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A Unique Perspective on a 'Game-Related' Tragedy
Megnatron writes "Penny Arcade has a letter from the stepmother of one of the kids who was recently charged with killing a homeless man. Her article is an extremely sobering tale of the problems dealing with troubled teen. She explains how, in this situation, the parents did everything they possibly could. And, in a refreshing twist, she absolves the games industry of any blame for the tragedy these kids perpetrated. From her missive: 'Video games DID NOT make this kid who he was, and it's unfortunate that the correlation is there. The thing that really gets me with this whole thing is that the kid knows full well that by equating what he's done to a video game, that he will generate controversy and media coverage. It makes me sick that the media is jumping all over this, because that is exactly the result that he wants. The only good thing (if there is such a thing) that has come out of this whole ordeal is that the kid is behind bars. That is exactly where he needs to be.'" Her letter is a passionate, troubling story, but well worth reading.
Frankly, all of science points to the answer being "yes". In fact there are numerous examples of people becoming downright evil from head trauma. And just like the ending of fight club, there is at least one case where the opposite is true. (Truth is stranger than fiction, after all.)
In fact a fairly recent study also stated that those people who are just happy all the time no matter what haven't made a decision to be that way. It is not an exercise of will. Those people are actually physiologically different.
The simple truth is that some people simply are born bad. I'm torn on whether we should be curing them, or implementing George Carlin's idea and turning the four corner states into a gigantic prison, and just throw them in there.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I don't think there is any question that people can be born bad. It's called anti-social personality disorder, and in its more extreme forms, sociopathic or psychopathic. There is an acronym for remembering the diagnostic criteria: corrupt.
* C - cannot follow law
* O - obligations ignored
* R - remorselessness
* R - recklessness
* U - underhandedness
* P - planning deficit
* T - temper
Here's the checklist for a psychopath
1. Glibness/superficial charm
2. Grandiose sense of self-worth
3. Need for stimulation/proneness to boredom
4. Pathological lying
5. Cunning/manipulative
6. Lack of remorse or guilt
7. Shallow affect
8. Callous/lack of empathy
9. Parasitic lifestyle
10. Poor behavioral controls
11. Promiscuous sexual behavior
12. Early behavioral problems
13. Lack of realistic, long-term goals
14. Impulsivity
15. Irresponsibility
16. Failure to accept responsibility for own actions
17. Many short-term marital relationships
18. Juvenile delinquency
19. Revocation of conditional release
20. Criminal versatility
That's a pretty clear definition of "bad."
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Ultimately, humans have free will and choose their own actions. Saying someone is "born bad" is equivilant to saying that they have been possessed by Satan. It's not a valid argument.
I'll will admit that people can be born with violent temperaments. They can be born with harsh attitudes or a lack of empathy. However all but the most severely mentally disabled are born with free will and the ability to reason. People may not intuatively understand right from wrong, but they still know what is acceptable and what is not.
This is why I don't accept the argument that someone is not responsible for their actions because they've had a "hard life" or were "born bad" or live in a "bad neighbourhood". I can be sympathetic, but ultimately I must insist that people take responsibilty for the decisions they have made. I don't think it's a lot to ask.
Blaming society, or genetics, or your parents, or video games or anything else for decisions you yourself have made is an insult to everyone who does accept the consequences of their actions. It's an insult to your own dignity as you are claiming you have lost your own free will.
There are people in this world who were born with physical and mental disabilities. People who have suffered accidents, abuse, insult, poverty and hardship of every kind. Even people who play video games. And most of these people live their lives, despite having to work that much harder at them. They overcome their problems, make an honest living and contribute to the society they live in. Often they contribute more than other more fortunate individuals. Even people with violent personalities or troubled pasts can still find a positive place in society.
When you argue that people are "born bad" or otherwise don't have free will, you're arguing that all these people are wasting their time. That they will never overcome their difficulties and they should either give up an committ a crime, cause trouble, go insane or just kill themselves. That is a flawed assumption. We all have the power to change our own lifes, and to alter the course of our lives. That's what seperates humans from animals.
This kid could have lead a better life. He chose not to. It had nothing to do with his mental chemistry. That was solid enough to allow him to dress himself every morning, walk without stumbling and converse with people when he needed to. He wasn't born bad. He chose to be bad. His parents didn't make that choice. Neither did his genes, or his playstation, or his neighbourhood. He did. Anything else is just an excuse.
May the Maths Be with you!
After reading the "stepmother's" reply I have to say yea it probably was the parent's fault. This kid seems to have been tossed back and forth between the "father" and the mother. The stepmother's language in her reply was what I would expect for a high school kid and not a parent of a child. In all the discussion of what they did and didn't do, I at no time heard the word love. I heard hate a lot but not love. Yea this kid might have had issues from the start but I have to say that didn't sound like he had much of a chance with the parents he had.
Yes he was unmanageable at 15 but what about at two? How about at five? How much love and time did he get at seven?
Read a bit more closely, and you'll catch this bit:
I am sorry this got so long. I have been reading PA since the very beginning, and I feel that both of you are very much like me. I think we are the same age (29) and I have been a lifelong gamer like the two of you.
If she's 29, then she would have been around 14 when the kid was born -- and remember, she describes herself as a kind-of stepmother. It sounds like she didn't get involved until he was already a teenager -- too late for her to have much impact, especially if she was only in her mid-20's herself.
So we can't draw any conclusions about her bad parenting when he was a baby. Also, note that he was living with his dad until he decided to leave -- and move in with his natural mom, who had even less control over the situation. If we must conclude that nurture had a larger role than nature, then we have to look at her role, long before the letter's author was involved.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
I really don't understand how you can blame the parents based on the information provided. Sure, the parents split up, but there are plenty of parents who divorce or separate and still have well-adjusted children. Beyond that, we simply have no idea what this kid's childhood was like. We also have no idea how long the stepmother has been on the scene, so I don't see how you can expect her to comment on how much love the child received at any specific age, much less support any conclusions based on the presence or absence of the word "love" in a letter.
It seems like a great modern fad (and fallacy) to blame parents for every lousy thing a kid does, as if people have become desperate to take nature out of the classic "nature vs. nurture" argument. But none of us are shaped purely by our environment, as the mention of the kid's younger brother being reasonably well-adjusted supports. We all have judgement and free will, so unless some actual evidence surfaces to support the notion that the parents somehow meaningfully contributed to these horrible acts, let's place blame back on the kid who committed them, shall we?
When you argue that people are "born bad" or otherwise don't have free will, you're arguing that all these people are wasting their time. That they will never overcome their difficulties and they should either give up an committ a crime, cause trouble, go insane or just kill themselves. That is a flawed assumption. We all have the power to change our own lifes, and to alter the course of our lives. That's what seperates humans from animals.
In a sense, that's irrelevant to society, however. Philosophically it's all well and good, and well worth debating into the long, dark hours of the night.
Society as a whole is (or should be) unconcerned. If a human CHOOSES to act like a wild animal - in fact, worse than one if you concede free will - he should be treated as one: caged, cared for to a minimal standard of care, and ultimately if not able to behave within norms that society sets - euthanized.
For example, I know that Alfonso Rodruiguez was someobody's little boy, once. But now (after his rape and murder of Dru Sjodin) he is simply a human-shaped dangerous nuisance that it is in the public interest to remove.
As far as the OP's lad, he's not stupid. He knows that society will give him chance after chance after chance, in the vain hope that he will develop something analogous to a conscience. Why should we bother? Because of "Human compassion"? Pull the other one - I have more pre-emptive compassion for his next victim than I ever would for him.
-Styopa
This is not an example of what I am talking about. That particular issue can happen from either nature or nurture. Letting the kids get away with their shit is rewarding that behavior because it places them above other children for whom there is zero tolerance. Like me, for example. I was a mama's boy up until I was about 21, no joke. Total pussy pushover. I used to get attacked at school literally every day. If they weren't hitting me they were destroying my bicycle, that kind of shit. So one day a kid attacks me without any backup and keeps it up until I get pissed off - all 5'11" of me or so at that time. I've been pretty huge since about the end of sixth grade, that was the year I started getting the nonstop growing pains. So I beat the living crap out of him and got expelled.
Yeah, I have to agree completely with that.
The real problem there is that the system isn't interested in helping people anyway, or rehabilitating anyone. If they were, the prison system wouldn't be allowed to remain a mass of murder and rape that only begets additional violence and not only provides opportunities for people to learn to commit more serious crimes, but also provides them with incentive to do so because we continue to punish people after they have ostensibly served their debt to society. They cannot get many types of jobs, they cannot vote, et cetera. The only reason to disenfranchise ANYONE is so that you don't have to fix the problems that affect them. Disenfranchising felons means you don't have to fix the problems that create felons, because those people can't vote you out anyway.
No, if you stop that kid from being a bully now, you can't make money on him by placing him in prison.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Sounds like she was involved here for several years, I guess you can consider that 'quick' but most reasonable people wouldn't.
Speaking from experience, my sister is like this kid. This girl put my parents through 18 years of pure hell, was a contributing factor in their divorce and my mothers alcoholism. She currently is unable to hold any job, but has two illegitimate children. The kids do not even have proper beds to sleep on, but child services will not remove them from her custody. My mother offered to adopt them, and she refused to give up custody. This girl leeches off my father at age 22. She spends her money on cigarettes instead of food/clothing for the kids, then calls us for handouts. If you asked me what I thought of her, my response would be very similar to the step-mother who sent this letter. There is no love there, there is no respect or compassion. My life will only be better if I never interacted with that waste of a human being ever again.
But I guess by your standards, I just sold her out, and am a terrible person.