More Columbine

one wonders if they have real news in america if theyre still going on about this thing. ok they found some videos, its hardly earth shattering news is it?

You'd think not but the media has a tendency to pounce on crap like this.

Here in the states, we don't have any real problems...or at least, not any that we're willing to deal with. So we invent our own problems, and then spend all of our time talking about them. ::dissonant::

n/t

The news always chooses to ignore whats going around their butt headed face and just find the closest thing to blame, When they should actually be blaming the kids themselves + parents. Why didn't they? Because the parents had lots of money, and thah made them 'good parents'. I say, DOOM doesn't make people vilent. So let's all go over to the news places that never report the truth and blow them all up. :) -=The Friendly Canadian=-

Yeah, I still remember seeing Orin Hatch holding up the Doom II box after all of that and thinking "WTF is wrong with this country?" It's just sickening how parents can't deal with the fact that THEY'RE the cause of the problem, so they blame it on something else. Man, grow up, parents.

Games are NOT being too realistic! First off most outdoor areas are a joke in most games i've seen. Never any dust or real looking clouds/fog. In Tribes there wasn't a single tree(except in modded servers but they still looked awful). The only game that had realistic rain was Descent 3. Tribes and Descent 3 depicted furturistic indoor areas, and although realistic, aren't really like buildings of today. Violence has little to do with games. People know it's a game!! Linking violence to games is pretty stupid in my opinion. Violence is more caused by incompetent/unresponsible people, not games! People just leave firearms out in the open or in unlocked areas where anyone in a bad mood could take them and go on a rampage. If someone doesn't like someone else and they are in a bad mood, they grab a rifle and go start something. It's because people are depressed and frustrated. Violence for them is a way to take out frustration. The media are liars. They keep people informed of some realistic things, but for the most part they are just trying to make money. Profit is more important than anything in the media. Anything that'll get them some money they will use. Also, people want to hear that someone burned down their neighbor's house because it was too close for comfort; people don't want to hear that an air liner landed safely with no trouble and 200 people visited a museum safely. That's boring! People want exciting news! This also makes the media look pessimistic because they always look as if there could be a gunmen around every corner. The media makes a situation look far worse than it actually is.

It's pretty obvious the two guys were complete psychos.. I'm not paying attention to any of this.. just keep on Doomin' :) Derek Mac Donald aka Afterglow http://doomnation.com/afterglow/ derekmd@frad.org

I agree wholeheartedly. Hyena.

*yawn* moving right along...

Hmmmm, just like Doom, they said... Well, in the Doom I play, every single potential target in the game is both capable of and intent upon killing me. In Doom, even the weakest monster was capable of killing the player, so how is slaughter of defenseless peers 'just like Doom'? It's not. (unless you only play while in god mode...)

The thing that's pure poison to just about everyone in our society is to actually admit that they're the ones who f-ed things up; that people as a whole may be responsible and not some goddamn inanimate thing. It's not the games, people... oh no. Parents, politicians, schools, social apathy, outcast culture, religious fervor... I could go on but you'd all thing I was just being boring. It's a sad state of things when we're blaming Doom for our problems. You need to be over the edge before the game means a damn thing. I get a kick out of killing stuff in video games, I listen to heavy metal, I own swords and knives and practice regularly with them, and I wear the ill-received black trenchcoat. But would I kill people? The answer to that question is "no". Doom has not and never will turn people into killers, it's just a game. ~Gray Lancer; pardon my lengthy blither

I wouldn't worry about it. The boys were obviously disturbed by things far beyond Doom. A game does not create rage, but rather releases it (in most cases). Unfortunately, their rage was too great to release in a safe way. - <B>PuPz</B>

Its total bs come on half-laife and crap like that are more violent than doom come on like cyb said a few issues ago in dd that aw nevermind i cant get it out right. Hey do you think annonymous has enough to post.?!

take a deep breath.. proof read what you type. Anyways, you people are right on the mark over and over about this, but unfortunetally, the elders of this society seem to not realize that all change comes from the youth. They don't see that despite the fact that they may have seen worlds, teenagers can see so much that they have never been exposed to. Of course, I'm sure you all know this, but hey, i like looking smart :) Darco

what people neglect to realise is these games are for people who want the action and excitment, but not the violence or permanent consequences. if i really wanted to kill stuff i woulndt buy doom, id kill stuff. at least for me, i play because i love the idea of stepping around the corner w/ "old painless" and just turning a wave of bad guys into human swiss cheese. but i could never do it in real life. i dont want to die, so im not gonna run around with a mini gun aimed at armed men. and i dont want to kill anyone. its a horrible thought, i cant imagine doing it outside of some extremely necessary situation, and even then id need counceling. i think this is how most the community must feel. i know i can only speak for myself, but ive never met a single doomer who thought anything like what was done in columbine is anywhere near acceptable.

Yeah. What Carnevil said. About the parents. That is dead on the button. I'm not sure about blaming the kids though. No kid with a normal life would do any of the stuff as seen in the Columbine / Taber / Springfield / etc, incidents. Parents just get off too easy. Sheez, it's such a shame... :-b

theyll blame anything for attention

All good comments, all that I agree with. Hey Carnevil, you think it's bad seeing Orrin Hatch blame Americas problems on a computer game, well I live in Utah, and I have to put up with Hatch and his cronies running the show around here. Hey, quick question: did anybody reading this get personally burned in the aftermath of Columbine? Suspected by classmates and teachers, questioned, searched? I just wanna make sure I'm not alone here. ~DP

In order for Columbine to be Doom, everybody the boys killed must have been on there way to Hell (based on their judgement). My guess is that the people they killed had picked on them. The two boys must have thought they were out to send the people they killed to Hell for their sins. The parents probably had good intentions, but they should have been more wary. I'm pretty sure they asked if something was wrong, but the kids didn't feel like their parents could do anything to correct their problems (with siblings, the extended family, and with classmates). The parents probably knew something was wrong, but they were not able (or even possibly capable) to assure their boys that they could fix (or ease) their boys burden, and they unwisely decided not to investigate (for one, by looking through their kids rooms). In the end, the boys appearantly faced these problems: siblings relatives classmates, and they had nothing to look forward to. Economically speaking, they saw their lives as something not worth living for (costs exceeded rewards), so they decided that they should die. To make their last moments more profitable, they decided to take the lives from some of those that made their lives so miserable. What distorted their cause is that they attacked groups rather than individuals (although in some cases, there may had been few exceptions to the rule). The kids should have gone to a counselor or another individual to help them resolve their problems with individuals. A counselor, in particular, would have been useful, because the counselor could regulate the behavior of troublesome classmates to help make sure no conflicts would have occured later (and if they did, the administration could intervene). Remember, people are allowed to issue injunctions to keep others away, and if antagonizing individuals persist, they get arrested, just like other criminals. Either this chain of command failed, or the boys failed to contact their counselors. This problem is why schools needs to hire better employees (in general) so that the school environment can be a more positive (or a less negative) environment AND so that problems like those that stimulated the shooting at Columbine could be prevented. In order to attract the best possible teachers, we need to offer teachers more money. I am surprised that there had not been as much violence like this decades and centuries ago. My guess is that either the powerful weapons were less accessible a long time ago or that kids opted just to take on a simple suicide instead in the past (damn abusive parents; the once whipped their children). After all, people are more open about sharing their feelings, and this is reflected by the kids decision to videotape their reasons for their actions. The general impression I got about Doomers and the sort is that we were never the antagonizers. We were either the victims or those who were on neither end of the shaft. People who pick on others would never be attracted to play Doom, because all the harm done in Doom is pretty insignificant (and besides, the pleasure gained from Doom comes with risk, a factor that bullies do not need to contend with). What seperates us from these boys is that of those of us who did get picked on were able resolve our problems (or keep them within limits).

Doom releases tension, but these guys just had too much. Who is at fault? According to the boys, the parents contributed a little bit, but obnoxious relatives and rude/parasitic/hypocritcal classmates did them in. Combine this factor with the mental condition one of them had (not to mention a lot of weapons), they took out their overwhelming frustration the way their distorted minds thought best.

Blaming violent images is an old favorite, but it's an argument not backed up by facts. If it were true, we could easily create a Utopia by doing the opposite. Violence is an inescapable fact of life. The context is determined by the parents, one way or another. Strikes me as odd that if Klebold and Harris had been 30, no one would have blamed Doom; this whole thing is about shifting blame away from their parents. After all, I guess K&H probably watched the evening news, too. That's filled with burned corpses, death, rape, child molestation, illegal arms, war, murder, serial killers, and all kinds of charming images. At least Doom is a safe outlet.

I don´t think they should blame Doom and other games, they should do something about violence instead.

you know that doom trains to kill and i think all of you are future killers too! in fact we should hold all of you responsible for harris' and klebold's actions.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Anonymous User - Monday Dec 13 09:09:35 1999 - it's all doom's fault you know that doom trains to kill and i think all of you are future killers too! in fact we should hold all of you responsible for harris' and klebold's actions. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> It was a whole combination of factors that caused the shootings, including a bunch of stuck up assholes who put Eric and Dylan through a ton of shit. Do I condone the shootings. NO. do I understand why they did what they did? YES. I've been through pretty much the same kind of shit before, and while I would never hurt or kill, I have gotten into fist fights because of it. Some people for some reason like pushing and pushing until the one they are targeting snaps. Frankly I don't know why some people have to be such assholes, or why the schools allow it to go on, but the schools responsibility to put a stop to it. It is not teaching kids to socialise (I've heard this being used as an excuse before), but rather allowing some punk to make life hell for the kid. Maybe the schools should be held legaly or financialy responsible for what they allow to go on. With that over the school's, I'm very sure almost every campus will get their act together in no time. Did Doom help to drive Eric to do what he did? We may never know, but one thing for certain is that they may have never done what they did if people were respectful to eachother, instead of running some fucked up social hierarchy (which is often made worse by the closed enviroment of the schools where kids are running around on a time table and basicly have to shut up and sit in their own bubble while in the classroom. This makes the problem of socialising much worse for some kids. I know, because I never did well socialy in such a closed enviroment)

Damn, if one person picks up a ssg and goes out killing people, he was mad before playing DooM

The only things that killed all those poor kids were two assholes with guns. So they were picked on? So what? Everybody gets picked on. There is no one who goes through life without being bullied. Those two pricks were crazy, plain and simple.

I was bullied... From personal experience I can say that many of the students who are continually bullied are actually doing some little thing to encourage it. Not that it's intentional by any means. The most common fuel is over-reaction. Bullies love to feel that they are in control, so the more of a reaction that they get from their 'victim', the more satisfying the experience for the bully. Frankly, my take on Columbine is this: two disenfranchised kids had grown up with next to no respect for themselves, their parents, other people, or weapons. They didn't set out to kill anyone in particular, I don't even think that they really were targeting specific groups. They just roamed the halls with guns and fired whenever the whim struck them. They played God by deciding on the spot who lived and who died. They became the ultimate bullies. The biggest question in all this is how two young men could have believed that there was nothing in life living for, or if this was not the case, how they could have not understood the nature of cause and effect. AFTERSHOCK

I hate the way this country works. We live in such a blameless society where noone wants to pay for their own stupid mistakes. Compare the number of sane people who play Doom and similar games to Doom players that lose their minds and go on killing sprees. There is a striking difference in the numbers. Many people who play such games have played them since the genre was first created. So, if you go out shooting people, you were pretty screwed from the beginning. You don't need Doom and Quake to prompt you to do such things.

someone should send this thread to a news page with a more diverse readership (i cant seem to edit my account, so im stuck with this stupid info line):