GTA, bad for the kids, or just an excuse by the parents?

60 minutes on CBS was taking about how a kid who went around with a heater (a gun, not one that warms you up.. >_>) and pop a few guys. The special fact about him, which differentiates him from a few thousand kids, is that he was playing Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas before he went shooting.

So, the flood gates are opened, all the moms and dads and their grandmothers are talking how violent games should be banned and stuff.

Blah Blah Blah.

Fine. 1 guy goes pop half the world because he played a video game, and you blame the game. What about the other 3 million suckers (including me) who has played the game, but did not shoot a cop on sight? Yeah, we play the game too! You don't see us holding AKs and shooting cars, car jacking, spray painting all over the walls.

How about those parents look deeper, and realise, that the main problem is, the upbringing of the child.

Which means it's THEIR DAMNED FAULT.

Of course, it's also something which they overlook easily.

Too easily.

But c'mon. Any kid with a decent upbringing will know that shooting people is bad. You don't need the school to teach you that, nor do you need a PS2 to tell you that. If they have bothered to bring the kid up properly, instead of going out and sleeping with their bosses every night and leaving that poor kid to his PS2 and the 16 year old Nanny who spends more time on the phone then looking at the kid, then it is your fault. Your kid turned out in a way which his main form of education came from his PS2. If the parents had bothered to spend more time with the kid, they will tell him that these things are wrong. And in turn, the kid won't pop anyone he sees.

But really, are video games the source of teenage violence?

Everytime a violent game (famous ones, to note), some one will complain about it. Quake series, Doom 3, Half Life, Grand Theft Auto, the list goes on. However, most of these games give you the option to kill the people. Or, you have to kill people to survive. For example, Half Life requires you to kill Aliens, but when it comes to attacking the scientists, you are not required to kill them. More over, in Half Life 2, only those people which you should not kill cannot be killed (without cheats). Your gun simply misses them. Same goes for Grand Theft Auto. Does it tell you to run over the poor bugger? No. But it's there. You can use it if you want. And the same goes for many other games. You don't have to kill innocent people if you don't want to.

Except maybe people want to. People like violence. Hell, I like violence, but only when it's in the screens. People do know that there is a difference from real life and what they see in the screen. Sure, one out of a million will be a total moron who don't know that, but 999999 out of a million will know that.

As I've said this is just for parents to cover up what their carelessness, their inability to teach their child properly.

Heck, it's because many more have to deal with "pong" and "tetris" back at their days. hey are simply jealous of the games in the market these days, but they can't buy it since they won't have time to play it. You know, hookers require a lot of time....

But here's another interesting fact: Many people have said that the main reason why San Andreas got so much "attention" was because the main character was black. Come to think of it...yeah. GTA3 and GTA:VC didn't get this bad. Then again, maybe it's because no one killed someone due to GTA.

We have learned this in GP, and many teachers are pretty much against violence. I was pretty much ready to write a crap essay about how violent TV cannot cause violent youths, but the sad thing was that it came out in promos or something, something which I can't screw around with.

So anyway, I'm always pissed when people cover their own ass with something. There will always be people who will blame violence on something. Last time, it was due to TV, cowboys and all that. Now, it's games. What's next?

Then again, if Pong and tetris can make you go nuts, as what a science research has said, anything can happen.

Bleep bloop bleep.