media is media wherever you are in the world my friend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

freespeech

I want to see the guy that actually doesn't know that the neck is a weak spot.

Spiderbait

Allen750

Dear (news) station.

My name is (your name) and I play video games. I am not a killer.

NDub

bueatifulraven

xvorpsm

I know exactly what you meant, and my initial point still stands: either there's an extraordinary amount of child-related crime in Japan relative to elsewhere, or you are just completely unaware of a the volume of similar crimes in the western hemisphere.

inphanta

Evil Tortie's Mom

Evil Tortie's Mom

Kojiro

Insomnia Bob

cswat

muu

Wow, what a nutjob

KM91

hehahohee

Bokusatsu_Tenshi

ThisCharmingMan

Sylar

GrimaceXL

Do you guys want to hire a copy editor? You might say no, but a lot of these posts say yes! I don't sleep much and I'm a cheap date. Call me.

Grave

This implies that the most I ever hear of these attacks come out of Japan. I love Japan. Tokyo is my favorite city on the planet. I married a Japanese girl, for fuck's sake. I have no beef with the Japanese people or their culture. My statement was more to the effect that I don't see reports of attacks where children are the victims from other countries as much as I do from Japan. Is that...is that easier to understand?

Atheist Jew

helyxzero

That's a pretty ignorant and short-sighted thing to say. I can think of plenty of western psychos and serial killers that have harmed or killed children. Check wikipedia.

It always gets me that, when atrocities happen in other countries, people suddenly become very moral and start projecting, proclaiming that "Foreign Country X commits worse atrocities than Home Country Y, which never does bad things to anyone ever."

inphanta

silentbob23

Does Not Equal

*Stabs guy in neck* "Dammit why won't Xbox 360 sell good here????!!!"

Jagzthebest

eric89

And I mean plus I think everyone knows (hopefully) that's where the esophagus is which seems easier to access with a knife than a lung. You don't even need Ninja Gaiden to teach you that (if he played it).

Garro

packratshow

But, to conform to normalcy, I submit the following...

Blaming videogames again... I blame the fact that he has no guns. He was curious how it felt to kill someone, so obviously videogames didn't satisfy his curiosity, which also tells us we need MORE killing and blood in videogames, because if it was really lifelike, he would've known and would have been satisfied.

That, and loosen up gun controls in Japan: had one, or all, of those guys had a gun he probably would've had a spree of .5 victims.

See Fox News? Anyone can be an idiot...

pxeIsword

No, seriously. If you kill just to see what it's like, you're all sorts of messed up in the head.

BPMζ

zlimness

durrem

hahahah... dear christ.

Really, if there were stronger punishments for murder, like torture, or genetic experimentation, do you think people would still continue to murder?

no. no one would be stupid enough to. at least then criminals could pay their debt back to society through aiding scientific research.

lasttimeyouaskedme

DanimalJenkins

DanimalJenkins

LittlestLamshi

Gouki4u

When are we going to hear about the sudoku killers? Or some of those poker-playing assassins?

fuchikoma

that's pretty good numbers considering...

ManjiKengo

Nope, I just stab people in the neck."

ManjiKengo

Do fighting games like DOA tell you where to stab a guy for maximum killage? I was under the impression they just taught people that if you button mash square or X eventually you'll guard throw everyone.

ManjiKengo

Hmmm... maybe I shouldn't post this. Don't want the media bothering Pat, cuz he's going through some major shit right now. Oh well. He can take it, because "pain don't hurt".

Tenth

Infradead

I just wish the "journalists and experts" that get given media endorsement were actually into the "truth" they claim to have a stranglehold on, rather than being motivated by popularity and personal gain like everyone else.

I know I'm living in a fantasy world... but I'd still love to see people, in general, begin to question the whole "simple solution" philosophy they keep shoveling, if for no other reason that it has clearly failed time and time again.

dv8godd

What is it with Japanese psychopaths and their desire to hurt children? There have been several completely meaningless, pointless atrocities in Japan committed against babies and children, and I just don't understand it. Of all the people you could go out and hack at with blades, just how incredibly fucked in the head do you have to be to go after children? That takes a very special kind of sociopath to connect children and babies with...whatever they perceive that needs attacking.

There's one horrible incident that took place a few years back where a man walked up to a mother and her new born baby and stuck a knife in the baby's head.

...

I just don't get it. I suppose that's the point when dealing with psychotics but the most I ever hear of these types of attacks aimed at children come out of Japan.

Atheist Jew

....wondering "When do they talk about Sexy Fighter!? That sounds like a game I wanna check out!"

LOL

Billkwando

Billkwando

tehFluffz

There's a reason why beheading has it's own word. You never heard of someone dying from being "befooted".

Seriously though, at very least this highlights the fact that even in a country with no guns, people who wanna tweak out and kill people will find a way.

Billkwando

relax_guy

As I always like to point out whenever this sort of thing comes up, finding someone who is under 30 that has NEVER played video games in their life is probably like finding someone who has never driven a car or watched TV. Blaming video games is a pretty lazy shortcut, because if video games DID cause violence the whole US would be a war zone.

NateN

Actually the percentage of possible mentally ill individuals wouldn't really go up because the world population goes up. The total number would, but the percentage of psychopaths won't go up just because there are more people.

One reason we see more examples of violence is simply because news programs are becoming ever more concerned with ratings. As a result they seek out stories that are going to catch the public's eye. Unfortunately, due to the culture we live in today (which could be influenced by previous exposure to violent media BTW), people are going to be more interested in stories about death and murder than politics and other more neutral topics. Other reasons have to do with cultural factors (e.g. increased stress due to increasingly more complex environments and increasingly higher requirements on individuals to achieve wealth to survive).

I think another important thing to note is that a lot of the posts in this forum seem to assume that all people who are murderers are born murderers. This is a quite grim assumption for those poor individuals. Rather what is more likely (and is suggested by research in psychological science) is that some people are born with certain predispositions that could make them highly aggressive, but they will not grow up to be killers unless they are raised in a hostile environment. This is the standard diathesis-stress model of most psychological disorders. Additionally, some people could be born without any predisposition and be exposed to so much violence (and other factors that could increase the likelihood of violence) that they become violent individuals. Given this, there is the possibility that violent games could be one influence. Not the only influence - Violent games won't do it on their own. But they are one potential influence.

So although this story, and other similar stories, are probably blowing the influence of violent games wildly out of proportion, I would be more considerate of the possibility that violent games may play a role.

graddy

Tanuki00

These kind of people depresses me.

Hope the survivors recovers well.

The_Antihippy

CookieMasterPunk

Humanity always had crazy ppl that went on killing sprees for the sole purpose of watching someone die. This has happened always since we exist as humans. No matter what they blame, it will happen again.
Looking at the amount of ppl that play violent games, if they caused this, we wold be killing each other all the time.

It happens more in recent history because:

1: The world is connected, you know everything that happens in it, in a split second.

2: The world population is a lot bigger, so the % of possible insane individuals is a lot higher.

Efforts should be concentrated on helping the families that were affected. But we all know thats not how things work unfortunately.

My condolences to the families.

Krumm

The last time I was in the town some kid threw himself off the station and landed on the cab below.

Also some girl hung herself in the bathroom in a park near the HS.

Witzbold

Krytha

Wolfkin

SigmundTheSeaMonster

radink360

Tiber

Vaanelo

AkumaX

PhilESkyline

pylon_trooper

oh, and FATALITY!

midwynter

No connection.

gblock

Not the toe?

I guess I've been learning murder from the wrong games.

It never ceases to sicken me how they gleefully demean the tragedy and suffering caused by events such as these with cheap, sensationalist, knee-jerk, pseudo-pop-psychology.

MartinX

"(and really, there isn't any connection to be made between gaming and this truly disturbed individual)"

Seriously, this dOOd by his own admission was just plain fucking deranged. And again, I quote.

"I just wanted to see what it was like to kill. It could have been anyone."

I mean I could see the connection if he groped a bunch of tits at that mall after playing DoAXBV...but killing, that's a fucking stretch.

-EDGE-

Number41

Captain Impulse

*sigh* When will people learn that there is a huge difference between 'cause' and 'inspiration'. Music, for example, doesn't cause people to wear stupid hair or drop their pants to their knees. It does not follow that if you listen to emo, you have stupid hair. It is entirely possible that you are inspired to do so because these artists become your heroes or what have you, but it is not a tautology. "If A, then B" illustrates cause, but it's simply not so. Thus, it's not a cause.

dunetiger : one of the naerds

However, since he didn't, he clearly didn't learn how to inflict MASSIVE DAMAGE from video games.

gblock

GlossGreen

Brian Ashcraft

tshack

TrevWolf

Angryrider

Amerijapoxicano

I'm assuming he didn't get enough from the first guy he randomly killed earlier in the month? Sigh.

And yes... so someone who's brain is more than a bit out of whack was into some form of escapism? Very surprising. Another opportunity for the media to hop on the latest scapegoat, directing attention at the attributes he shared with millions of other people rather than the specific attributes that turned him into a unattached killer in the first place.

Might as well say "The killer was 6 foot 4 and had blonde hair... be on the lookout for people that are 6 foor 4 and have blonde hair... they could be killers."

I'm pretty much ashamed to be of the same species as these types of "journalists and experts" anymore. When common sense itself is obvious enough to defeat any arguments they might have, it really begs the question how they get the opportunity to influence so many people in the first place.

Which leads me back to the eventual results of this sort of reporting... it always strikes me as curious that people get so quick to suggest regulating entertainment media formats while never questioning the validity of the information channels that led them to that course. As though calling themselves "the news" somehow made them impervious to distortion and falsehoods.

History lesson for the world:

The media and their experts said comic books were killers... the world learned better.
The media and their experts said television was a killer... the world learned better.
The media and their experts said violent movies were killers... the world learned better.
The media and their experts said porn was a killer... the world learned better.
The media and their experts said music was a killer... the world learned better.
The media and their experts now say games are killers...

Please, rational thought, allow the pattern to finish out... but can we please, as a species, stop this goddamn pattern?

dv8godd

DaDeath

McBonk

Captain Impulse

Suzaku

smackthenun

Number41

Seriously, this is getting more ridiculous every time ... even school pretty much teaches you about neck being one of "body's weak points".

uzivatel

But really, I'm at a loss. On one hand I'm sad that 8 people were killed, but happy that he didn't mow through an elementary school. It's a real toss up.

TrevWolf

Krytha

[us.i1.yimg.com]

Close enough? ;)

Captain Impulse

NameYourCharacter

cswat

Ludwig

Ashurahori

This is a tragedy, it's upset that the victims and their families have to deal with this, and it's a shame the media has already blamed video games instead of mental illness.

Garro

but seriously that is just sick, its really eerily similar to the Virginia tech tragedy. There are just some things which are just unexplainable

Next thing you know is that Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy will now have age ratings

KaliKOtt

FarmboyinJapan

ragfragger

Anza

Moonshadow101

Should we send Geoff over there?

Shiryu

Bombaaaman

seamouse

First, any multiple-murder is national news here.

Secondly, I wouldn't be surprised if the game thing comes up, but it will all blow over pretty quick unless this guy starts screaming about video games in court or something.

feitclub

NDub

Pretty much every murder in Japan gets covered as if it's indicative of the downfall of society. Nevermind that the murder rate has dropped over the last decade or so and is pretty much the same as it has been historically. There's been a 4.6% rise in violent crime so far this year and it's being treated like the end of the world. And as you can see, the media's looking for anything it can to pin the blame on.

badasscat

What a bunch of sensationalist nonsense. Maybe if he'd killed someone with a volleyball they'd have something to run with. I guess this kind of scapegoating is universal.

Captain Impulse

El-Suave, JP games are actually quite strict with violence, many are blood censored exchanging red for blue/black etc.

Riquez

Nope, that's not common knowledge at all. Nosiree. Musta been games.

ShaggE

Bombaaaman

NaryaMithrandir

Grinman

Krytha

Lyrai

Funny, don't know why but somehow I had faith in japanese media treating games a bit more fairly, guess I was wrong.

El-Suave