RFK Jr. Blames violent video games for Mass Shootings.
Shade of idiot Jack Thompson with brain worm here.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/rfk-jr-comes-up-with-new-possible-cause-for-mass-shootings-video-games/Open linkView original on lemmy.world662
Comments165
Yup, famously before that, violence didn't exist at all.
No but his dad and uncle were still alive.
My dad and uncle are still alive though
These guys were evil! 😯
Games of Mass Destruction
"Yo, Charlie got PONGED"
this is so obviously false it's enfuriating coming from the head of HHS. Lots of coutnries all over the world have the same violent video games we do without the mass shootings.
okaaaaaaay... follow that train of thought just a liiiiiitle bit further bobby. Do you think Switzerland is stuck in the 80s or something?
You got yourself in a cul-de-sac there. The worm ate the train long ago 😂
God damnit Bobby...
remember, that his bear cub incident was only 10-11years prior too.
Oh wow, we're really hitting all the classics.
We're almost back to blaming violence on D&D. Exciting times.
They're communing with Satan, I hear!
We'll get there, just give it time.
It's those skateboards that done it, and the comic books the hooligans are readin. And all them lady folk wearin trousers! It's the devil I tells ya!
Tipper Gore just got a tingling sensation in her naughty bits.
*If you saw the pre edit you're welcome.
Aw man what'd I miss?
I wrote I'm her naughty bits instead of in because phones are dumb.
We got time travel before GTA 6
Can't risk hinting that the policies that they push directly lead to the material conditions that cause these shootings.
When you are trying to avoid the most obvious solutions at all costs, you have to recycle the greatest hits.
Are we really restarting this conversation for the FUCKING millionth time???
Crime in the US peaked in 1993... when Doom first came out. Then it started dropping until recently.
Conclusion: violent video games cause a drop in crime.
But it peaked the same year Doom came out. Obviously Doom was the cause of the peak!
I should add, that as less people played Doom, violent crime reduced.
::: spoiler Tap for spoiler Ok no the double down will woosh someone, here's your /s :::
Doom is a game made by a cultist where the player goes to hell to interact with demons!!!
Ban the Mormon made demon killing game!
There was one helluva gamer in Utah today.
I live in Utah and have a coworker that was supposed to be there for class tonight. Wild times...
How many more until he can call in a drone or an air strike?
It's called the 'Gish Gallop.'
The best way for the Right to defeat the Left in an argument is to unload a torrent of lies, half truths, complete nonsense, and other disinformation. The idea is to overwhelm the other side's ability to form a coherent response, because there's too much to unpack.
Trump knows Kennedy is an idiot, but he's a useful idiot in that he forces the Left to deal with him.
fun fact its created by the russian, its also called the FIREHOSE OF FALSEHOOD.
It's because we have Trump to deal with that we have him to deal with.
Because Brain Worm Jr is Trumps gift to the world.
Who do you think they'll run in 2028?
Who the fuck is downvoting this comment? Genuinely why? Is this some pro-trump instance or something? Like wtf I don’t understand what I said wrong…
You used an ableist slur for no apparent reason?
is the news supposed to NOT cover what the government is doing?
Trump listens to Fox News on the daily. He takes advice and opinions from Fox News. Fox News influences his stances and direction.
In this way, Fox News is even more powerful than Trump himself. Because Fox News influences like half the country, but also influences Trumps future actions.
So it's not that Fox News covers the news. The issue is that Fox News creates news.
the comment wasn't about fox news specifically, it was about news in general. like it or not, we need news agencies to cover what these people are doing.
probably people shilling for Charlie kirk.
Same reason any other politician is on the news. Because unfortunately they dictate our collective plight as Americans. And really outside the US as well.
Because they control the country and people should know what they are doing. It's not that complicated.
Games don't cause mass shootings.
Conservatives(policies) do.
Conservatives (reactionary fear mongering) do.
You mean the same dumbass that blames an ingredient that hasn't been in vaccines in over 20 years for Autism, an ingredient that has never been shown to cause autism in the first place? Does anyone actually take this jackass seriously?
Bobby Kennedy must be rolling over in his grave.
Yeah unfortunately 40% of Americans do take this jackass seriously.
Well he's right.
Until the invention of video games no one ever killed anyone ever. Then pong came along, and it was mass murder every other day.
Proof:
I'm bout to pong yo eye out, mutha flicka!
i blame mass shootings for video games
Charlie Kirk would like to have a word. Go ahead Charlie, Charlie? CHARLIE NO!!!!
Charlie yes! Charlie always yes!
Ooh, so original. Going back to those age old talking points eh. So fresh, so new. Why does anyone listen to these wind bags?
I played a lot of Pac-Man and now I'm munching for pills in dark rooms while listening to repetitive music. It's true, I love techno parties. Joke, I barily ever played Pac-Man.
I also played a lot of age of empires. Now I annoy everyone with "whololoooo" all the time. Joke, no I don't.
::: spoiler Tap for spoiler Whololooooo :::
It probably has nothing to do with widely available guns.
Here in NL we don't have that, but we do have loads of mass shootings. Oh wait, no we don't. But we don't have violent video games. Oh wait, yes we do.
::: spoiler Tap for spoiler Whololooooo :::
This comic is 26 years old. Still relevant.
https://auknewmedia.wordpress.com/2012/11/03/pacmans-effect-on-behavior/
For some reason I want to subscribe to your newsletter
Dear czl,
In today's newsletter:
Whololooooo
Whololooooo whololoooo whololoooooooooooo
No longer want to receive this newsletter? Click unsubscribe
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_g0AFBslNms
Those spoilers deserve an upvote.
Not this again...
Back to the 90s.
Hear me out...James Tiberius Kirk was supposed to be a descendant of Charles Aswipe Kirk. Slowly these photos will fade away and be replaced by photos of Christopher Pike.
Then we'd be in a timeline where Spock dies instead, which ends up much worse. (per Strange New Worlds)
I concur
He has two kids. Maybe one of his daughters hands her last name down
Jesus K Rist he is stupid.
Better loosen gun laws some more, that'll fix it.
Microwaved Mel Gibson can fuck all the way off with that nonsense.
Peripherally related:
https://www.psypost.org/sexualized-video-games-are-not-causing-harm-to-male-or-female-players-according-to-new-research/
Battlefield and CoD are responsible for war?
Oh jeez, I glad they didn't have video games in 1914, otherwise they might have killed a bunch of people!
RFK Jr do better...Tylenol killed 7 people in the 90s, Kirk was obviously killed by Tylenol.
It's straight disinformation. Nevermind that everyone else plays the same games, let's cherry pick the one western nation that has a comparable number of guns per capita and not think about that any further.
If we look at "intentional homicide rate" (choice of weapon agnostic), the US is 66th and just above Greenland. I think this statistic is better than "gun deaths" since it excludes suicides and accidental deaths and looks at intentional murder.
The number is way higher than it should be, but probably way better than most assume given the news.
why should we exclude suicides and accidents?
also Greenland isn't a very reliable comparison statistically since their grand total of intentional murders in 2024 was 3. Canada is ranked 111 with a rate less than half of US. UK is ranked 142 with a rate less than a quarter of the US.
Because those are separate problems with separate solutions.
If people use guns to kill themselves, will they stop killing themselves if we take the guns away? Maybe some will, if the alternatives take so much more time, but the impact won't be massive. Instead of making suicide harder, we should be treating the root cause of suicide, which is desperation (i.e. have a decent social safety net) and depression (make mental health resources widely available).
If people get hurt due to gun accidents, I highly doubt they'd be happy if we took their guns away, since that's like solving traffic deaths by banning cars. The better solution is to improve safety features on guns and teach people gun safety so they can use them safely, or in the car example, we should be improving road design and driving education (and making cars less necessary, but that's a separate point).
Suicides and gun accidents are certainly interesting statistics, but mixing them with homicides just makes it harder to see what's going on and arrive at effective solutions.
Generally yes, Suicide tends to be a spur of the moment decision to go through with it and having immediate access to a very easy, very lethal method increases the rate significantly. There have been numerous studies that show that putting up barriers at bridges etc that are commonly jumped from dreastically reduces the suicide rate from them without raising it elsewhere e.g.
Sure, and sensible things like barriers at bridges makes a ton of sense because doing that doesn't negatively impact anyone and merely gives people more time to rethink their choice.
That said, even with those safeguards, tons of people kill themselves. I had a friend do it by hanging, others use drugs, and some use cops.
If we look at statistics, the US has 15.6 suicides per 100k, compared to 18.4 in Belgium, 12.9 in Germany, and 16.6 in France (not trying to cherry pick here, please look up the stats yourself). Each of those countries has (largely) banned guns, yet the US's numbers aren't all that different, so surely guns aren't a major contributor here.
What we need is to address the core issues here, such as access to mental health resources, more social interaction, etc. Banning guns isn't going to meaningfully impact suicide, it'll just shift the statistics to other methods and maybe delay it a bit. People like easy solutions, and treating the symptoms is very attractive, but it's not a real solution.
Or… both?
it’s not even remotely the same thing since cars’ primary purpose is not killing. Also there's a very wide middle ground of options between "do nothing" and "take all guns away". This is not a binarry issue.
it doesn’t really. what does make it harder to arrive at effective solutions is making any excuse possible to avoid gun control.
Sure.
However, most of the gun-related "solutions" I've seen wouldn't actually solve anything, or there's very little supporting evidence that they're actually effective (see this Twitter post by the RAND Corporation, media bias for RAND Corporation).
When it comes to suicide prevention, the most effective solution I've seen presented and implemented are red flag laws, yet suicide and mass shooting rates don't seem particularly impacted by that. It turns out people are really bad at taking advantage of those laws, and there's always the risk that innocent people get hit as well.
We already have laws in place in most (all?) of the country that, if actually followed, would prevent a lot of these cases (not suicide, but access to guns). You already can't own guns if you have a felony, if you're on certain medications, or have a history of mental illness. The problem is that many people don't actually get officially evaluated for mental health, don't report medications, etc, so the laws end up missing the very people they're intended to prevent from getting guns.
And then when we look at suicide statistics, the US isn't all that different from European countries at 15.6 per 100k, France at 16.6, Germany at 12.9, and Belgium at 18.4 (IIRC, guns are largely banned in those countries). The US is higher than its neighbors (i.e. Canada has 9.4, and Mexico has 7), but I don't think that's a smoking gun here since Europe also has a wide range (UK is 9.5 and Spain is 8.7). Guns existing doesn't seem like a major factor in suicide rates, it just happens to be the most convenient method so it gets used the most. If guns were effectively restricted from suicidal people, the biggest change we'd likely see would be shifting from firearms to other methods of suicide, not a significant drop in overall suicide rates (though maybe an initial drop due to delayed suicides).
Real solutions here are hard, and banning guns is comparatively easy, but I really don't think it would actually solve the problem.
Absolutely. There have been so many studies trying to prove a connection and failed. It's a completely debunked argument.
I agree. Those who miss out on playing violent video games, end up resorting to real life violence later.
For those who don't remember this guy, he was pretty obnoxious.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Thompson_(activist)
Didn't work last time, won't work this time
It actually galvanized people against the movement and made a younger generation more politically aware, including many probably seeing (voluntarily even) their first testimony to congress as they flipped over from MTV to CSPAN to watch some of their favorite rockers.
So yeah good call GOP
They are really in the shitter with ideas, they have a lot of levers right now, but they are truly staggering under their own weight. Their coalition isn't going to last forever.
What's old is new again...
No what's old is running the government
Been playing bloodborne all week. I still have no desire to go out with two wagon wheels assembled together with some kind of cog mechanism to toss it over my shoulder and slam it into dogs that are too aggressive for my tastes.
Do not lie to yourself hunter, it calls to you just as it calls to all of us. The need for blood the call of the hunt.
Throws spider Patches into the Walmart
Dogs or pigs?
They're all beasts... Yarnam is done for....
No, Nazis like you do. Look at Charlie Kirk. Nazi down.
Hey, dude was a POS but I'll never condone violence.
Not sure if this is the type of reaction post appropriate here.
Remember when Coloumbine happened and politicians started blaming DOOM (a several year old game at that point) and Quake? Hell didn't they also try to blame the Matrix simply because the shooters were wearing trench coats? meanwhile the film came out like what? one or two weeks before the shootings?
Politicians just LOVE their scapegoats.
https://hard-drive.net/hd/video-games/jfk-files-reveal-lee-harvey-oswald-played-violent-video-games/
I'm pretty sure the mass shootings are just emulation of the mass violence the ultrarich inflict on everyone on a daily basis.
I hope the shooter's name is Mario Brother
The CEO killing was nothing more than a correction of the Free Market. His denial policies went to far, and the market corrected the problem. In addition, his company, and other health companies as well, loosened up their denial policies as a result of the killing, almost certainly avoiding deaths. THAT is the very definition of a Free Market correction.
This is another one. MAGA policies have gone too far, and are promising to go further, despite outrage from the majority of the citizens. Now one of those citizens has attempted to reduce some of the most vicious, treasonous, and influential rhetoric by removing the source. It's another Free Market correction.
The Free Market is the Conservative religion, you would think they'd be cheering at evidence that it is working.
Well what is the saying, free market for everyone else, but socialism for themselves.
Even if you've never heard of video games, you can tell this is total bullshit by the fact that RFK jr is saying it.
Remember when Mortal Kombat came out and we all started ripping each other's heads off and pulling out still beating hearts? Those were the days.
it’s guns.
This man is an absolute moron, him saying this is no different from the uneducated garbage he’s been spewing
so does he believe that Swiss people do not play video games, or what
He was so close to the truth, yet so damn far
I love that he is telling something stupid, trying to validate it by using a fact that is probably the best way to prove how stupid it is.
If its a stupid idea. RFK jr. has had it.
Played adventure games and fighting games growing up. Never in my entire forty-something years have I even thrown a punch at anyone.
Japan LOVES video games, you don't see them being brought up for the reason they have sooo maaany murders. Oh wait...
(Now I play MMOs and I never cast a spell at anyone either, in case y'all wondering...)
I played tons of first person shooters, GTA, etc, and I also have never thrown a punch at anyone.
I've punched multiple people, but I know I punched people before I ever had a game console or computer.
World War 2? Nanking? Unit 451. They were plenty messed up.
So you are saying videogames fixed them?
They also gave us anime. I wonder what effect that has had on the world. Nyaaa~!
Funny, Hillary Clinton said the same thing.
And Tipper Gore in the 90s.
I mean, typical boomer shit from an ignorant boomer. I'm not surprised at all.
The single biggest factor for American military hegemony in Grenada was Pac-Man.
Hey fuck you....I know video games didn't cause shit...it seems like I ate that part of his dumbass brain.
God. Are we back on this loop again?!! Incidentally what is the most selling game currently?
A game about a bug with a needle? Super violent.
I'm old enough to remember "Mortal Monday" with the release of the first Mortal Kombat on consoles and everyone was CONVINCED that it would result in kids ripping the spines and hearts out of peoples bodies.
Hell I remember when the original TMNT and Power Rangers was bad because it would encourage kids to do "ninja stuff" to the point where in the UK they changed "Ninja" to "Hero" and eventually Michaelangleo wasn't allowed to use nunchucks anymore because out of ALL the weapons the turtles had, THOSE were a no-no. Sword? Sai? that's fine...even the boe! but heaven forbid a child crafted their own nuncucks!
We never left it, its just not been getting as much traction. It also pivoted, to "Video games cause sexual violence towards women". And yes, GTA was the main culprit as it always has been.
Binding of Isaac is why I torture children /s
Jfc, this again?
So it's a mass shooting now? Feels like a slap in the face to every other incident
If you're referring to the Kirk shooting, this was before that.
Ohh gotcha
Kirk was pretty dense.
Well, if you take away video games we'll have to find entertainment somewhere
What did they tell him about how his father and uncle died?
Probably the truth, just like they told him the truth about vaccines.
The Kennedy assassinations were clearly the result of the Hula Hoop.
I blame faulty condoms for RFK Jr
Wolfenstein was pretty good, ngl
Is the shooter a person of color? Seriously, ask yourself that. Likely that is the citing factor for someone coming up with fucking bullshit like this. When the shooter is white, the defenders of gun rights will point to mental health. The point I am making is that POC will be a used as a scapegoat to upturn causes in society for their actions while a white person is largely upheld by gun rights advocates as a sign of failure to address mental health.
To be fair, a lot of POC gun violence is gang related, not mental health related, because POC tend to be stuck in poorer areas and resort to gangs to make ends meet. There is certainly white gang violence as well, but there's also a lot of mental health related crimes that happen to be committed by white people, probably because they have more ready access to guns that the average non-gang affiliated POC.
Games are unrelated to both cases.
He outed himself as an ignorant fool.
Hey, that's an insult to ignorant fools
He's been doing that his entire life.
Yeah. When all y'all are talking about how we need government intervention and legislature to get you what you want?
THIS is why some of us are very wary of that and don't think "We are just idea people. Other people can make it a law" is at all a good idea.
I guess RWS can add a 'Kennedy Mode' to Postal2 Redux. (in reference to the previous lowest difficulty, Liebermode, named after Senator Joe Lieberman.)
If I don't pass that ant zone on silksong I'm going to shoot something.
Spoons made me fat!
Truth in England.
Christ, man. It’s either “god had a plan” or “captain price from mw2 indirectly shot the suspect, your honor”
His office leaked his plans to link video games to behavioral issues earlier this week, so he already had the press release ready, he just swapped some words around.
Poor innocent guns being used for evil, good thing someone stands up for them. :')
His Brain worm is right. I remember when Pong first came out, and I'd get so pissed off when playing it, that I wanted to kill somebody.
what in the 1993
I know, right? Jack Thompson called, he wants his shtick back.
It's just a rehash of the same silly satanic panic in the 80s. Same idea, different scapegoat, slightly different thing it supposedly causes. But the repugnants have a multi decade history of this shit and trot it out every 5-10 years
Is this real?
Will somebody shoot this guy to make him a martyr?
A polly who doesn't know what they are talking about. nothing new here.
Ask Jack Thompson how that line of reasoning worked out for him
Yeah sure its not idiots like this calling democrats child rapists thats doing it
RFK Jr. is the epitome of The Weekly World News.
I thought they figured out a long time ago that it was actually the ADHD medicine causing it
Video games? You mean mass murder training simulators.
It depends on the individual. Those who cannot distinguish fiction from reality are the ones to watch out for but it’s tough to figure that out.
It really doesn't.
The only legitimate link between violence and video games is that violent people seem to like violent video games. I haven't seen any compelling evidence of a video game causing someone to kill.
And what do you think makes people violent? Their upbringing, their environment, their circumstances, and so on. Obviously, if video games are a significant part of their lives, they can contribute to violent tendencies especially if someone cannot distinguish fiction from reality. That’s exactly my point.
Idk, I'm not a psychologist, but I have looked at studies on video games and there hasn't been a causal link between violent video games and IRL violence. You'd think that with so much focus on age ratings and whatnot that we would've found something, yet that's not the case. My understanding is the largest contributing factors are childhood abuse, social groups (esp. anonymous online groups), and bullying. I suppose some of that could happen in video games (i.e. in-game chat), but then it's not the game itself causing violence, but the interaction w/ other players.
So no, I haven't seen any evidence that violent video games contribute to anything. The best argument is that people who have violent tendencies tend to play violent video games, but the reverse has little to no evidence.
Reasonable, I think that’s a fair argument. I’m just adding that some abused individuals who use video games as a way to cope with stress might be pushed over the edge when they encounter violence in those games. It may be a small percentage, but it can certainly contribute. But yeah, I have to admit that since it’s not such a tangible thing to grasp, it might be difficult to truly know unless the individual clearly says so.