Boy kills dad with sledgehammer after being banned from playing computer games

Butch Cassidy

At least the BBFC retracted its stance and unbanned the game.

The same cannot be said for Ireland's pathetic censoring body that either follows the BBFC lead - like in this case - or still follows teh church's lead - like in the case of the Passion of the Jew.

o1s1n

Butch Cassidy wrote: »

Despite the lack of evidence people still drag it up on rotten TV and radio shows the

Speaking of rotten television, things like the Late Late Show and Ryan Tubridy's stupid rubber face make me want to go on a killing rampage more than Manhunt ever could.

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

Mark Hamill wrote: »

He couldn't, thats the point. He murdered his father over a video game, there is obviously something wrong with him.

I mean, man has killed and maimed eachother from the begining of our existance. It's not a new thing, it's very old. You do not have to have something wrong with you to kill somebody. Everybody has the potential to kill. What he done was obviously very wrong, but it does not guarantee he is crazy or anything of the likes.

o1s1n wrote: »

Not everyone who kills is a nutter, you're right. However, people who are sane and kill have motives. Be they self preservation, killing because of business, war, theft etc.

Sane people do not kill other people over trivial things. The evidence I have is that he commited an act of insanity.

I am trying to suggest that we have no evidence of such, and until then we should treat this guy as if he were sain. That's just my opinion though. I couldn't possibly say that this kid is sain or not even though his actions are very odd. Until I know more I will hold my judgement on that part. It's quite possible he's nuts, but it's also quite possible that he is of sound mind.

Perhaps we're using words that are too harsh. Mentally disturbed might be a little better than insane. I'm not saying this type of story = straight jackets and padded cells. I'm saying people who commit such acts aren't of sound mind.

I do believe that violent videogames may push an already mentally disturbed individual over the edge...however I also think that any other violent media can have the same effect.

That is not what I am trying to say. I think in most of my posts about this topic I normally say that you are influenced by everything, I don't think I said anywhere that violent media makes you kill people, because that's not what I believe. The main part of my arguement is that I believe violent media can influence you to become a more violent person. You may never kill, or hit or beat or torture or anything of the like, but being violent doesn't have to be physical. You can be more aggressive, snappy, cranky, etc etc. Do video games kill people? No. Do they influence your personality? Yes.

Sorry but no.

If I hear someone killed someone else with a sledgehammer over something trivial I will assume that person must have been a bit gone in the head..what media they have consumed does not come into it. If this thread was in any other forum discussing any other media I would have the same opinion. I'm posting in this thread because I happen to read this forum a lot

I stand by my points on other mediums too, such as films and books, to different degrees of course.

Not at all, I just find it mind boggling how you can seem like a logical person yet think a form of media entertainment can turn sane people into killers. If that's not what you're saying, fair enough. But it's the impression I've gotten from your posts in this thread. Have you got any links to your past posts on this subject?

I never claimed that media turns people insane, I didn't imply that either. I find myself repeating this all the time, but I think people take it to another level and build straw men out of my words. I don't have any links to my past posts either. Sorry.

Lu Tze wrote: »

I googled "peer reviewed study on violent behaviour associated with video games"

First link

http://www.springerlink.com/content/66217176984x7477/

"Results indicated that publication bias was a problem for studies of both aggressive behavior and visuospatial cognition. Once corrected for publication bias, studies of video game violence provided no support for the hypothesis that violent video game playing is associated with higher aggression. However playing violent video games remained related to higher visuospatial cognition (r x = 0.36). Conclusions Results from the current analysis did not support the conclusion that violent video game playing leads to aggressive behavior. However, violent video game playing was associated with higher visuospatial cognition. It may be advisable to reframe the violent video game debate in reference to potential costs and benefits of this medium."


That said i have no idea what visuospatial cognition is. I'm not a huge gamer myself, and will admit (from seeing my nephew, and perhaps me to a degree back in the amstrad days) that it is addictive, but thats a problem for a different debate.

You encounter violence/aggresion growing up everywhere. When i played soccer as a teen i put a guy in crutches for a couple of months, could have pulled out of the challenge, you know at that stage that there is risk you will do damage (to him or me).

For most people (unless i am abnormal) there is more aggression playing sport than video games.

Yea, there are reports on both sides, some claim that there is a link, others claim that there is not a link, that's the big problem. There are no real reports that we can base our debate on. All we have are theories. Most sports don't encourage you to physically damage another player, that is not the goal. If you chose to do that then so be it, but that is not the objective of the game. Now there are games such as Rugby and American football where you are required to use strenght and brute force to take down your opponent, but at the same time you are not encouraged to stomp his face into the ground, or cause serious damage. Boxing and the likes are different again, but they have rules too. I am not sure of the effects of these sports are on your personality, be they negative or possitive, I honestly don't know enough about them, but from what I can see, martial arts tend to have a positive effect on people. Channeling energies and all that lark.

nix wrote: »

He is a pyscho, he is 14 and smashed his fathers face in with a sledgehammer in his sleep. Clearly missing the bounderies of right and wrong here, which defines a psychopath

If it were a psychotic episode he would have had it there and then when his father took the game, not a few hours later while he is sleeping

One action does not define a psychopath, however nutty that action may be.

Sisko wrote: »

Lol Iamxavier really reminds me of these lads

Lol, Sisko really reminds me of these guys

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Sorry Iamxaxiar you aren't being insulted, just losing the argument, badly.

Losing? I think I have put a more solid and logical argument than any of the opposition. I have yet to see somebody give some good retorts to disprove my theory, but what I do see is people nit picking and not really discussing the topic per say. I have given my reasons as to why I believe what I do, but has anybody given reasons for their beliefs? If I missed them then I am sorry.

All reputable scientific research and publised works on the link between videogames and violence has shown that there is no evidence of a link.

Wouldn't make that a stale mate for the moment? Neither side are losing, but one side looks to have more logical evidence and the other seems to have more passion than anything.

It's just like the massive outcry against the british governments own report into the situation in the Byron report. It published it's own research results showing no link between violence in children and videogames and there was an outcry for rags like the Daily Mail that couldn't accept it.

Lets not assosiate ourselves with the Daily Mail. Or any tabloid for that matter. I wouldn't wipe my arse with that rag.

Basically just like the flat earth society. All the scientific evidence says otherwise but they refuse to accept it.

You just went back on your words. All the scientific evidence says nothing. As nobody seems to have come to a conclusion, hence the ongoing debate. There is a massive difference between this debate and the flat earth society. There being outstanding evidence to disprove the flat earth society. Apart from pictures, there are mathematical equations to state the truth.

Butch Cassidy wrote: »

I've nothing to quote but I'm pretty sure it's the same scenario with movies and television. The science just doesn't hold up when you want to blame violence on entertainment. Despite the lack of evidence people still drag it up on rotten TV and radio shows the like of an RTE or whatever.

I don't agree that entertainment is the sole entity to blame for violence, because that would be naive and ignorant. It does have it's place and it does have a role in violent behaviours. That's what I believe.

The BBFC was set up in teh 80s because of a prolonged shock campaign by the Brit tabloids. Of course Ireland soon followed suit. You see it with the video games that get banned. There's a story that someone who killed might have played a game, listened toa CD or watched a film so then you have to ban said game/music/film. If I'm not mistaken Manhunt 2 was banned because it was linked to a murder but it turned it out it was the victim not the perp that was playing the game?

That's the media and parents going right for the jugular. Without thinking for a moment and investigating it properly, instead of trying to understand better the situation, they just want to outright ban these games and films.

In my other posts I made it clear that I was all for violence, if anything I want more, and I want the likes of soldier of fortune 2 physics mixed with call of juarez graphics. I want realism and I want to be able to shoot things when they are dead.

Mark Hamill

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

I mean, man has killed and maimed eachother from the begining of our existance. It's not a new thing, it's very old. You do not have to have something wrong with you to kill somebody. Everybody has the potential to kill. What he done was obviously very wrong, but it does not guarantee he is crazy or anything of the likes.

All you are speaking of is capability and having the capability to do something speaks nothing to the motivation of doing it. Its very simple really, the boy killed his father with a sledge hammer for not being allowed to play a video game. What makes him crazy is not that he was capable to respond in such a way, but that he actually chose to respond in such a way. What he did was irrational and psychotic =>crazy.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

I am trying to suggest that we have no evidence of such, and until then we should treat this guy as if he were sain. That's just my opinion though. I couldn't possibly say that this kid is sain or not even though his actions are very odd. Until I know more I will hold my judgement on that part. It's quite possible he's nuts, but it's also quite possible that he is of sound mind.

Saving for the report leaving out a major detail of the case, as it stands the boys actions where completely irrational. If you have any information about this case that changes the situation expressed in the article, then by all means share, as it stands though, mental instability is a perfectly reasonable viewpoint to take on the motivation of the boys actions.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

One action does not define a psychopath, however nutty that action may be.

Actually, it does. If an action has no rational motive (after the full situation is considered, of course) then the person commiting the act is irrational. The extent of the irrationality will define the insanity of the person.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

Wouldn't make that a stale mate for the moment? Neither side are losing, but one side looks to have more logical evidence and the other seems to have more passion than anything.

Absence of evidence is, sometimes, evidence of absence. There is no stale mate.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

I don't agree that entertainment is the sole entity to blame for violence, because that would be naive and ignorant. It does have it's place and it does have a role in violent behaviours. That's what I believe.

The science doesn't back it up though.

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

Mark Hamill wrote: »

All you are speaking of is capability and having the capability to do something speaks nothing to the motivation of doing it. Its very simple really, the boy killed his father with a sledge hammer for not being allowed to play a video game. What makes him crazy is not that he was capable to respond in such a way, but that he actually chose to respond in such a way. What he did was irrational and psychotic =>crazy.[/
quote]


Yet you have no evidence of this, other than what the media portrayed, and if we are going to go by what the media say, then we are doomed. This kid may have had some thought disorder, yet there is nothing to prove or disprove that as of yet, that I know of. Definately irrational, but irrational does not = psychotic.

Saving for the report leaving out a major detail of the case, as it stands the boys actions where completely irrational. If you have any information about this case that changes the situation expressed in the article, then by all means share, as it stands though, mental instability is a perfectly reasonable viewpoint to take on the motivation of the boys actions.

I don't have any information, which is why I will reserve my judgement until I do. It's a reasonable theory to have, but that's all it is at the moment. A theory. All you have is speculation and assumptions at the moment. Which is definately not going to sway the debate.

Actually, it does. If an action has no rational motive (after the full situation is considered, of course) then the person commiting the act is irrational. The extent of the irrationality will define the insanity of the person.

In fact, it does not. One action does not make you a psychopath. It is a personality disorder, not an action. While your action may not be logical or rational, that does not make you a psychopath. A key characteristic of a psychopath is their lack of empathy. We have no proof of this in the above case. Being irrational, no matter what action you take, does not make you a psychopath.

Absence of evidence is, sometimes, evidence of absence. There is no stale mate.

What do we have then? And why? Which side has the upper hand? etc etc, in my eyes there is a stale mate, as both sides have provided reports which both sides disbute.

The science doesn't back it up though.

The science I know and understand does though. It enforces my theory on the subject. If you can provide some evidence to state science does not back it up, I would like to read it.

Lu Tze

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

Mark Hamill wrote: »

What do we have then? And why? Which side has the upper hand? etc etc, in my eyes there is a stale mate, as both sides have provided reports which both sides disbute.




The science I know and understand does though. It enforces my theory on the subject. If you can provide some evidence to state science does not back it up, I would like to read it.

Did you look at my previous link at all? It is a meta-analysis of many studies, hence the legitimacy of its claim that the data "provided no support for the hypothesis that violent video game playing is associated with higher aggression"

What is the science you know and understand then? As it certainly isn't that of results based conclusions.

Mark Hamill

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

Yet you have no evidence of this, other than what the media portrayed, and if we are going to go by what the media say, then we are doomed. This kid may have had some thought disorder, yet there is nothing to prove or disprove that as of yet, that I know of.

There is evidence of the kids mental state, the article is evidence. It may not be particularly reliable evidence, but its the only evidence we got. And going by the evidence the kids obviously has mental problems. If their is other evidence you know about, maybe another report detailing how it was an escalated fight where there the father went for the son with a knife and the son acted in self defense, then the opinion of the kids mental state as insane is perfectly valid.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

Definately irrational, but irrational does not = psychotic.

In this context it is. This wasn't a mistake that the kid made, it was a willing act. The kid looked at the situation where he was loosing the use of his game and decided the best repsonse was to kill his father. This inability to make a rational response to the loss of the game makes him a sociopath

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

I don't have any information, which is why I will reserve my judgement until I do. It's a reasonable theory to have, but that's all it is at the moment. A theory. All you have is speculation and assumptions at the moment. Which is definately not going to sway the debate.

You do have information, the article. Its perfectly ok to make a hypothesis about the facts heard in the aticle and be open to any new facts that might change your hypothesis. I'm beginning to think your ongoing participation in this discussion is more for the sake of having an argument, rather than making any valid points.

Breanna Embarrassed Sprout wrote: »

In fact, it does not. One action does not make you a psychopath. It is a personality disorder, not an action. While your action may not be logical or rational, that does not make you a psychopath. A key characteristic of a psychopath is their lack of empathy. We have no proof of this in the above case. Being irrational, no matter what action you take, does not make you a psychopath.

If that act is psychotic, then that makes you a psychopath. There is no evidence the boy showed empathy for his actions, and the fact he may not have been violent before only suggests he didn't need to be violent before, to get what he wanted.