How old was the shooter in Connecticutt? How many years older do you think he would have to be in order to not to have been affected by the video games?

Lots of articles discuss Lanza's practice of sitting in the basement focusing on violent video games for extended periods, but these are articles that quote people like the plumber who came to his house, his barber, ect. Not sure I trust those sources as how would they really know?

Im not sure such a question on video game limiting would have had an effect on this guy, but still, it seems if you take the accounts we hear at face value, was a huge part of his life. Did it have an effect? who knows, seems like it could have to me though. The only person who could answer that question would be Lanza.

The only way I see age restrictions on video games working is with the help of parents doing the restricting. And the benefit I see to that would be that it allows kids to develop other interests as well in formative years, without necessarily having those interests developed FOR them, as the entertainment industry definitely does.

I don't see it as stopping people from being suggested to, I see it as allowing someone to become more of a complete person first.

I know from personal experience, that as child I was banned from TV or games until homework and chores were finished and only on certain days could I watch or play anyway. I wasn't necessarily banned from running about outside, and other activities. Just those two types of recreation were off limits, the others were frowned upon if I hadn't finished my requirements, but I could sell the idea of a bike ride, or kite flying and homework later to them.
(this may have been based on the fact that I was a butterball, and the parents were worried about me becoming a obese gamer the second I got into them, but there were other good side effects)

Subsequently, gaming culture and TV did not make up much of my childhood, which allowed me to expand other interests first, and by the time I had unrestricted access to gaming culture, I didn't become overly obsessed, and fall deeply into those worlds. I was able to enjoy them normally, and then quickly lost huge interest in them.

The allure of some of these gaming worlds is simply amazing to me considering the march of technology and complication in todays games. Have you ever met anyone who was addicted to World or Warcraft? Thats their reality, its appalling.

Whether you realize it or not, your post gets into a LOT of what is causing problems today. You had good and savvy parents that laid down a good set of rules and raised you themselves. Unlike your parents, too many parents expect the schools to raise their kids. The video games and the TV work great for such parents because it gives them a baby sitter.

It's very likely that YOU or I could have been allowed to sit in our rooms all the time playing the nastiest video games in the world and wouldn't turn into serial killers. Couple someone like the Lanza kid with the same stuff and it turns out to be a disaster. Who's to know if Lanza would have had the same upbringing as you or I, he would have still turned out with the same problems? For my money, if he would have been raised differently, it very well might have turned out for the better.

My $0.02,

In the old days old farts blamed Rock & Roll and Presley's hips to all the misery and now it's video games... :rolleyes:

so the sexual revolution didn't happen? :D

Those old farts didn't like where the world was going, led or perhaps more accurately, demonstrated by presleys hips and rock and roll, but in those directions it definitely went!

NRA membership : 4.3 million
Guns in private hands in the U.S.: 310 million non-military.

The NRA presumes to speak for gun owners in the U.S. Either the average gun owner in this country owns 72 firearms, or the NRA isn't the voice of firearms that it (not to mention it's detractors) would have us believe.

+1

Hmm... I don't remember them coming to my house to count my weopons?:confused:

So you saying the old farts are right and the next generation will shoot each other up...:eek:

Very well stated. That is why my wife quit her job to be a mom first. She only went back to work when her schedule could work with thte kids being in school.

im thinking they were kinda right in how outside influence can share partial blame. Put it this way, old farts then objected to the idea of timmy and tammy humping their brains out listening to "a big hunk O' love" without the accepted social precedents all lined up back then.

Well, their objection IMO was silly, but if timmy and tammy humping resulted in dozens of people killed, then id say we might look closer at just how much influence "big hunk O' love" actually had.

On one hand, we can accept that runs on the bank for completely engineered through media situations as the NEED to have a tickle me elmo, or a furby, are facts of the modern world. Look at how Mcd's ruthlessly controls the popularity of the mcrib, a sandwich made of crap as another example, yet people froth at the mouth to eat them.

I just think that gaming environments that are so real, so complex, and so self sustaining can definitely have a negative impact on the right mind when the overall message is that carnage is cool, violence is good, and pursuit of both has its rewards.

The whole asbergers syndrome scenario is still pretty new. They really don't know for sure what it is and what causes it. My daughter the pediatrician works with asberger and autistic kids as a specialty. she is a firm believer that much of our health problems are diet related. Much of our food is raised with too much pesticide and so forth, plus all the hormones in beef and on and on. We have abundant and cheap food in this country but it is not without a severe price.

She only eats organic food now and has come up with regimens of suppliments and vitamins which help the autistic and asberger kids.

She said this danza kid probably would have benefited if his mom had not allowed him to withdraw from society and concentrate on his bloodthirsty video games.

My uncle probably owns twice that. It's just one of his many hobbies, collecting and shooting guns at his private range out in the woods. All of them are locked up in gun safes or have trigger locks and most of the time he has no ammo in his house save for his CCW, and if he does have ammo, its in a separate gun case. He usually just goes out and buys ammo at Walmart the day he wants to go shooting (sometimes in the thousands of dollars worth). He owns everything from .22 revolvers to 30-06 scoped rifles to glocks to a P90 semi-auto carbine with 50 round clip. Although he has enough guns to arm a small militia, he is not a violent person and has never shot anyone. He works in a really bad section of Atlanta, which is the reason for his CCW. I can sorta see why he likes guns so much, they can be incredibly fun to shoot but they are not cheap to own and maintain.

I don't know how many of you have ever watched/played some of those video games but some of them are absolute trash in my opinion. Walk around busting ppl up to win points to buy weapons, running around stealing cars and shooting ppl and doing drug deals. I can see how an easily influenced young mind could think it is "normal". If ya'll have never seen it check out the latest rendition of Grand Theft Auto sometimes. The ex wife could not get to the store fast enough to purchase these games for my boys.

I agree with this^.

Gee, for all the violent video games I play and have played for hours (yes, I'm a geek) you'd think I would have gone and performed some heinous crime by now. Or maybe some of my friends who also play online with me. Some of those racing games would have put me into a tree by now too right?

There is no way to prove it one way or another, but my guess is the kid had schizophrenia pop up. Age 18-24 is when symptoms arise in most schizophrenics so in many many cases there are no previously documented symptoms. Pair that with Aspergers (or at least frustration from it) and probably depression and there you go. I could see someone with Aspergers have a lot of trouble trying to bring that up with others which would just compound it.