Video games have proven to be a convenient scapegoat for tragedies of all sorts. They ran with it in the Trump assassination attempt.
Over the years, one of the mainstream media’s favourite meme’s when it comes to technology is to blame video games for everything. They push narratives that say that video games in general are highly addictive and comparable to cocaine or that video games are murder simulators designed to turn people into psychopaths. Yet, every single time they push these narratives, it is invariable backed by either flawed data or no data at all. There’s little wonder to why that is as science, in general, have never shown links to either one of these behaviours. Since science generally defeats the narrative and challenges the moral panic, the mainstream media generally tries to ignore the evidence or tries to argue that the science is in dispute and needs more time to finally come to the conclusions they are pushing.
Some politician’s wind up falling for this moral panic that video games are some sort of ominous threat to society. In Australia, there was an attempt to include video games in their age verification laws, blocking them from younger audiences unless highly sensitive personal information is submitted first.
While the moral panic about the alleged “dangers” of video games have been repeatedly debunked over the decades, the mainstream media still loves to trot this silly meme out to explain away things like tragedy. Recently, there have been efforts to explain why a would-be assassin would try to end convicted felon, Donald Trump’s life. One mainstream media outlet jumped to the conclusion that video games were to blame. From Fox News (not linking for the sake of not rewarding the stupidity they wrote):
Trump shooter used gaming site that features presidential assassination game
Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, also had a Discord account
The Steam platform offers more than 100,000 games, including the assassination game Mr. President!, but there is no evidence Crooks played it.
The game’s protagonist, Dick “Rock-Hard” Johnson – “the best bodyguard money can buy” – is sworn to protect “the most hated presidential candidate of all time Ronald Rump,” the game’s description reads.
Immediately after Crooks opened fire Saturday at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, Steam users began noting the Mr. President! game’s sudden real world parallels in a forum.
Users in a discussion board commented on how the game Mr. President! had mimicked real life with the assassination attempt on former President Trump. (Steam)
Crooks had a very limited online footprint, but had an account on the encrypted social media platform Discord and on Steam, according to authorities.
Seriously, what the ____ was THAT?
You could tell the “journalists” were attempting to link video games to the assassination attempt, but not getting anywhere. The game they cited was actually a game about protecting the presidents life, not ending it. Then, on top of it all, admit that there was no evidence that the would-be assassin even played the game in the first place. For good measure, they mention that he had a discord account even though they don’t even bother trying to explain how the heck that is relevant information.
It’s pretty obvious what they are attempting to do here. Despite zero evidence, they are attempting to get their audience to form the link in their minds while not really getting into the silly little details. Just skim the headline and form their opinions.
Mike Masnick of Techdirt, unsurprisingly, called this some of the worst reporting he’s ever seen. From TechDirt:
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.
The attempt to make the link in the first place was absolutely pathetic. Like Masnick says, it would not be a surprise if others bring this up as if it were just further evidence that video games cause harm. After all, it fits with a very convenient narrative that some people love pushing – even if there is no science to back up these wild claims. Further, I’d normally say the outlet should be ashamed of themselves, but this is Fox “News”. Being shameless is pretty much a job requirement to work for a terrible company like that.
