-Caveat Lector-
>Can Media Make a Killer?
>by Declan McCullagh
>
>3:00 a.m. 13.Apr.99.PDT
>
>Everyone in the fly-spit town of Paducah, Kentucky, knows of Michael
>Carneal, a computer geek convicted of gunning down eight of his
>high-school classmates. Everyone knows the gory details of the crime:
>How the 14-year-old opened fire on a prayer circle in the lobby of Heath
>High School on 1 December 1997.
>
>What's still unclear is the nature of the demons that drove Carneal to
>bring six guns to school that day. The uncertainty isn't due to lack of
>details. Those became plentiful during the trial.
>
>Might the hours Carneal spent playing Doom have blurred the line between
>fantasy and reality? How about a Leonardo DiCaprio movie with a similar
>scene? Or persiankitty.com and other erotic Web sites that police say
>Carneal frequented?
well, i've played doom, i've played wolfenstein 3D, i've played quake,
quake II, blood, blood 2, redneck rampage and most of the rest. call me a
wierdo but i haven't felt the consumption to run out onto the street and
gun down a prayer group, in fact the only noticeable side effect of playing
quake for hours on end was that i stopped having a social life for a while.
man, there must be something wrong with me
>The parents of the three students who died have a ready, and angry,
>answer: All of the above.
well, that's simplistic.
simplistic solutions to desperately complex problems are what cause death
and war, simletons are responsible for the first world war, the current
Kosovo crisis has been caused by excessiveness stupidity on both sides,
NATO in particular. simpletons were responsible for the long suffering of
russia under authritarian communism, simpletons were responsible for
vietnam, and simpletons were responsible for the rise of the likes of Hitler.
>On Monday, the families filed a lawsuit in Kentucky federal court
>against a broad swath of computer companies and media firms, claiming
>that the executives traded conscience for cash.
>
>The suit, which seeks more than US$100 million in damages, says that the
>25 companies engaged in a pattern of corrupt business practices that
>glorify violence and promote "disregard of authority." According to the
>plaintiffs, the firms "should have known that copycat violence would be
>caused by their products."
it'd be nice if they did teach disregard of authority, but let's be
realistic here.
>Of particular concern to the families is The Basketball Diaries, a
>Time-Warner movie in which the main character, played by DiCaprio, slays
>his teacher and some classmates. They say the flick "is a nihilistic
>glamorization of irresponsible sex, senseless and gratuitous violence,
>hatred of religion" and other mendacities. They blame Time-Warner and
>its partners. Carneal has told police that he remembered watching that
>movie.
and i remember listening to Cradle of Filth once, big deal
>Videogames are another concern. Doom, Quake, Wolfenstein, Redneck
>Rampage, and other programs allegedly "trained Carneal how to point and
>shoot a gun in a fashion making him an extraordinarily effective
>killer." And porn sites "provoked violence in Carneal" by showing him
>illicit material not suitable for teens. Just to be safe, the plaintiffs
>have also charged the operators of persiankitty.com, adultkey.com, and
>porntech.com with racketeering.
you can't learn to shoot from a computer game, i know people who can beat
quake II without blinking, yet they can't shoot an air rifle for shit.
>The companies being sued did not immediately respond to requests for
>comment, saying that they need more time to review the allegations. "We
>haven't really had a chance to look through the material well enough,"
>said a spokesman for Activision, which sells Wolfenstein and Mech
>Warrior.
>
>Experts say that the suit will be thrown out of court. "This is a very
>tough case to fight," said Eugene Volokh, a law professor at the
>University of California at Los Angeles. "It has virtually no chance."
glad to hear it.
>Similar lawsuits in the past have had little success. In 1981, Hustler
> published an article -- part of a series about taboo sexual practices
>-- called "Orgasm of Death." It described in graphic detail the practice
>of autoerotic asphyxia, in which a person masturbates while hanging
>himself to cut off the blood supply to the brain. A 14-year-old boy
>found a copy, tested the theory, and was found hanging by his neck in
>his closet the next morning. An appeals court said Hustler couldn't be
>held responsible for the youth's death.
well, i wouldn't like to be responsible for someone else's stupidity. i've
never heard of gun companies being sued when people get shot, quite right too.
society lacks a sense of personal responsibility, they expect someone else
to be responsible for everything.
i heard about a mentally unstable man who killed someone and then sued his
therapist, that's the height of insanity, dependency taken to it's ultimate
conclusion
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