Researchers skeptical about link between violent media and mass shootings
All four video games do exhibit “blood and gore” and “intense violence,” according to the Entertainment Software Rating Board, but many researchers are skeptical that there is a direct link between violent media and aggression in viewers. Violent-crime offenses decreased about 20 percent from 1998 to 2011, according to the FBI, while video game sales more than tripled, to $16.6 billion last year, according to the Entertainment Software Association…
LaPierre on Friday also assigned blame for mass shootings to music videos that “portray murder as a way of life” and to “blood-soaked films” such as “Natural Born Killers” and “American Psycho.”
Some research books, journal articles and dissertations suggest there is no direct correlation between an Oliver Stone movie about renegade criminals and a mass shooting like the one in Newtown. A 2009 article in the Journal of Pediatrics titled “The Public Health Risks of Media Violence: A Meta-Analytic Review” did not find “either a causal or correlational link between violent media and subsequent aggression in viewers.” The results of two peer-reviewed studies published in a 2008 issue of the journal Criminal Justice and Behavior suggest that “playing violent video games does not constitute a significant risk for future violent criminal acts.”
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It must be true, the NRA has no reason to lie.
Pablo Honey on December 22, 2012 at 8:49 PM
What do they say about “gun free zones” and mass murders?
Or is that too hard for them?
cozmo on December 22, 2012 at 8:56 PM
The thing about any study, is the possibility of selective data or data that is the result of faulty method and limited scope.
GIGO.
Mimzey on December 22, 2012 at 9:01 PM
Wow, those results mirror that of gun sales and ownership. About the only direct correlation to gun crime appears to be prohibition of concealed carry.
Dusty on December 22, 2012 at 9:02 PM
So when conservatives try to parrot back the same idiocies spouted by the left for decades, all of a sudden “there’s no proof.” That’s never slowed down libs before. LaPierre should have known better.
RoadRunner on December 22, 2012 at 9:06 PM
Who’s paying those researchers? Follow the money.
petefrt on December 22, 2012 at 9:30 PM
Is there an “indirect” link?
YiZhangZhe on December 22, 2012 at 9:31 PM
Instead of “Dude” these threads should be called “Old Dude.”
Capitalist Hog on December 23, 2012 at 2:28 AM
But God forbid kids find a toy in their Happy Meal, because that urges them to be obese.
RedRedRice on December 23, 2012 at 7:35 AM
Once more, I offer a suggestion: let some large foundation offer to ‘any major motion picture studio’ up to five hundred million dollars to fund a movie in which bright and attractive young people amuse themselves by killing major motion picture studio executives in entertaining ways – and get away with it. (There should be a requirement that the movie at least make its cost back, to keep it from being made and hidden away.)
I think the foundation’s money would be very safe.
PersonFromPorlock on December 23, 2012 at 7:37 AM