Comments on: “Because, uh, but, uh, I wrote a book.”

By: dhex

dhex — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 17:33:30 +0000

now take a random sample of the US population of equivalent size and look at the gun homicide stats, I’d make a good bet that the games demographic is considerably less violent than the random sample

seeing as the core games demographic (males 13-30) is the same demographic that both commits and suffers most violent crimes, i would not take that bet.

canada has had six or seven since the late 60s, iirc. all committed by young men in that demographic.

the real connecting bit in all of this isn’t guns or weapons, but young men with a history of impotent rage that builds into that kind of profound violence.

[insert the usual stuff about barzun and hyperindividualism here.]

edit: http://www.thestar.com/News/article/217023

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 15:00:29 +0000

Aw, you were doing so well up until the Fox News Killed My Children bit.

By: C0nt1nu1ty

C0nt1nu1ty — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 10:32:51 +0000

This isnt exactly Thompson bashing but just some food for thought:

Valve says there are approx 100,000 people on a CS variant at any time, consider all the other games there monitoring (half life etc) via steam and that would come to…oh at a random guess a couple of million unique users over the current life of steam

There have been say between 5 and 10 high school (teenagers the apparent core demographic of games) shootings over the past 10 years, lets say there have been roughly 100 people killed

Also why doesnt this happen in say… Canada? They have more guns than people (i’m pretty sure they actually do) and over the same time period there have been…..well i wont say no shootings but considerably less, maybe one or two but i reckon not.

So lets assume these ideas are true, then surely its an issue with American culture as a whole, not the games. And who would you say was one of the most prevalent companies in American culture at the moment? Why none other than News Corp, owners of 20th century fox and its subsidiary Fox news.

So Fox, Mr Thompson: you are the reason people shoot each other in the US
stick that in your pipe and smoke it

By: MeestaNob!

MeestaNob! — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 05:30:48 +0000

Jesus Christ, after reading Whacky Jack’s entry in the wikipedia I’m stunned at what a psychotic nuisance he really is.

He and his supporters (both of them) are pathetic.

Continues reading: My god he’s a head case. Who hasnt he sued??

By: NegativeZero

NegativeZero — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:41:53 +0000

The only way that they could actually come up with believable correlation with brain studies is if they were to hook someone up to a scanner, hand them a shotgun and tell them to go slaughter some people. If their brain activity matches what gamers demonstrate, then that would be positive correlation.

But that sort of research would be a tad unethical.

By: fearian

fearian — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:37:56 +0000

SUPER COOL NEWS!

Jack Thompson, the REAL JACKO, has joined the Destructoid.com community. I find this hilarious.

Heres my favorite quote:

I know facts are inconvient things for e-tards, but there they are, and here I am, right, oh so right, yet again.

We need to get you sociopathics kiddies off these murder simulators and back to doing your homework.

By: EMPty=IRL=

EMPty=IRL= — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 01:43:02 +0000

~~Video link is dead… :-(~~ Nevermind me….

By: dhex

dhex — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:18:57 +0000

for fun, do a google search for “jack thompson and janet reno.”

By: Phil

Phil — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:08:56 +0000

If Jack Thompson didn’t exist someone would have to invent him – How else can a multi-billion dollar industry retain any shred of it’s teen demograhic appealing infamy without grey haired, dead eyed idiots laying into it on Fox?

By: Snarky

Snarky — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:00:44 +0000

The guy is nuts, despite his lawyership. Ever notice how he takes his religious beliefs above his duty to the law? If you’re a lawyer (or a law-related occupation in general) you shouldn’t have a personal agenda, since your duty is to the law! If religion or revolution is what a person wants, then being a lawyer is not an occupation that makes sense to have. It’s somewhat like some of those crusading mommy-celebrities who rant about everything they hate and then say that “As a mother… blah blah” even though much of what they foam at the mouth about is completely unrelated and moot in relation to children (go shield your kids eyes and bodies and watch them grow up to be ill-adjusted and inept because they grew up in a bubble instead of ranting at us, ffs. It hurts less real people in the process…), though at least they have less power to change laws in the end. Don’t get me wrong though, ol’ Jack is actually relatively powerless when it comes to changing laws: the very system that lets him practice law in his home state is holding him under review, pending loss of his license when I last checked!

And it’s not like lawyers don’t make exceptions and lies every damn day when it comes to supporting their clients… but that’s besides the point: he’s nuts, he likes attention… and believe it or not, not many in the general public or leadership over here in the US of A actually listen seriously to what he says (save perhaps Fox News, Hillary and Lieberman on occasion, but they honestly don’t count). Ignore the bastard and he’ll likely lose the will to be an attention whore… if he still has a grain of sanity left. If not, still ignore him… or if you’re the wordy type, deftly derail his arguments whereever you see fit… just not in personal e-mails or private conversation to him (insult-o-rama, plus the public can’t see your debate). Just demonstrate that you’re exactly the opposite of what he try to depict gamers to be and even more people will ignore him.

By: Matt

Matt — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 16:08:25 +0000

You’ve mis-transcribed the place name (“Perduco”) in his closing comment. He’s talking about the Heath High School shooting in Paducah, Kentucky.

By: Zuffox

Zuffox — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 11:11:10 +0000

Jonathan: It’s actually a reference to a term used in an earlier article which was linked to at RPS.

And I found the term pretty corny too …

Seniath: The usual jabs and “oh dear, he’s at it again” don’t grind my guts that much, but counterarguing him sentence by sentence, “picking his arguments apart piece by piece” is so futile and useless, to say the least.

As for internet debates in general, the best thing to do is usually ignore the lamers in them – or report them to the admin. At least as far as the ones beyond any hope of mental ailment goes.