Kevin McCarthy, a top Republican politician from California suggests that video games “dehumanize individuals” which contributes to events of mass shooting. In a television interview on Fox News “Sunday Morning Futures” when asked about the two deadly mass shooting in Texas and Ohio the top Republican expressed his concerns about the “bad influence” of video games.
Quoting directly from the interview, Kevin McCarthy said:
The idea of these video games, they dehumanize individuals to have a game of shooting individuals and others. I’ve always felt that is a problem for future generations and others. Studies have shown before what it does to individuals. When you look at these photos of how (the El Paso shooting) took place, you can see the actions within video games and others.
Earlier, responding to mass shooting in Texas, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, another fellow republican called for federal action on “Video Game Industry” and argued that the video games were root cause of shooting in Texas quoting the gunman’s manifesto as proof.
Just before shooting in Texas the gunman had posted a 4-page manifesto on social media site 8chan describing the attack as “Hispanic invasion of Texas”. The manifesto also reportedly included a brief reference to the “Call of Duty.” Game. Although the investigation is still ongoing about the credibility of manifesto whether it was posted by the gunman or is just a false document making rounds on the internet.
Politicians in USA (specially Republicans), have for a long time insisted on links between mass shooting and violent video games despite various studies showing otherwise. They insist on regulating the “Video Game Industry” as solution to mass shooting rather than stricter gun laws.
Various researches and studies have shown that there was no relationship between aggressive behaviour in teenagers and the amount of time they spent on playing video games. In other parts of the world, where the same games are available and similarly popular didn’t experience the same amount of gun violence as USA did.
Most of those countries have stricter gun laws which prohibits majority of population from owning a gun and require them to pass several tests and screenings before getting license to owe a gun that too a handgun/pistol or hunting rifles only.
But, even after repeated calls for tightening of gun laws the politicians believe that the gun control won’t be solution for the rising gun violence and believes innationwide mental health improvement programs as the only solution.
