Recently, a blogger I know said on her blog that she noticed that "almost every mass killer including the two recent ones Elliot Rodger (UCSB) & Cheng Chieh (Taipei Subway killer) are active video games / MMORPG players", to which many of her Facebook followers commented, some to agree, and some to disagree. She also asked if, "people who are loners tend to spend more time with games instead of integrating into society with normal people and this results in them having deviant thoughts and behaviors? Causation or correlation?"
Well, here's some of my two cents.
Could be correlation or just an unfortunate coincidence. It's not the game, but rather the fact that they isolate themselves from society through a hobby obsessively, or they have problems themselves which is why they isolate themselves from society through games or other 'closed-door' activities (nothing else to do when society isolates them).
I for one
have seen content in anime, games, movies that can be overtly violent, filled
with hatred, or sexuality, so I understand the concerns of some people who would be quick to blame the violent behavior on playing video games. However,
that is still looking at the symptoms and not the cause. We have to find out
why these people became lonely and isolated in the first place. Because the
same video game / anime, or movies also contain positive elements that teach us
the right way to behave etc. So why is it that many others who have watched or
played all these had no problems, while a fraction of these become killers or
commit suicide? I think we can go back to her previous posts on cyber-bullying
or bullying to find the clue that will lead you to the answer. The issue here
is emotional weakness. Some people are not strong enough to handle these
emotional or psychological stresses. Some are stronger so they don't succumb.
Some have family support. Some have social support (friends, girlfriend etc.).
Some get such support because of their social skills (charisma, eloquence,
convincing skills, cognitive skills etc.) which come naturally for some but not
so naturally for others (so even if you ask them to learn by observing they
would start to misinterpret what they observe, if they have hidden cognitive
disabilities). Such people who are desperate and are 'at the bottom' of their
lives can succumb to anything. It can be games. It can be movies.
Even the dramas we watch on TV can have disturbing
messages because most forms of mass media thrive on the insecurities and needs
of the masses to sell. Why the Korean dramas thrive so well? Because they
thrive on the needs (and insecurities) of some ladies (and some men, depending
on the drama) who are not getting all these 'perfect love' scenarios from their
boyfriends or husbands, or dun have anyone in their lives to give it to them.
One of the reasons why Harry Potter was so successful. The beginning of the
story shows Harry being mistreated by his aunt/uncle. People like him because
many people would have been in his shoes in one way or another: being an
underdog (to oppressive persons in power) or being rejected (by a crush, a
prospective job, client, etc.), something we are all so familiar with. Such
stories also exist because of the insecurities of the writers of the stories.
Violent stories and horror stories are examples of them.
Bram Stoker's Dracula was actually a reflection of
Britain during the 1930s when there was a lot of immigrants from Eastern
Europe, deflating the wages of the average British man, where Dracula's blood
sucking tendencies were a reflection of the immigrants 'sucking' away the job
opportunities. In other words, this literature classic sends a message of claustrophobia.
This is example of a literary work or intellectual property where the writer
may be unwittingly feeding on the insecurity of his readers. Similar for these
games, there will be content that may influence the players because of their
insecurities, and all this content has to be there for the game to be sellable.
Killings, wars, etc. It's the man's innate desire to 'conquer' and 'possess',
or seek justice for wrongdoings. Some of these games talk about seeking justice
for the oppressed. You know what that message sends? It is 'alright' to seek
justice for the 'oppressed' and the 'oppressed' may refer to 'yourself', the
guy who did not get the girl he wanted, or the top boy position he coveted. So
the fault lies not in the game, not in the books or other forms of intellectual
property, but whoever is allowing him to feel these feelings, have all these
expectations about life, and not help him to differentiate between fact
and fantasy.
There must be a way to help these individuals live in the real world and the fantasy world at the same time, and not let characters or events in their fantasy world cross over to the real world (unless it is something harmless).
I used to have a friend who really lived in his own world. He was a former classmate of mine who claimed that he was the No. 1 Swordsman in China in his past life, and his wife back then was a girl he linked in his class. He claimed many things, like the knowledge of black magic, true religions were Buddhism and Hercules (back then the American "Hercules" TV-series starring Kevin Sorbo was the rage). He claimed that certain classmates of his were 'possessed', and other things. After I did my research, I found out that those characters he talked about came from certain video games or Chinese swordfighting novels. It was nice to see him so imaginative that he actually believed that all those fictional characters were real, and he said that to everyone, but is that really a good thing?
I for one, love to daydream. I daydream about Chinese swordfighting TV series, fighting scenes in games or anime, love scenes in my favorite movies or TV dramas (pretending it's me and some girl I like). After meeting him was when I discovered my passion and dream to write a fantasy novel where I was the protagonist and some girl whom I admired was the female lead. I worked on it for years due to changing perspectives in my life, new ideas acquired from new shows that I watched, and understanding the limitations I had in writing style, industry knowledge, exposure to different cultures and people, vocabulary, and foreign languages. I even wrote samples for my classmates to give their opinion so that I could improve.
Over the years the pace of my writing slowed down because of army and work commitments, but I didn't stop writing. I wanted to write about a world where I would be living a different type of life. A charmed life, getting the girls, having superpowers, having revenge on the people who upset, ridiculed, or humiliated me, who turned out to be demons from hell in disguise all whom I was justified to destroy.
I was living in my own world. I was creating my own world. But I was creating it with the purpose of also turning it into something big and marketable. A Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. I wasn't planning to live in my dream world and turn my back on the real world. I was planning to bring my fantasy world into the real world in a more productive way. It was supposed to be a source of income to fall back on if any of my employment pursuits in real life were to fail due to my inadequacies from the viewpoint of corporates that demand absolute perfection and nothing else.
In order to do so, I acquired vocabulary from a number of foreign languages to create names for magic spells, in Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Italian, French and Spanish. As a result I recognize a lot of words in these languages now even though I did not go for classes in those languages (except Japanese and Korean). I studied demonology to give names to my 'villians'. I read up about places in foreign countries to create settings for my story to take place in. London, Paris, Beijing, Shanghai, Hokkaido, Bangkok, Hanoi, etc. I even read up about some events in history that I could link with my story. In fact, it could very well be that all these events happened in another world parallel to ours, but those events that you read about in my story could have been erased from the memories of everyone in the world, only to be reflected in my story. You could say it is make-believe. You could say it is a conspiracy theory. I live in this world that I created for myself, but I don't lose myself in it and forget about the real world. I come back, and I live a normal life, just like everyone else.
I think that, for people who don't have every thing working out for them, I always welcome them to create a world for themselves which they can go back into without being trapped by it. They could write a book or a fanfiction which they probably could sell in future. Doesn't have to be good. Just do it. Make your fantasy worthwhile. Turn it into a game for others to play and appreciate.
Don't need to go round killing someone.
WRITE YOUR OWN BOOK AND BECOME THE SUPERHERO! DON'T BECOME THE VILLIAN IN THE REAL WORLD!
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