Connecticut school shooting

[TMF]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

[glowdotGlock]

Were the children that were shot the students of the mother in her classroom?

[Dolomite_supafly]

Were the children that were shot the students of the mother in her classroom?

 

That is what I got from what was reported. I have yet to make it more than a few minutes into any reporting this morning though.

 

Dolomite

[luvmyberetta]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

 

We also need to stop ignoring what effect violent games, violent cartoons, & shows kids watch today. I don't have cable or satellite at my house and I control what my two young boys watch & what games they play. While visting a friends house I was shocked at some of the gorey, violent movies they let their kids watch and the games they play all day. These are young kids, not teenagers. Their kids are absolute hellians too! You can't tell me there's not a connection to the way these kids act & what their parents let them watch and play. Using TV and video games as baby sitting devices only supports the behavior. Notice a pattern when people always say it's the quiet ones? That's because often they're the kids that get ignored by parents and picked on at school & hold it in until they snap. People & kids are becoming desensitized to violence & cruelty because they see it all day every day and it has an effect on them. It should be no surprise that some of them loose a sense of reality & pull a stunt like this.

Edited December 15, 2012 by luvmyberetta

[mikegideon]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

You're pretty smart for a meat eater :). We can blame the gun, morals, lack of accessible mental health care, etc. Fact is, if somebody would have capped his ass, the killing would have stopped immediately. We need to protect our kids like we protect our money. It's a nasty world.

Edited December 15, 2012 by mikegideon

[jgradyc]

It's come out that this kid had some sort of personality disorder. I wonder if he was on medication and had stopped taking it? Some of those powerful drugs have been linked to suicides in the past. It's even on the warning labels. Hopefully, more details on this will come out when more information is available. This is the only thing that even remotely makes sense.

[TMF]

We also need to stop ignoring what effect violent games, violent cartoons, & shows kids watch today. I don't have cable or satellite at my house and I control what my two young boys watch & what games they play. While visting a friends house I was shocked at some of the gorey, violent movies they let their kids watch and the games they play all day. These are young kids, not teenagers. Their kids are absolute hellians too! You can't tell me there's not a connection to the way these kids act & what their parents let them watch and play. Using TV and video games as baby sitting devices only supports the behavior. Notice a pattern when people always say it's the quiet ones? That's because often they're the kids that get ignored by parents and picked on at school & hold it in until they snap. People & kids are becoming desensitized to violence & cruelty because they see it all day every day and it has an effect on them. It should be no surprise that some of them loose a sense of reality & pull a stunt like this.

Mass killings have been going on since man strapped a rock to a stick.

Charles Whitman lead a pretty sheltered childhood, in a time before violent shows and video games. He was raised in a strict Roman Catholic house if I remember correctly. There was no shortage of structure, discipline or God. He still managed to kill nearly as many people in a mass shooting, and would have likely killed many more if he was able.

This idea that this behavior is new is silly. This has gone on since the dawn of time. The difference is there more people now and 24/7 news. The sky isn't falling. This is, sadly, business as usual.

[mikegideon]

What Mas said...

 

http://backwoodshome.com/blogs/MassadAyoob/2012/12/15/against-monsters/

[luvmyberetta]

Mass killings have been going on since man strapped a rock to a stick.

Charles Whitman lead a pretty sheltered childhood, in a time before violent shows and video games. He was raised in a strict Roman Catholic house if I remember correctly. There was no shortage of structure, discipline or God. He still managed to kill nearly as many people in a mass shooting, and would have likely killed many more if he was able.

This idea that this behavior is new is silly. This has gone on since the dawn of time. The difference is there more people now and 24/7 news. The sky isn't falling. This is, sadly, business as usual.

 

Charles Whitman was brought up in a violent, disfunctional home and was abused regularly by his father & was nearly killed by him once! Hmmm...I wonder if there could be a connection here?

Edited December 15, 2012 by luvmyberetta

[gnmwilliams]

Mass killings have been going on since man strapped a rock to a stick.

Charles Whitman lead a pretty sheltered childhood, in a time before violent shows and video games. He was raised in a strict Roman Catholic house if I remember correctly. There was no shortage of structure, discipline or God. He still managed to kill nearly as many people in a mass shooting, and would have likely killed many more if he was able.

This idea that this behavior is new is silly. This has gone on since the dawn of time. The difference is there more people now and 24/7 news. The sky isn't falling. This is, sadly, business as usual.

Yep. Just do a search for Bath Michigan Massacre. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster

 

-Oh, and it was done with explosives, not guns.

Edited December 15, 2012 by gnmwilliams

[Guest bkelm18]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

 

That's not good enough for some people. As someone said earlier, some people mistake coffins for soap boxes and will take every opportunity they have to blame this on the "evils" of society, whatever they may be. Guns, porn, video games, Jenga. You name it.

Edited December 15, 2012 by bkelm18

[TMF]

Guns, porn, video games, Jenga. You name it.

Good point. I effing hated Jenga.

[daddyo]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

 

 

Spoons made me fat.  :ugh:

[Sam1]

We also need to stop ignoring what effect violent games, violent cartoons, & shows kids watch today. 

They have ZERO effect on them. In Japan the games are so violent for children that they would be lucky to even be release in the USA with a mature rating. They also have a fraction of the issues we have.

[DaveTN]

They have ZERO effect on them.

What a child sees, does, or spends a lot of time doing has ZERO effect on them? I’m, not a psychiatrist, psychologist, and I didn’t sleep at a Holiday Inn last night; but common sense tells me that isn’t true.
 

In Japan the games are so violent for children that they would be lucky to even be release in the USA with a mature rating. They also have a fraction of the issues we have.

What fraction do they have? And if that’s true could the reasons be something that has nothing to do with video games?

[Links2k]

I'm not a very religious person but I completely agree with this. We were a better society when everyone went to church and had strong Christian values.
 
Times are a changing.

I somewhat agree with this. Then, you have to wonder why people have turned their backs on God. I say it's because the people who claim to be followers of Christ are really bad examples of his teachings. If everyone who claims to be Christian behaves like heartless buttholes, one may ask, why bother?

I understand that your relationship with Jesus is an individual relationship and that it's your choice to accept Christ. I base the opinion above on conversations and observations. Jesus freak on Sunday. Judge, jury and executioner Monday thru Saturday.

[Sam1]

What a child sees, does, or spends a lot of time doing has ZERO effect on them? I’m, not a psychiatrist, psychologist, and I didn’t sleep at a Holiday Inn last night; but common sense tells me that isn’t true.
 
What fraction do they have? And if that’s true could the reasons be something that has nothing to do with video games?

Plenty of statistics out there, if you give me the afternoon I'll get the numbers from some academic journals instead of the web. Personally, after living in Korea for 3 years, I believe that their crime rate is lower because of their social activity. They have more violent media and are less religious than we are, yet in most of the big cities you will see 5 and 6 year old kids walking on the subways by themselves at night because there is no fear of something happening like here. 

 

This is one of those topics that is impossible to prove one way or another through empirical data because the variables are immeasurable. The only thing that can be done is comparing statistics.

[Links2k]

So are we blaming video games now? Why not guns too? Can't we just stick to blaming the POS for committing an awful, incomprehensible act?

I agree. Would we be making excuses for his behavior if he looked like the big scary football player Tryvon Martin?

[Links2k]

We also need to stop ignoring what effect violent games, violent cartoons, & shows kids watch today. I don't have cable or satellite at my house and I control what my two young boys watch & what games they play. While visting a friends house I was shocked at some of the gorey, violent movies they let their kids watch and the games they play all day. These are young kids, not teenagers. Their kids are absolute hellians too! You can't tell me there's not a connection to the way these kids act & what their parents let them watch and play. Using TV and video games as baby sitting devices only supports the behavior. Notice a pattern when people always say it's the quiet ones? That's because often they're the kids that get ignored by parents and picked on at school & hold it in until they snap. People & kids are becoming desensitized to violence & cruelty because they see it all day every day and it has an effect on them. It should be no surprise that some of them loose a sense of reality & pull a stunt like this.

I guess that my kid is the exception. He is an avid gamer, honor roll student, on the schools honor board, exceptional SAT/ACT scores, tutors, mannerable, shoots and plays sports. Guess that that he is too busy to plan assasinations.

The video game excuse is another cop out.

[Guest Fingersoup]

I guess I'm wanting people to feel warm and fuzzy. We'll see....

 

Dave S

 

People fought and died for you to have that right. You have nothing to feel guilty about.

[DaveTN]

I believe that their crime rate is lower because of their social activity.

My point exactly. They may have less crime because of their social activity and interaction. But that doesn’t mean that a kid that is home schooled and lacks social skills won’t be impacted by what they see and do in a video game.

 

What we take in and the things we do is who we are. You can’t say that violence in any form has ZERO impact on a kid.

 

I’m not making an argument to blame video games. But common sense tells me everything a kid does in their formative years has impact on who they are and who they become.

[xRUSTYx]

I guess that my kid is the exception. He is an avid gamer, honor roll student, on the schools honor board, exceptional SAT/ACT scores, tutors, mannerable, shoots and plays sports. Guess that that he is too busy to plan assasinations.

The video game excuse is another cop out.

 

I don't think the problem in and of itself is video games, but its hard to argue that video games don't desensitize today's youth to violence.

 

I think the issue lies in parenting these days.  Too many parents use video games (violent or otherwise) to "babysit" their kids for them.  Instead of telling their kids to get out of the house or to spend time with their kids doing activities, they'd rather their kids just keep themselves entertained.

[Sam1]

OK I get what you're saying, I misunderstood your post and thought it was insinuating that the child would act out upon the media and not that the child may be impacted just not act out.

 

My bad!

[luvmyberetta]

I guess that my kid is the exception. He is an avid gamer, honor roll student, on the schools honor board, exceptional SAT/ACT scores, tutors, mannerable, shoots and plays sports. Guess that that he is too busy to plan assasinations.

The video game excuse is another cop out.

 

I guess you didn't read my whole post? All you say was "video games" & quit. Well, maybe you're right. In fact maybe the news got it wrong and they blamed the wrong kid. I bet the real killer planted the weapons on him & got away! :shrug:

Edited December 15, 2012 by luvmyberetta

[DaveS]

People fought and died for you to have that right. You have nothing to feel guilty about.

And I fought and bled for those same rights. My point being, I've had the opportunity to come across troubled teens and kids, and when asked about a certain type of behavior...."I seen it on TV ", I played it on a video game (grand theft auto), Call of duty", oh and "I thought it would be cool" because stealing a car and shooting a cop was cool on the video game.

 

Believe what you want to folks.....some of us damn sure know better!

 

Dave S