Mass Effect... Demonised
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Category: News ArchiveHits: 823
Of course this skewering, as Brown's letter suggests, may be born out of fear: "As video games continue to take audiences away from television, we expect to see more TV news stories warning parents about the corrupting influence of interactive entertainment. But this represents a new level of recklessness." The problem is that gaming is still a relatively niche hobby, at least compared to television and cinema, and it is enjoyed by a disproportionate number of youngsters. So, when older viewers watch reports like Fox's, this is probably the most they'll hear about gaming for weeks if not months; and it doesn't sound good. Little wonder, then, that the greying moral majority think that gaming is in part to blame for US society's ills.
Not that damaging misconception is constrained to the United States, of course, in fact a more serious example happened here in the UK a few years ago - during the Stefan Pakeerah murder case. During this case, controversy-courting Manhunt was linked to the vicious killing, and both TV and newspapers reported that the 17 year-old murderer Warren LeBlanc was obsessed by the game. It emerged, in fact, that it was victim Pakeerah who had played the game, not the other way round.
"The video game was not found in Warren LeBlanc's room, it was found in Stefan Pakeerah's room," a police spokeperson explained at the time. "Leicestershire Constabulary stands by its response that police investigations did not uncover any connections to the video game, the motive for the incident was robbery." Despite this fact, newspapers like the ultra-Conservative Daily Mail did little to assuage the general impression than Manhunt was related to this horrendous event, reports focussing on the game, despite the plain truth that it was seemingly unrelated in any way whatsoever.
