I’m sure you've seen this one; Katie Couric did an hour long
exposé on the dangers of violent video games, and video game addiction. In
short, she found some particularly gruesome cases of violence and tragedy, and
tries to frame them in the context of being caused by violent video games. The
prominent case on display is the case of Daniel Petric, the so called “Halo Killer”, who
shot both of his parents in the head when they took away his copy of Halo 3.
Petric's father survived the gunshot, while his mother did not, and after
facing trial was sentenced to life in prison, with possibility of parole after
23 years. I could spend literally 12 hours typing up all the reasons why this
piece of “journalism” is a complete farce, but I’m going to try to do it in 8.
I would like to point out that I am in no way trying to
undercut this tragedy. Petric snapped, and in his rage committed a terrible act
of violence. As a society, it is up to us to protect the members of our society
first and foremost, even against other members. Petric is a murderer, and no
amount of justification or science will change what he’s done, or what
punishment he will face for it. However, the way that Katie Couric is
presenting this tragedy is nothing short of exploitation.
I could go on a rant about legitimate mental health problems not
suddenly appearing in 1972 when Pong
was first released, or in any other year when your game scapegoat de-jour came
out. I could talk about the fact that, if we assume that video games cause these behaviors that the actual
violent events are statistically insignificant compared to the number of people
who actually play video games (about 70% of the entire world).
I could also point out how this report is framed and shot like a horror movie,
with the sole intent of scaring its audience. How about I go on a rant featuring all of the well
documented positive effects of video games? I guess the most convincing evidence is that this is just a
repeat of history. Before video games, rock music was going to get our kids to
worship Satan, and before that comic books were ruining our children forever.
Video games are just the latest in a long list of parental scapegoats, and if
history is any indication, we will irrationally discriminate against something
that our kids like.
Instead of all of that though, I’m going to talk about
something I didn't even know about until I was doing research for this article.
The Petric case took place in 2007, so the trial and sentencing have come and
gone, and during the trial, the defense attorney claimed that Petric was
housebound for nearly a year due to a staph infection that resulted from a
snowboard injury. The defense went on to say that due to these conditions, he
was “more prone to be influenced by the game's violent content”.
What.
What does that even mean? Is this lawyer literally implying
that boredom can lead to murder? Is
he saying that Halo 3 encourages matricide, but unless you have sufficient time
to play it doesn't affect you? They were going for an insanity defense here,
but that means that they were trying to prove that playing video games for a
long time causes insanity. Not even
the “sleep deprivation causes insanity remarkably quickly” defense, literal,
balls to the wall, insanity. While he was still found guilty, and his
sentencing was lighter than it could have been on account of Petric being a
minor, the judge admitted that he believed that “[Petric] had no idea at the time he hatched this plot that if he killed his parents, they would be dead forever."
What the hell? I’m not about to go on a personal
accountability rant, but this is not rocket science people. When someone does
something that they like to do over and over again, it isn't an addiction, it's
just something they like to do. When they get to the point of neglecting other
elements of their life for it, it becomes an addiction. Petric had legitimate
mental problems, and the event of his parents taking away his copy of Halo was
just the trigger that led to this awful incident. That trigger could have been
anything else just as easily, any other confrontational act with his parents
where he had to choose between them and something he wanted. I’m willing to bet
that a gun wouldn't have even been involved if his father hadn't locked the game in the same lockbox where he kept his 9mm handgun.
But that’s a whole
other issue.
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