Videogames Don't Kill People, Psychopaths Do

Yet again, an American teenager has taken a gun to school and yet again an American teenager has shot another. Who's to blame? Disco music? Heavy metal, rap, R&B - country and western? Of course not. So it must have been comic books, that also teach us to objectify each other as sex symbols! I say thee nay! Ah, then violent movies with that Stallone or that The Rock - explosion fests that glorify gunfire in a rain of... gunfire...? Once more I say you're wrong.

So let's blame videogames! Murder simulators every one of them, from the pill-popping yellow guy who eats ghosts, to the plumber who squishes turtles whilst taking mushrooms. They're to blame for Timmy shooting Billy instead of pushing Lassie down the well, I see it now. Except no.

The reason Timmy shot Billy this time isn't because Halo 5 told him to. It's not because he got a rush from killing Billy with a sniper rifle in Battlefield Hardline. Timmy didn't get fucking road rage from GRID 2 and decide to take it out on Billy. Timmy had shitty parents.

If you bring a weapon into your home and expect it to never be used as a weapon, then don't have it. There's plenty of weapons in the home when you have no weapons in the house. The steak knives in your cutlery drawer, the length of 2x4 in your shed, your frying pan, your microwave - even a length of string. It wouldn't be easy, but all of those could cause death just as seriously as a gun and most of them have been used as weapons in videogames.

There are hundreds of people who spend far too long playing Call of Duty: Oh God Not Another One each day. Laws of averages say that at any one time five of them have access to a loaded gun in America. Whether it's in a safe or in a box under the bed, if you own a handgun and have a child, they have tried to get to it. Just to look, maybe to touch, but if you brought them up right they will know to never pick it up.

It doesn't matter how much CoD you play, you are never so fully immersed that you think it is a good idea to live it out in real life. If you attempt it, you have mental difficulties. If you are a teenager who has no way of discerning that Transformers is an awesome cartoon, but is entirely fictional, then you need to seek professional help. Pet Rescue Saga is not a simulation of what an animal shelter is like. Do not pick up the gun and see what happens when you shoot someone "just a little bit".

The only reason the mainstream media chooses to blame videogames, is because the lawyers use it to paint the accused in a different light. "They believed they were following Foxhound directives and taking out Cuban troops" makes it appear to the jury you had a mental lapse and would do better in a psychiatric hospital for a few months instead of a high security penitentiary. It sounds a lot more sympathetic than "He's a brutal bastard who also tortured next-doors dog just to see what happened" would. The first gets you a guilty manslaughter charge, the other gets murder-one and life in the joint.

So no, videogames didn't get anyone to kill anyone in real life. Not being taught that guns are not toys - or suitable household appliances - has killed dozens. This isn't even counting the lax gun laws that led to the mass killings like Aurora. Guns, whether bought for hunting or protection, are designed to do one thing - kill living beings. If you feel you absolutely have to have a gun in your home, do everyone a favour and keep it locked in a safe that's hidden in a secret room in the empty basement your family doesn't know exists. Because if your child gets hold of it, something will go wrong and someone will die - because guns only have one function.