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Grand Theft Auto Civil Case Moves Forward
An Alabama court has refused a request by retailers and Take-Two Entertainment lawyers to throw out a 'Grand Theft Auto-style killing spree' civil case. From the Next Generation article: "Moore, who was 18 at the time of the 2003 slayings, is convicted of killing two Fayette county officers and a dispatcher, and claimed that Grand Theft Auto inspired him to do it. That defense was barred, and Moore was sentenced to death. Although that defense was thrown out, the multi-million dollar suit filed by relatives of the victims claim that Moore was in fact mimicking GTA, which attorneys claim Moore played 'obsessively'."
WHY!?
Love the culture of blaming anything on everyone except the person who actually did it to begin with. /disgusted
legal lottery for week 13, now giving away $600 million for the lucky winner.. .."
Do we really need more disclaimers on game boxes?
".. by opening this box, you agree that we are not to be held responsible in any way if you get influences from our game and decide to kill 3 people
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
The next time I'm arrested for stealing, lying and circumventing the law, I'm going to blame it on CSPAN, which I watch obsessively. While I may get a slap on the wrist and time served, I do wish my victims well in their civil suit against CSPAN for it's contribution to my anti-social behavior.
Maybe the police officers families should bring a civil suit against the parents for not paying attention to what their child was doing and for not being responsible parents. This sickens me when people think that they can forgo the roles that parents are supposed to play and then sue somebody else for their kids not turning into perfect citizens.
>victims claim that Moore was in fact mimicking GTA, which attorneys claim Moore played 'obsessively'
even if we're prepared to accept that there's a causal link in this case between observation and mimicking, surely that he played it 'obsessively' is enough to reject the argument. if you eat/drink/smoke/gamble/have sex/do anything 'obsessively' there are bound to be negative consequences.
if, on the other hand, he'd played the game for 30 minutes and, for example, the seqence of lights and sounds put him into a suggestable state of hypnosis and programmed him to be a cop-killer (not possible annyway since hypnosis can't make you do anything you're not really prepared to do), then there might be a case.
If he was mimicking the game, it's time to remove him from the game. Sometimes helping somebody with a problem is as simple as "let's go fishing" or something similar. If they noticed terrible behavior from him before hand and they actually cared about him and not making money off his mistakes, they would have sought to help him beforehand instead of whining after the fact.
You know, this has to stop somewhere. The guy was sick. His parents, friends and relatives who knew him are much more guilty than people who created the video game. Society itself is guilty of allowing such people to roam free. But then, we can't incarcerate everyone "just in case". So my point is: shit happens. Whatever his reasons, whatever the motives, whatever the games he played and the programs he watched, he is a murderer. He's been sentenced to death. The vast majority of people who play GTA do not go on a killing spree aftewards. The game is not the problem.
You are more than the sum of what you consume. Desire is not an occupation.
when he was playing 'obsessively'? there were no big bucks to be made then, were there?
If a person's mental state is so twisted that they would kill 3 people after being 'influenced' by a video game, then obviously there are much deeper issues at fault than a bunch of pixels and a joypad.
Where is the logical conclusion to this constantly expanding era of absurd litigation? It's scary to think where it may lead... hell, it's scary enough to think about where we are with it already.
She's built like a steak house, but she handles like a bistro....
/me obsessively watches Morgan Freeman's/Brad Pitt's movie, "Seven" then runs off to kill sinners.
/me obsessively eats Twinkies until he dies.
/me obsessively plays Super Mario Bros. then starts throwing turtles at patrons of the local pet store & gets thrown into jail.
/me obsessively chugs water until he drowns in it.
:P)
Can my family sue New Line Cinema for making the movie?
Can my family now sue Hostess for making Twinkies?
Can I now sue Nintendo for teaching me that the way to get ahead is to lob reptiles?
Can my family now sue God for creating H20? (don't start that debate plz
the phrase "don't give them ideas" is commonly used?
The problem isn't if the game MADE him do it, but if the game helped him do it MORE EFFICIENTLY.
From the original CBS News link (not TFA) :
"The video game industry gave him a cranial menu that popped up in the blink of an eye, in that police station," says Thompson. "And that menu offered him the split-second decision to kill the officers, shoot them in the head, flee in a police car, just as the game itself trained them to do."
Perhaps if he hadn't played the game, he would have shot them in the chest where hopefully the cops couldn't have died instantly.
In other words, videogames TRAIN the players to become better and more effective criminals. I don't know about you, but the thought gives me the creeps.
It seems to me that it's easy to get someone to do something to do something they haven't "prepared" to do. (Rob the bank or I'll kill your family for example, or that pizza delivery bomb guy) Much harder if they have prepared against it. If you've talked with your family members and all of them have talked it over and agreed that they would all rather die than have any one of them rob the bank for them then such a scenario becomes much harder.
caused by people who play Animal Crossing. That and hitting people on the head with a butterfly net - that stings!
Now, personally, I blame the use of cars for violent crimes on the movies.
Nothing like blaming someone else for your own actions, right?
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
not the relatives of the killer. I didn't even have to read the article to see that:
Although that defense was thrown out, the multi-million dollar suit filed by relatives of the victims claim that Moore was in fact mimicking GTA
Did anyone else see the title and think that the company was making a new GTA game called "Grand Theft Auto: Civil Case"? Presumably in which you'd drive a car around breaking contracts and whatnot...
Let me look at this:
1: We have evidence that Violence and Violent Video Games are correlated. Nobody has any clue if violent games makes kids violent, or if violent kids like violent games; but it's politically unpopular to accuse your constituients' kids of being thugs. (FYI, this is the kind of evidence that says smoking and cancer are correlated, but nobody really cares whether or not cancer causes smoking)
2: It's a mid-term Election year. That means that there are several elected officials who desperately need to distract the people voting for them away from an unpopular war, and a deficit which is spiraling out of control.
3: The violence issue in particular has traction because people feel powerless to combat it; trying to protect your kids from becoming assholes is like trying to protect them from the chicken pox. It doesn't work. So, people find a scapegoat, something tangible that they can dismantle and try to keep away from their children. They convince themselves that if they can just keep violent media away from the kids, maybe kids won't know how to be violent. This isnt really their fault, people have been falling for non-causa-pro-causa arguments (with this, therefore because of this) since the dawn of time.
4: Our elected officials are like the contractors at your work. Solving problems does not help them; in fact, Solving problems permanently in a way which makes everyone happy makes them less likely to be re-elected.(this is not a troll, think about this) However, appearing to solve problems does help them. They get the credit for being a tireless defender of the public, and the problems are still there to fix next time they need a boost.
5: History teaches us the following: Games and other High-definition media will continue to be the scapegoat until someone builds a better scapegoat. Console games like GTA will wear targets on their backs until someone makes a VR Game where you rape/kill/steal/whatever or otherwise manages to take simulated violence to the Next Level. Until then, we personally have a choice: we can either whine, follow the mob, or run for congress.
6: There are thousands of idiots out there, sooner or later you will probably fail to think about something and be one of them. While I don't expect you to fix any of the above problems, do try to be smart about it and start thinking critically about the next thing that pisses you off.
Lagito ergo expectabo
Oh boo hoo, if you play games as crappy and boring as the GTA series you deserve the death penalty.
Does it occur to no one that in order to be 'obssesive' about something, like a video game for instance, there have to be present psychological problems? Since when do we hold companies accountable for selling a product to a distributer who doesn't get a psychological profile before selling to their customers?
FanFictionRecs.net
Steve Ballmer made me do it!
You just got troll'd!
The thing that gets me the most is that some people just don't seem realise the gap between real and not real. Granted the murderer did know what he was doing. I myself play a lot of violent video games (mostly because that's all that's out there anymore) and i don't go killing people. Violent media and games does not cause violence, and it certainly did not make this guy kill. The style may have been determined by the game, but he had it in his mind to kill before he decided how to do it. I think he was honestly trying to please innocent and blame it on the game. Today's America is all about passing the buck until nobody is clear who has it anymore. People don't do actions because the violence in the games makes them do it. Nightmare on Elm St is still WAY more violent than most games, and kids watch it on TBS or TNT late at night. Violence has become a part of our media cultre and that's just the way it is. This guy deserves the death penalty, because HE pulled the trigger, HE made the shot, HE killed the police officers. The game didn't do it, the game makers didn't do it, HE did. The only one responsible for your actions is YOU.
He whom you called four-eyes yesterday, you call Sir tomorrow.
Perhaps if he hadn't played the game, he would have shot them in the chest where hopefully the cops couldn't have died instantly.
Yeah, the fuckers should suffer before they die, headshots are too mercifull.
But back to your point:
the phrase "don't give them ideas" [...] videogames TRAIN the players to become better and more effective criminals.
Go burn some books, those give people ideas too.
You can't take the sky from me...
Am I the only one who's extremely alienated by the thought of killing a kid? I mean, okay, so he's done things that, after the code of law, justify a death penalty. And I guess after turning 18 you can be judged as an adult.
But does that have to be the case? Did the jury not have a choice in the matter? After all, you don't magically become an adult 18 years after being born.
We're talking about Alabama. Tell them that they're taking the same stance as Joe Lieberman and (gasp!) Hillary Clinton. Things will quiet down in no time.
I wonder what "obsessively?" means in this case.
When I get into a game, I'll play it for maybe 8 hours a day every day for a week or whatever it takes to finish it.
Haven't gone on a homocidal rampage yet.
Seriously, what's obsessive for someone who enjoys games might not apply to other pursuits...games often encourage certain time commitments regardless of content.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
if he was wearing green and shouting "Grove Street! Mutha Fucka!"
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
Back in the day, I had to make myself stop playing Tetris, because I kept obsessively stacking things on top of each other. The game made me do it.
psmylie's dictionary: Godzillion (noun) Any number large enough to destroy Tokyo
This is an 18-year-old boy we're talking about.
Obviously if he'd ever played Grand Theft Auto, he'd be out scoring with hookers, not killing cops. Now, if he was on trial for killing a prostitute, then maybe he'd have a case.
I'm sure he'd never watched any films which featured shooting guns or killing cops...No, of course not! And even if he had, we all know that movies don't influence kids, it's those video games that are really Evil (as in Frooits of the Devil)!
Come on, I'm not that old, but I'm old enough to remember when the target of this kind of hysteria was Dungeons & Dragons. Good mothers wouldn't let their kids be exposed to that source of Evil. How can everyone else have forgotten so quickly?
I...I'm attacking the darkness!
SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING
Excessive exposure of disturbed individuals to graphically violent games may reenforce existing violent tendencies. Coupled with a disconnect from reality, these conditions may result in the real-world application of themes observed in the game environment, including--but not limited to--assault, robbery, rape, torture, and murder. Please note the existing ESRB rating and seek professional help if you feel the desire to replicate game scenarios in real life.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
...are the victim's loved ones suing the family of the murderer? Or just the ones with, you know, money?
Lets all be completely honest, not a one of us wants to see this case be successful because we feel a danger to our right to art and entertainment.
While I agree, there is also a part of me that thinks any developer that makes a game where the primary objectives in the game involve car-jacking, murdering and getting away from law enforcement that that developer should have at least a passing concern as to how thier creation will have an impact. We talk so freely about people pointing fingers and shurking responsibility. Are we really saying that Rockstar should have ZERO consideration for the overall impact of what they create? That they get to completely wash thier hands of any culpabilty when they make something original. Why does Rockstar get a pass on the responsibility hit list?
I am certianly not saying this litigation is right. But at the same time maybe just maybe making vidoe games that glorify the killing of cops may not be "right" either.
Ves
I beg to differ on the scientific conclusions in this regard. The science is quite settled on the statistical link of certain cancers to tobacco usage, especially worldwide, regardless of your belief to the contrary.
... do you think the tobacco institute might do it?
Your point on media and violence is more scientifically founded, however.
This does not however, mean that game violence or media violence is or is not a contributing factor to GTA-inspired behaviors, but I'd love to see the research proposals for such a study:
let's see, I'm going to need a few helicopters, a lot of fast cars, guns, lots of guns, lots of ammo, a few grenade launchers, and Get Out Of Jail Free cards for the research city.
Now I just need to find someone to finance the grant
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Although you get the gammut of noobs and whatnot with online shooters, I've noted - particularly with the euro and australian set, the overwhelming amount of polite chatter, "sorrys" and the like during fragfests. Although people in the real world are generally polite around where I live - it pales in comparrison to the almost creepy-polite people splattering my corpse into a million gibblets every other night in RTCW.
What am I supposed to infer from this compared to the "media" (who have been losing oodles of revenue to slobs like me who are tired of watching their violent programing and are going elsewhere) who perpetually throw data counter to first-hand data everyday? The start of a slander and libel class-action suit might be just what the DA ordered.
Thanks for reading.
I can't think of a better way to dishonor the memories of your loved ones than by trying to make money off their tragic deaths...
Ok all I'm going to say is, if a young man is so "obsessed" with a video game such as GTA that he's going to go out and mirror the actions of it, then there has to be more to this story. There is obvisiously some sort of deep seeded psychological problem with this guy that wasn't picked up. All he needed was a trigger. And GTA was that trigger to set it off. But suing the developer is not the answer. I mean, if their intent was to get kids to shoot cops, then sure, theres a case of brainwashing right there. But the developers of these games make the game to have fun. This is the same type of arguement that was going around when Columbine happened. Many people said "Oh they listened to Marilyn Manson, a violent rocker, and therefore his music caused them to committ murder and suicide." But did Manson get sued? No. I'll admit, I've gamed sometimes to the point where I'm a bit fuzzy (A good example is when I first got the Sims and spent hours on it a day and I'd keep thinking what my energy levels were and would imagine the bar in my head). I mean most gamers I know have played a game to the extent where various thoughts come to mind (eg. We sometimes look for snipers while walking through the city a la Counter Strike). But to fully be in a situation where you mimic and carry out the actions in full by committing a crime... Well, yeah where is the psych evaluation of this kid? That would be pretty interesting to see. But everyone I know has played GTA and we're all fine. I think these people really need a stronger case, and I hope the lawyers for the defense are smart enough to win this, cos this case just blows big time.
...let Jack Thompson be their lawyer. Then, as a Take Two shareholder, he'd have a conflict of interest.
That would be sweet.
The only surefire protection against Microsoft infections is abstinence. - The Onion
It doesn't glorify cop killing. GTA makes it pretty fucking clear that if you kill cops they will kill you. Seriously, try to complete the game whilst killing every cop you see - you won't have a chance.
p.s. US army glofifies (Iraqi) cop killing. Ban those bitches.
next time someone is hit crossing a road they need to sue the makers of Frogger for making it seem fun to dodge traffic.
Thousands of auto accidents every day just waiting to turn into lawsuits against the carmageddon series!
Speeding ticket? "But sir, I was obsessed with Need for Speed!"
Caught in an act of terrorism? "I was just acting out something I'd seen in counter-strike!"
The judge in this case needs to slap a humongous "don't waste my time" court cost to these plantiffs, and to the lawyer that filed the case, and kick it out of court.
You can get 15 minutes of fame, but you can go down in history for infamy.