blame video games – Techdirt (original) (raw)

from the beyond-clickbait-to-just-utter-nonsense dept

When tragedy strikes, it’s human nature to search for answers. But when you’re Fox News, it seems that the answer is always the same: blame video games, social media, or anything else that fits your preconceived notions, facts be damned.

In the aftermath of the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, I idly wondered how long it would take before someone tried to blame the shooting on social media, smartphones, or video games.

It took just slightly longer than I expected. On Thursday, ever reliable Fox News blasted this headline:

Trump shooter used gaming site that features presidential assassination game

And then they also mention, for good measure, that he “also had a Discord account.”

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Incredibly, it took two whole reporters to come up with this story.

And let’s be clear, almost the entire story is false, and the parts that aren’t false are stupid. This is some of the worst reporting I’ve seen in a while.

The “gaming site” in question was Steam. Anyone should know it has a ton of games. Listing the “Presidential assassination game” in the headline is basically an admission of just how dishonest Fox News is because five paragraphs into the article, they mention:

“there is no evidence Crooks ever played it.”

So what’s it doing in the fucking headline, Fox?

Also, it’s even worse than that because other reporters who actually understand what “reporting” means did the research and found out that the reported Steam account that some people claimed belonged to Crooks was fake. CBS reporters had that story:

A new analysis shows an online account that was believed to belong to the shooter in the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump — and where he had purportedly called the date of the attack his “premiere” — was fake, a federal law enforcement official told CBS News on Thursday.

A law enforcement official and an additional source familiar with a briefing given to U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday previously told CBS News that the gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, had an account on an online gaming platform on which he posted: “July 13 will be my premiere.” But the federal law enforcement official says further investigation determined it was a fake account.

I saw some other reporting suggesting that the account on Steam was one where someone changed their username to pretend to be Crooks.

Watching the Fox News crowd get so desperate for anything to blame the shooting on is pretty pathetic. But I have no doubt that someone will bring this up in the future as if it were factual, and seeing the story morph to claim not just that he was on Steam, but that he played this supposed “Presidential assassin” game. Because facts no longer matter.

Filed Under: blame, blame video games, donald trump, steam, thomas crooks, video games
Companies: fox, fox news

Flordia AG Somehow Pivots To The Danger Of Video Games After The Latest Florida Shooting

from the facepalm dept

There is a long tradition in conservative politics for blaming video games whenever a mass shooting is carried out by a relatively young person. It’s a monumentally stupid argument, given the complicated and twisted nature of mass shootings and the motivations behind them. But, since policy and politics are now offered merely in soundbite formats, the end result of a mass shooting is for every person to retreat to their familiar corners and make lots of noises that ultimately accomplish nothing but stagnation.

The mass shooting that happened in Florida recently could have been a different story. While it indeed happened at a video game tournament, the gamers involved were playing Madden, not some violent shoot ’em up. If playing a football video game makes people angry enough to shoot people, just wait until those decrying video game violence turn on their TVs on Sunday and realize that there are actual people playing the same game for real. There was no indication anywhere that this shooting was carried out by anything other than an individual that likely had some severe mental problems and access to weapons. And, yet, somehow Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi addressed this latest shooting by pivoting directly to the dangers of kids playing video games and the predators that will harm them.

With the strength of a long history of conservative handwringing over the impact of violent video games on children’s minds to her back, Bondi went down a different road, instead warning parents that “predators” might find children through location services on video games.

Here is video of the interview in question.

If all of that sounds completely insane to you, you’re not alone. If you cannot view the video above, it consists of Bondi somehow, in the wake of a public mass shooting that occurred in her own state, warning parents that predators out there are using location tools in video games like Minecraft to hunt our children down and kill or otherwise hurt them. What any of this has to do with the shooting that just occurred is anyone’s guess.

Bondi went on to warn that parents should check the settings on the games their children are playing, because “predators can find you based on location services.” According to Bondi, “The scary thing is they could find out where your 13-year-old is sitting at home playing that game”—not, presumably, that almost anyone could have a gun anywhere, including at a pizza restaurant or a video game tournament. Bondi conveniently failed to mention that the two men who died in this incident were 27 and 22 years old.

“I know Minecraft, we’ve talked about that in the past, I don’t know about Fortnite,” Bondi also said. I have no idea what she’s talking about, and have reached out to Microsoft to clarify whether Minecraft does indeed feature any location services options. From what I can tell looking at my version of Fortnite on Nintendo Switch, there is no option that would reveal my location to other gamers.

So what the hell is all of this? Is it just a staunch conservative politician abdicating her responsibilities to push back against the familiar attack on gun rights that occurs after mass shootings like this? Is this sort of pivot to, in some way, any way, blame video games in the wake of shootings simply some Pavlovian reflex at this point? Or, given that Bondi has made waves and perhaps history as the only sitting AG that also occasionally fills in as a host for a cable news network, is she instead simply auditioning for her next career move?

Pam Bondi is still the attorney general of Florida, at least for another four months. But last week Bondi had a different job: co-host of Fox News’ The Five. She subbed on the news talk show not once, not twice, but three times, appearing as a panelist Wednesday through Friday.

The situation was so unprecedented for a sitting elected official that Bondi first sought guidance from the Florida Commission on Ethics, the government body that oversees conduct of public officials. Tallahassee lawyer Richard Coates “spoke to the Commission on behalf of the Attorney General” prior to appearing on the show, her spokeswoman Kylie Mason said.

You know… it’s the auditioning thing. And I’ll be damned if that isn’t yet another gross ingredient in this sickening bullshit pie that is somehow blaming Minecraft for a mass shooting at a Madden tournament.

Filed Under: blame video games, florida, football, guns, pam bondi, school shootings, video games

Jack Thompson Disbarred; Claims Florida Lawyers Are Out To Get Him

from the will-he-still-get-on-TV? dept

It’s been quite a while since we last wrote about Jack Thompson, the rather infamous lawyer who blames all sorts of violent crimes on video games and has repeatedly sued video game makers in an effort to shift blame from actual violent criminals to the makers of the video games they play. Thompson was also a regular guest on various TV news shows talking about video games and violence, where he would insist repeatedly (against plenty of evidence to the contrary) that video games cause people to kill. He was also famous for filing bogus lawsuits against critics and has been told by judges repeatedly that he needs to actually follow the law.

Well, it appears that all that may be over, as Jack Thompson has now been disbarred, effective 30 days from today. Of course, Thompson isn’t one to let a little thing like being disbarred stop him. He’s responded at length and is appealing the disbarment (even though he’s not actually allowed to file the appeal — he did so anyway). Still, all this makes you wonder if the various TV news shows that always had him on as a guest will (a) report on his disbarment or (b) still use him as a guest in future stories about video games and violence.

Filed Under: blame video games, disbarred, florida, jack thompson