[On march 11th, Tim K. entered his former school (in Winnenden, Germany) armed with a gun he stole from his father. In the school and while on the run from the police he killed 15 people, and finally himself.]
I’m truly sad that things like this keep happening. And I’m really angry about the way part of the press and some opportunistic people reacted. Instead of ranting about them and calling them names, I’m just going to let them speak from themselves. This includes voices against video games and voices who are sceptical of a direct connection.
These quotes have been collected from numerous german news sites, including Gamestar, Spiegel Online, Stern.de, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Neue Osnabücker Zeitung, Zeit Online, Welt Online and Die Neue Netzzeitung. I translated them myself, while trying to stay as true to the original as possible. [Editor's note; minor alterations have been made to the translations to make them easier to read, but the context and sentiment remain unchanged - Wardrox]
Not every user goes on a killing spree, but a high portion of the gunman has [sic] used killergames. We should look into that.
Günther Beckstein, Bavarias Minister of the Interior (AD)
The motive is connected to the internet.
[Counter Strike] is part of the motive.
Klaus Hinderer, police spokesman
That the 17-year old kept shooting while on the run, is a behaviour that youngsters can also learn in games like Counter Strike or Crysis.
Hans Dieter Schwind, President of the German Foundation for Fighting Crime
Media consuption is always seen as part of the trigger. It is my thesis that media like computer games at most provide behaviour patterns and strategies, but do not make the individual decide to commit the crime. You are misjudging if you think that you can prevent these crimes with a ban. But the media does spur violent fantasies. A mixture of feeling neglected [in the real world] and the virtual immortality the media gives causes the media to take a role in these crimes.
Willhelm Heitmeyer, Researcher of Violence
It isn’t clear right now if [violent videogames] had a role for the 17-year old culprit. But there are Killergames on the market that are totally unbearable and lower the inhibition threshold especially for young people. There are games that put the player into the role of the violent criminal, to uninhibited pick off other humans.[...] I think that those games have no place [in our society].
Joachim Herrmann, Bavarias Minister of the Interior
Killergames are atrocious and inhuman. [...] nobody needs these products.
Volker Bouffier, Hesse’s Minister of the Interior
Teenagers know very well that the society doesn’t tolerate violence [...] They can use the computer to break taboos, without getting their hands dirty. [...] [Banning violent games, to prevent killing sprees] criminalises millions of peaceful people.
Christoph Klimmt, Computergame Scientist
(original pic by flickr user jahfool)
iTunes
Earlier this year a 15 year old near Toronto, ON. Canada went missing and was found dead later. His father blamed CoD4 publicly as this kid was skipping school to play with his clan and compete. The dad took the 360 away, the kid ran away, and died-apparently he fell out of a tree(seriously).
The non-gaming public like to blame games for bizarre sociological occurences, because they are an easy target. 40 years ago novels were being banned in schools that were considered dangerous or inflammatory. It’s intellectual sloth to blame games for kids going on killing sprees, or running away, or whatever.
In all seriousness about this whole thing, prosecuting video games is completely ridiculous. First off, most people over the age of fifteen, and who are sane, would not try to recreate scenes from a video game that involve violence. I will say however, that younger people, ages maybe 1 to 13, are, in comparison to the rest of society, are completely mentally retarded. My point is that people are smart enough to not imitate what they see in games. Banning violent video games in order to cut down on murder is like trying to ban porn in order to cut down on rape. When you first glance at it, the idea makes sense, but upon closer inspection, one finds that it total bullshit.
The whole issue here is that the German public is looking for a scapegoat not to have something to blame, but so they can have something to blame that they can act upon. 90% of school shooters come from well adjusted communities based around a central culture or ideal like suburbs and suburban areas tend to experience all school shootings. The act comes about when an ostracized individual reaches a point when he makes the conclusion that his life is not worth continuing but suicide will not leave a large enough impact.
Suburban children and youths are expected to live their live as a more modern version of the parental communities perfect schooling experience. This is why social cliques have not changes much over the last 50 years. The children either succeed or fail, sometimes these failures are so personally destructive they are driven to rationalize such extreme methods of exacting revenge.
“90% of school shooters come from well adjusted communities based around a central culture or ideal like suburbs and suburban areas tend to experience all school shootings.”
What? Maybe I have misinterpreted that statement, but if not, that’s complete bullshit. “suburban areas”? Fuck no, it happens in cities, not in suburbs. I wish I could write this better but I can’t find any words right now, but if anything, 90% of school shootings happen in urbans areas, definetly not suburban.