People Getting Randomly Punched... Because Video Games

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MarkWahlberg

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So this might be the first time I've ever seen video games being associated with real-world violence and it being even remotely relevant. In today's Washington Post, there's an article on a recent spate of attacks that are being attributed to something called the 'Knockout Game'. Essentially, a bunch of asshole kids run up behind someone and try to knock them to the ground in one punch. To reiterate, assholes.

The weird thing is, by the time the article mentions Grand Theft Auto (because of course it does), it's only because the kids they interview brought it up in the first place. For clarification, this kind of thing is what they're referring to:

So basically, kids are doing that IRL, and then posting it to Youtube. Of course the article goes on to mention that these particular sorts of attacks have been recorded since at least the early 90's - i.e. before GTA or Youtube even existed. So, on the one hand, saying 'Those punks are gonna get ya because of video games and the Internet' is really stupid and paranoid. On the other hand, I can totally see some idiot being all 'yo man, this shits funny' and then trying to actually do it. I'm still not willing to concede that this is GTA's fault - assholes are assholes - but this might be the one time I've ever seen it being mentioned in regards to actual violence in a way that wasn't completely absurd.

In more cheerful news, this 24 hour music video is pretty great.

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reisz

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#2  Edited By reisz

No one with a head on their shoulders hurt's people because they saw it in their entertainment. Happy slapping has been a thing forever just as you said. If the kids brought up GTAV it's as an excuse for their own misbehaviour. Just dumb kids trying to blame their problems on something else.

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mrfluke

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@reisz said:

No one with a head on their shoulders hurt's people because they saw it in their entertainment. Happy slapping has been a thing forever just as you said. If the kids brought up GTAV it's as an excuse for their own misbehaviour. Just dumb kids trying to blame their problems on something else.

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Steadying

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#4  Edited By Steadying

What a disgusting thing to do. I mean.....What??? :|

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I_Stay_Puft

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#5  Edited By I_Stay_Puft

This was done years ago from the SNL digital short. But seriously people don't be jerks.

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ArtisanBreads

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Yeah I heard about this on the CAGcast and don't see the video game connection. But pretty fucking awful.

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Undeadpool

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@mrfluke said:

@reisz said:

No one with a head on their shoulders hurt's people because they saw it in their entertainment. Happy slapping has been a thing forever just as you said. If the kids brought up GTAV it's as an excuse for their own misbehaviour. Just dumb kids trying to blame their problems on something else.

I'm gonna say the kids are actually pretty savvy and the idiots would be the people who BELIEVE them.

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GaspoweR

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#8  Edited By GaspoweR
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joshwent

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#9  Edited By joshwent

I remember a case not too long ago where 2 people (Canadian?) kidnapped, tortured, and eventually killed someone. One of them said they were inspired by the Hostel movies. So the "influence" there is undeniable. But like Reisz said, that influenced behavior starts with those people being psychopathic murderers, not with perfectly peaceful people being driven to violence by experiencing media. It just doesn't happen. But horrible people will get urges to do horrible things from any kind of thing they see.

Of course, we're all fucked when these asshole kids start playing Dead Rising 3.

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TheHT

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Yeah, I made a thread about this yesteday. It's some infuriating shit.

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Hailinel

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This has been going on several years now, apparently. GTAV specifically has nothing to do with it and it has everything to do with kids being shitheads.

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Krullban

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Seen something about a kid who was doing this often and eventually it didn't work and he got shot. Lived and is in jail.

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Elwoodan

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One step closer to the Clockwork Orange.

As a counter-measure I'm just going to go to the mall tomorrow (that's where they hangout right?) and punch some teenagers, leave them as a warning for the others.

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mikethekilla

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Some kids did this to an old lady and she's pulled out a gun and shot two of the kids.

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jerseyscum

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#15  Edited By jerseyscum

WORLD STAR! WORLD STAR! WORLD STAR!

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Oldirtybearon

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I can see how punching random people would be appealing. At that point it's better to just go join a boxing gym, though. Get a place to vent your aggression and become a better person while doing it!

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Sterling

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Maybe these kids should be rounded up and put in the ring with a boxer. Let them feel what its like to be knocked the fuck out.

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Slag

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Games ain't got nuthin to do with this. Knockout has been happening in my city for at least 7 years, probably a lot longer than that.

I view this like dog fighting/Michael Vick thing where the national media acted like it was some novel horror. People from the suburbs are really ignorant of some things that go on everyday in inner city. And the country for that matter.

Typical old media hysteria, Damn those young Hooligans and their TV Picture games!

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VeggiesBro

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WORLD STAR! WORLD STAR! WORLD STAR!

Exactly what I thought when I saw this. Pretty sickening that they pick on people who are totally minding their own business. Here's hoping they learn their lesson by getting their teeth knocked out.

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Canteu

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Happy Slapping. Dick head charvs with phones paid with benefits do it.

Video games are the root cause of genocide, not happy slapping. Duh.

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vaiz

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Knockout, or whatever the name of choice is these days, has been going on for a lot longer than the GTA franchise has even been around, and anyone who thinks it's at all a matter of correlation or causation is an idiot.

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intro

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This disgusted me. Thankfully there is a new article out saying a kid who did this was shot twice, lived and sent to jail for a year. He tried to use a taser on someone who was legally carrying a pistol, the taser failed and the man shot him. I'm not really on either side of the whole gun debate thing and don't care to talk about it, but hearing this made me feel good. Hopefully that's not weird.

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tourgen

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@slag: yeah the game has been around quite a while actually. Some people are just giant assholes.

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ajamafalous

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I actually saw a link to a video about this a couple weeks ago on Facebook.

It's just fucking baffling to me that people do shit like this.

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Evilsbane

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I like how if anyone doing this thought about for more than 3 seconds they would realize that this is 100% a mugging and nothing more it doesn't make an ounce of sense.

Hey guys I'm going to go play a game called Running a Smuggling Ring its HILARIOUS!

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audioBusting

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#26  Edited By audioBusting

When I was in elementary school, we had a game where 2 of us combine our fists and punch somebody up to a wall. Yeah, I don't know. It was so difficult to move together that the punches don't actually hurt.

This knockout thing is pretty fucked up, though. When we were in high school, one of my friends was randomly punched on the street. Now I wonder if it was on a dare like that. He was pretty tough and did not even budge, so I guess the puncher lost the dare.

Man, kids are dumb.

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stryker1121

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#27  Edited By stryker1121

To reiterate some of the posters here,this kind of thing has been going on for years. "Knockout King" is one name for this disgusting practice. Bunch of little sociopath punks..one victim as reported by CNN was a 78-year-old lady.

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Capum15

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1: That's fucked.

2: I absolutely love how Vinny plays these sorts of games. Sleeping Dogs QLs are easily some of my favorite. That moment in GTA V was absolutely hilarious.

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Broomhitches

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I never understood why people do shit like this. Also, wtf is this shit?

Fernanda Leiba, 21, a senior at Bell Multicultural High School, said she just heard of the knockout game in classes this week. “I think it’s not funny because people are getting hurt,” she said. “What if someone does it to me?”

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falserelic

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Yeah, It's the dumbest shit I've seen in awhile. Dickheads going around trying to knockout people (That can potentially kill them) all for fun is just stupid. Some teens try to justify it to make it seem not so bad are fucking stupid. I'm sure they don't want someone they care about, get knock the fuck out for no reason. That just shows whoever their parents are fucking sucks at disciplining them.

Sad thing is this ''knockout game'' will probably only get worse in the upcoming days, but only way for these teens to learn. Is probably picking on someone that they shouldn't have fuck with from the start, and if something bad happens to them well that's too fucking bad, karma can be a mean fucking bitch.

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korolev

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This isn't new and it isn't due to video games. In Australia, we call it "King Hitting" (I don't know why we gave it that name) - it's essentially just a very hard punch thrown at a person's head. Very often the people who do it are drunk, but sometimes people just do it because they're violent, aggressive and bored. And it is quite dangerous - more than a few people have died due to "king hitting" - often not due to the punch itself, but due to the trauma sustained when the head hits the pavement.

It's not as common as the news makes it out to be, either in America or Australia. Let me ask you something - do you see a rash of people getting hit on the head at random? Do you see such things on the street in person? Do you know, personally, anyone who has been assaulted in this way? Chances are you do not know anyone who has been hurt in this way and you've never seen it, and statistically, you are very unlikely to be a victim of this sort of behaviour.

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Sanious

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#32  Edited By Sanious

@stryker1121 said:

To reiterate some of the posters here,this kind of thing has been going on for years. "Knockout King" is one name for this disgusting practice. Bunch of little sociopath punks..one victim as reported by CNN was a 78-year-old lady.

Yeah, one recently happened close to where I work and a couple victims have been elderly people.

15-Year-Old Arrested In Northeast Philadelphia ‘Knockout’ Attack