gun the same as using a controller (or a keyboard and mouse), or the same as pointing a plastic gun at as screen, video games do not factor into his crime.

Just as a motion-intense game about sword usage cannot provide the necessary strength training and mental/physical discipline to use medieval weaponry, nor can a game controller teach a player the body mechanics and mechanical know-how to use a real firearm (nor should they; that really would be dangerous...).

But I'm generalizing here. Let me remind everyone that the vast majority of games out there are not shoot'em'up games. Racing games, RPGs, sports games, and platforming games cumulatively occupy a much bigger piece of the pie than the shoot'em'ups. Games that have players use imitation guns are even less prominent. At the very least, it is pretty much unarguable that games like Paper Mario, Need for Speed, Wii Sports, Sonic the Hedgehog, Final Fantasy XII, and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess have nothing to do with the shooting. Of course, critics these days tend to have no interest in limiting their criticisms to a single genre, and lash out at video games in general. Misguided oafs...

So what have I done so far? I've exonerated almost all (if not all) non-shoot'em'up games, I've provided evidence that shooting games (even ones with imitation guns held by the player) are insufficient with regard to gun-handling instructions, and I've divulged the ridiculously obvious reality that games do not put real guns and/or real ammo in people's hands. I think I'm pretty much done.

Now, let's pretend - pretend - for a moment that video games really do teach people how to handle guns, really do teach people how to snipe. Heck, we'll even pretend that games somehow really do provide gamers with real firearms and real ammo. Even then, the shooter would not be completely innocent. He would still have to make the decision to take the ammo and gun, and go kill innocent Virginia Tech students. Game computers are not mind-bending creatures that can make that decision for him.

Consider the following scenario. I have a steak knife, with which to cut stake. I finish my steak, then I realize I have class so I pay my check and dash out of the restaurant. I leave my steak knife on the table, so that the waiter and/or bus boy may deliver it thereafter to the dish-washing room. Though I may not realize it, I have allowed for the possibility that a maniac will come in after I leave, pick up my discarded steak knife, and do things I'd rather not write about with it. He may even have learned how to use it by watching me cut my food with it. So I have, accidentally, provided this maniac with a steak knife and, accidentally, taught him how to use it. Though this was certainly not my principal intent. Am I now responsible for his decision to do the un-writable with it? Certainly not. I never told, suggested, or desired that he do anything bad with my steak knife. He, of his own free will and volition, chose to.

The way I see it, it's similar with games. There is no game, that I am aware of, that tells players to go and randomly shoot innocent people in real life. Games do not really teach people how to use weapons, nor do they provide them with real weapons. That being the case, they certainly do not instruct gamers to go out into the real world and commit terrible crimes like the those of the Virginia Tech shooter.

Now I know there are some people sitting at home saying something along the lines of "but Jon! If we don't blame video games for the shooting, then whom do we blame!? Society? The education system? President Bush? Who?" And...lemme see...I'll have to think about that and get back - how about we blame the shooter!? He's the one who DID it!

The fact of the matter is, none of us want to admit that what happened at Virginia Tech happened because of the shooter's free will. Why don't we want to admit that? Because it makes us uncomfortable to think that a man who shares our race (and I don't mean "race" as in what country he's from, I mean "race" as in he's a fellow human being) is capable of such things. It's certainly much easier to point the blame at something like a video game machine, which is not similar to us. But we can not delude ourselves in this way. Painful though it may be, we must accept this truth: the shooter's crime is the fault of the shooter.

Jack Thomspon's statement that the shooter is not responsible for his crimes because he played some video games is an affront to the memory and sacrifice of all of the Virginia Tech shooter's victims, and undermines the severity and accountability of the shooter himself. And I'm yet to even mention how grave an insult it is to us gamers! In a word, it's disgusting. We can not bring back those killed by the shooter, but we can, at the very least, properly mourn them by not irrationally shifting the blame to a machine.

Now, obviously, I've allowed a bit of humor to seep into this little rant so I can rag on Jack Thompson, and I hope some of you got a chuckle out of it. But, let me assure everyone, I see nothing funny in the events that took place at Virginia Tech. There is no satirical value in things of that nature. I hope everyone who reads this will, at least, stop and spare a prayer for the victims, and for the soul of the shooter.

Everyone, I want to thank you for reading this little tirade. I usually make a point of not using this site to toss around my political and/or social views, but this was something I felt I had to make an exception for. Jack Thompson's argument that video game's - and not the actual shooter - are responsible for what happened at Virginia Tech is simply something I must express my disagreement with. I know not everyone will agree with all of what I've written here (which is fine, no one should write things like this expecting everyone who reads it to agree with 100% of it), but I hope it was of some value.

And, fear not, I don't intend to be this depressing again anytime soon. This is still a webcomic site after all...

Thanks again,

Jonathan Gilbert