This week, United States President Donald Trump will meet game industry executives to discuss the impact of violent videogames on tragedies such as the recent high school mass shooting.
Pressure on violent games, as misguided as it is in our opinion, keeps mounting thanks to publications such as CNN. Just yesterday, The Cushman School in Miami, Florida, organized a "Violent Video Game Toss" campaign where students reportedly handed over games deemed violent and even signed a pledge to never play this kind of games again.
In this Twitter thread, the IGDA (Independent Game Developers Association) pushed back against this unfounded causal relationship, vowing that videogames won't become scapegoats for gun violence.
Let's be blunt on video games and gun violence-we will not be used as a scapegoat. The facts are very clear - no study has shown a causal relationship between playing video games and gun violence. The Supreme Court has clearly established video games as protected free speech in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association.
And the stereotype of gamers as disaffected teenage boys is simply untrue; 41% of the 150M+ gamers in the United States are women and more women over 35 play video games than boys under 18. The United States plays the same video games as the rest of the world, but we're unique in our problem with gun violence.
Gamers come from all walks of life. We're all genders, all ages. We're teachers and students, parents and children. Overwhelmingly, we're law-abiding citizens who agree with the majority of Americans who support reasonable gun control measures like stronger background checks, banning bump stocks and high-capacity magazines, and a minimum purchase age of 21 for all firearms.
Making video games-or any form of media-a scapegoat for consistently refusing to even CONSIDER the reasonable, rational firearm restrictions Americans want and deserve isn't fooling anyone.
What do you think of this sensitive topic? Let us know in the comments.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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