Violence and Video Games – Is there a connection?

In Miami, there is one man who does not like video games, attorney Jack Thompson. He predicted that a school shooting may occur by someone who likely played video games. Eight days later, two kids opened fire at Columbine, killing thirteen students. Both of them liked to play Doom. Three weeks before the Beltway sniper was apprehended, Mr. Thompson predicted that he probably trained using a game set to sniper only or god mode. It turned out that the sniper in question played Halo with sniper only and god mode.
Video games are leading to a massive increase in violence from everyone who plays them. Or are they?
I am a competitive rifle shooter, placing fifth place in the state games. I like to go paintballing and I like to shoot my airsoft gun with my brother. I've been hunting before and I love it. I also play video games. Could this be why I love to shoot things? Jack Thompson would probably say yes. I disagree.
Anyone who has ever played a video game, whether it be Halo or Duck Hunter, and who has shot a gun before, will tell you that the two are no where close to being similar. The mastery of your breathing, the ability to control your muscles, and the mindset required to shoot anything can not be compared to the skills required to run around shooting everything you see in games such as Counter-Strike and Unreal. Besides, moving your mouse around or positioning a cross hair using joysticks is a lot easier than holding, aligning the sights, and aiming a real gun. Then hitting what you are aiming at is a whole other matter.
There is more than first hand experience driving this argument. Since they first came out, video games have been violent. From Donkey Kong, where you throw barrels at a Gorilla, to Pac-Man where you run around eating ghosts. These classic games have been around for at least a generation. They are the type of games our parents played when they were teenagers. Has Pac-Man turned us all into cannibals? Do our parents go around throwing barrels at everyone? Violence in video games has been there from the start, and it has never affected us before.
But then again, Grand Theft Auto hasn't been out for years.
I can guarantee you that most children you know have played Grand Theft Auto. How many of them have shot police officers in the face with shotguns, shot rockets at cars or run over pedestrians for fun?
It has gotten to the point that if your weapon accidentally discharges and shoots someone, the first thing prosecutors look for are video games. If they happen to find video games at all, they will automatically blame the shooting on them.
But maybe I'm just crazy, maybe video games are what drove those teenagers to open fire at Columbine. After all, their parents were too busy to tell that their children were getting violent. And there’s no possibility that anyone at the school knew, I mean the counselors are just there to be there, right? There was no way this could have been prevented.
What if video games are the cause of violence in America. Are there ways to stop it? Of course there are, and guess what, they all fall back to the parents and school officials. Video Games are rated by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB). They rate all video games into one of these categories: Early Childhood (EC), Everyone (E), Everyone 10+ (E10+), Teen (T), Mature (M), or Adult Only (AO). Any violent game will be rated from T to AO. If it is rated M, a parent must be present to allow the child do purchase the game. Here is where the parent steps in. If your child has shown violent behavior or if you for whatever reason don't think a violent game would go over too well for them, DO NOT LET THEM BUY IT. It is that simple.
But of course, kids find ways around everything. So what do you do then? When you come home from work and see your child sitting there playing a video game, instead of just walking on, watch him a little while and make sure its something you would approve of. If not, you have every right as the parent to take it away. Once again, its that simple.
What if they still are playing those games? Thats when the school officials step in. It is the job of any School Administrator, specifically the counselors, to know their students and know what is happening at their school. For example, at my school they know who all the members of a certain gang are. If some gang activity is going on, they know exactly who to watch. You may think that it is just more work I am saying you should do but it is part of your job and you should be doing it anyway. Also, isn't that right there one of the main duties of a school counselor?
But maybe I am just crazy, maybe its impossible to keep track of everything thats going on. No one knew that an attack was going to be made against the World Trade Centers. After all, those CIA documents were really only blank pieces of paper, were they not?
People like Jack Thompson exist to find excuses for those negligent parents and the school administrators. No one wants to admit that they could have done something to prevent it. But if you work to do something to prevent it, you wouldn't be in that position to begin with would you? Just like the dog ate my homework excuse, this one is getting old.

10% increase?!?

Of corse!

A little more than a week after I posted that rant, the House of Representatives voted to increase the indecency fine by 10%

This is just annoying.

A call to arms... against Censorship

Theres this little sound that you here everywhere. While you are listeneing to your favorite song on the radio. While you are watching TV. It crawls under your skin and vibrates until you can't stand to hear it any longer. Then scarcely less than a second later (although it seems like ages) it stops. Its the beep. You know the beep. The one they use to take all the "profanity" out of whatever medium you happen to be paying attention to at the time.

Censorship doesn't stop there.

In Mississippi, Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was banned because the word "nigger" was used over 200 times (but everyone knows its because the book was making fun of them).

Censorship is only one of the plagues that are threatening our society. On February 1, 2004 Janet Jackson showed the world just how ugly she has gotten. But she really didn't show any more than you can see watching the "Girls Gone Wild" commercials on Comedy Central. Because of that "wardrobe malfunction" 'live' events are being delayed so they can censor anything that might happen again. CBS affiliates around the United States were fined by the FCC. And it caused a crackdown by the FCC. All of the sudden, radio stations won't play Pink Floyd's "Money" because it has the word 'shit' in it.

The FCC has decided to tell us, the free people of the United States of America, that we are too stupid to know what offends us. The FCC has decided to tell us that we don't know how to turn off something that is offending us. The FCC has decided to tell us what we can and can not see and hear. And we are letting them.

In our glorious age of over 900 channels of TV, dozens of local radio stations, the FCC has decided to say that we lack the ability to change the TV channel, or switch radio stations when something we think is offence comes on. THAT IS WRONG. If I want to watch "The Daily Show with John Stewart" without having to hear all the bleeps, then I am up the shit creek without a paddle. Never mind the fact that these are channels I have to pay for so I obviously want. Never mind the fact that I can always just push one button on the remote (or TV) and change the channel if I don't like it. If someone doesn't want to hear John Stewart say the word 'shit' than damn if anyone else can hear it too.

The sad thing is, we are letting them do this. WE MUST STOP! If you want a legal reason to kick censorship, cite the first amendment (although I have already established that the government has no idea what the bill of rights is) where it says, quite clearly, "Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press..."

There is your legal reason to fight. Censorship is more than just wrong. In these United States of America, it is ILLEGAL. All we have to do is fight it.

Domestic Spying's a Bitch

I hate Bush.....

Its not that he doesn't know how to talk....
Its not that he is a wannabe redneck.....
Its not even the fact that he is lying to the American People (at least not at the moment).

Its the fact that he is walking all over the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and getting away with it.

The latest hitting the American people, is the Domestic Spying program. It is "probably the most classified program that exists in the United States government" (Attorney General Alberto Gonzales) and it got leaked to the media.

The Domestic Spying is walking all over our 4th amendment rights guarenteeing us the right to be secure in our possessions. "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." (4th Amendment)

Fuck This doesn't requre any arguing..... Its so obviously fucking up our rights that I don't even need to talk about it anymore. And if you can't see it, maybe you should go back and take Civics class again. I'll be sure you get put in the same class as Bush.

To everyone: Race isn't everything

The views expressed in this rant may lead you to believe that I am a VERY racist person. I want it known from the get go that I am not racist, I just comment on my observations..

Now, on to the rant.

NOT EVERYTHING IS ABOUT RACE!
Those ignorant people somehow manage to find something wrong with every single thing anyone ever does. I was watching a news report on the Duke Lacross crap, and they have arrested two players who "participated in the assualt and rape". Except for one thing. One (or both) of them WERN'T EVEN THERE! And yet the "victim"'s cusin was on the news saying how she was glad they finally arrested those responsible and she was confident that they were the people who did it because she "picked out their pictures" More importantly; however, this whole thing has SOMEHOW managed to become a race thing. I'm sure that when the lacross players hired a "Exotic Dancer" they had no idea of her skin color, much less gave a damn. Even still, the NAACP is "watching it very closely" because god forbid those two white boys get free, they need to be there to file a civil suit (which, I will get into at another time).

Unfortunatly, this is a problem that runs much deeper than just the Duke stuff. Have you noticed how those exact same ignorant people are the ones causing the biggest rucous about the Mexican's "taking American jobs"? THE JOBS THE MEXICANS TAKE ARE THOSE JOBS THAT NOONE WANTS TO BEGIN WITH! I'm willing to bet money that if for some reason we kicked all the mexican's out, those people would be the last people to try and get those jobs, and would probably start complaining about how nothing is getting done..

Then there is New Orleans and Bush. I must admit I hate George Bush a lot, and I blame him for a lot of things, but theese people have gone too far. "George Bush didn't help New Orleans because the people there are poor blacks". IT'S NOT ABOUT RACE! Even if you were a city of white people, the help would have been lacking. Maybe if they got off their fat lazy asses more than once a year (Mardi Gras!), you could get out! Sure there are a lot of hurricanes, but how often does a Category 5 hurricane go directly over New Orleans... add to that the city is under water, there should have been no hesitation. George Bush didn't have anything to do with New Orleans, it was the FEMA Director, and he didn't help New Orleans because he didn't understand the meaning of "Category 5 Hurricane".

And of corse I have to add in the thing with the Congress woman from Georgia. She walks through a check point at the capital building and doesn't stop. Hrm. Lets see here. If I drove past a check point without stoping, what do you think the police are going to do? Let me go? Anyway the security guard tried to stop her, so he put his hand on her sholder. She then threw her Cell phone at him and started swinging at him.

Lets see now......... what do you think the Congress woman did? Apologize? Of corse not. She called a press conference and told everyone that she was being harassed for being a black woman. The sad thing: Those Georgians believed her! It has nothing to do with race. They were stoping everyone. It was just that she was too ignorant to notice.

Is it just me or do these people always manage to find a way to turn everything into something about race.