LF: Trump Announces One-Sided Plan To Meet With Video Game Makers Over Gun Violence

Title: Trump Announces One-Sided Plan To Meet With Video Game Makers Over Gun Violence
Source: TechDirt
URL Source: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/2 ... makers-over-gun-violence.shtml
Published: Mar 6, 2018
Author: Timothy Geigner
Post Date: 2018-03-07 10:39:52 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 179
Comments: 1

In the conspiracy against video games that is now in full swing after the school shooting in Florida, it seems that it goes all the way to the top, by which I mean the recent comments by our Dear Leader, Donald Trump. Lower levels of the government have already begun foisting the sins of the shooter on the scapegoat of violent games, with Rhode Island looking for a plainly unconstitutional tax on adult-rated games and the governor of Kentucky trying to blame violent games for the recent shooting, sans evidence. And now it seems that Donald Trump has gotten into the mix, announcing that he will be meeting with "the video game industry" in coming weeks to see how they can stop real-world gun violence.

Presidential Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders announced at a briefing Thursday that President Trump plans to meet with members of the video game industry next week "to see what they can do" on the issue of gun violence.
Details on specific timing and attendance for the meeting weren't immediately available, but Sanders cast the meeting as of a piece with multiple others that have already taken place between the president and "a number of stakeholders" in the gun violence debate.

Except it appears that the reason the timing for those meetings wasn't provided during the White House briefing is almost certainly because nobody in the video game industry has any idea what Trump or Sanders is talking about. The Entertainment Software Association, which represents the larger game studios and publishers, came out with a statement that it has had no plans to meet with Trump, has received no invitations to meet with Trump, and would push back on any responsibility games have for real life violence were such a meeting to occur.

The same video games played in the US are played worldwide; however, the level of gun violence is exponentially higher in the US than in other countries. Numerous authorities have examined the scientific record and found there is no link between media content and real-life violence. The US video game industry has a long history of partnering with parents and more than 20 years of rating video games through the Entertainment Software Rating Board. We take great steps to provide tools to help players and parents make informed entertainment decisions.

It's about as perfect a rebuttal to the violent games argument as there is: other countries have these same games, but not the violence. For its part, the White House clarified later that the invitations to meet with Trump would be going out over the next few days. Still, it probably would have been good for meetings to be scheduled before they were announced to the gaggle from the White House podium.

With this being so one-sided, instead, we're left to witness another grandstanding politician with another whipping post talking about protected art and speech being culpable for real-world tragedy.

Video games have physiologically measurable results.... just like the crap the Pharmasurance syndicate pumps out and into America's captive youths.