Kotsu: GTA Blamed After 8Yr Old Shoots Grandmother

Last week, an eight-year-old boy picked up a loaded gun and shot his grandmother in the head a few minutes after playing Grand Theft Auto IV. You'll never guess which part of that sentence has become a talking point for pundits and media analysts over the past couple of days.

On Thursday, just after 5pm, the child shot and killed his grandmother in their trailer park home in Slaughter, Louisiana. ..

Somehow, an eight-year-old kid had access to a firearm, yet this weekend's debate question has not been "how the hell did that happen?" The media is not befuddled as to why a gun was lying around in this mobile home. Psychiatrists are not taking to television to ask why the boy's grandmother wasn't watching him more closely so he couldn't pick up a gun. ..

Here's CNN:

While the motive is unclear, the sheriff's department implied the child's activities in a violent virtual world may have led to the killing.

"Although a motive for the shooting is unknown at this time investigators have learned that the juvenile suspect was playing a video game on the Play Station III 'Grand Theft Auto IV,' a realistic game that has been associated with encouraging violence and awards points to players for killing people, just minutes before the homicide occurred."

Fox News had their own unique spin, pulling in an expert witness to point out that video games are good practice for murder.

"From a behavior therapy perspective, I would say that's practicing," Kristopher Kaliebe, a LSU Health Sciences Center child psychologist told Fox8live.com.

"So if you have a video game where someone shoots at a target, that's sort of practicing shooting at a target. When you have a video game that is shooting at a human being, that is practicing shooting at a human being," Kaliebe said.

Kotaku: Grand Theft Auto Blamed After Eight-Year-Old Shoots Grandmother

So, guns are bad mmkay. By now, parents not getting blamed for their kids behavior, instead of Videogames, is still a thing. This stupid font editor.. Well, there's three videos on the link, none of which are embeds. Stay classy Kotsu.

Because having a gun where a 8 year old can reach it was not the problem. Or not having it with the safety on...or having it loaded...or the kid not being watched...

Playstation III

While clearly the biggest issue here is that an eight year old had access to a loaded gun, it's also pretty irresponsible to let a kid that young play GTA IV. All around bad parenting.

Take two replied with this on CNN "Ascribing a connection to entertainment--a theory that has been disproven repeatedly by multiple independent studies--both minimizes this moment and sidesteps the real issues at hand,"

Oh boy this shit again.

• A. Blame the careless gunowner
• B. Blame the careless parent/guardian, who thinks GTA IV is appropriate entertainment for an unsupervised 8 year old.
• C. It's the games. Of course it's the games. Burn the games!

Jeez!

P.S. What the 'eff is a *Kotsu*?!

The video game he was playing is far more important than any of the factors you mentioned, I agree.

I guess I can understand how society has succumbed to scapegoating the easiest scapegoat rather than actually manning up and looking into the realistic shittiness of lifestyle that actually matters, such as all the things you mentioned. Laying vain blame and avoiding taking real action has become the trend.

It's exciting to see where a society like this is headed, I'm just standing by and watching the world get crazier, it gives me a maaaaad ruuush.

Guns don't kill people. People who play GTA, kill people.

Shit parents. They should feel pretty bad for the rest of their lives for letting that happen. Also its kinda funny how these parents who blamed the game for it, also most likely bought it for the kid. lol

Did the kid also go bowling the day before?

How about the real issue? The clear reason that this tragedy happened? He lived in Slaughter.

@nictel said:

Hey, I've seen the Big Lebowski. Bowling turns everyone into blood thirsty Nihilists. #BowlingTruthers

I remember watching a vid about it yesterday, and yeah how did a kid have access to a loaded gun. On top of that why the fuck did he want to shoot his grandma.

Our society is so screwed up. Trayvon had it coming because he smoked weed at least once and GTA magically made this kid murder his grandma. I'm sure him being in a trailerpark, being near a gun, and being crazy and/or evil had nothing to do with it.

When I first saw the headline I thought the opposite: "Oh here comes gamers defending fanatically their hobbies again". I'm not as uppity towards news like this because I do believe violent media does have some influence on behavior, be it positive or negative. In cases like these it would be negative.

But then I actually read the article. Mobile home? Oh so this must be a relatively poor neighbourhood with high crime rate. Loaded gun reachable to children? Oh.

This is too much of a classic case of scapegoating and spotlight shifting that it's pathetic. Yes, gamers, let's take a shit on this piece of sensational news.

NewsCorporation, AOLTimeWarner, and the American Senate/House of Representatives don't receive funds from video game companies beyond the taxes they pay. Major weapons manufacturers like Lockheed Martin pay for many politicians and anchorman's secret double life's salaries. Further, FOX, TCW, and the gov't can invest in weapons corps and make interest when their own TV shows and campaigns stir a need for unused missiles and planes.

Video games are ultimately not responsible, so the industry will never be taken away, and its investors will never lose much besides maybe a 5% drop in Rockstar stock once every six months something like this happens, which in turn goes back to normal within weeks. Meanwhile it takes all of the attention away from gun-lovers notoriously lax handling of safety. I mean, a gun locked away in a safe with a safety on isn't gonna do much when the reptilian Mexican rosthchilds start a revolution at 3AM in your bedroom window!!!

Maybe they shouldn't live in slaughter.

move to fucking or something

Kotaku usually doesn't fit. + Katsu. = Kotsu

Kotaku usually doesn't fit. + Katsu. = Kotsu

@veektarius: A misspelled spoof on Kotaku, obvi.

Now you are just being ignorant. That Play Station III game gave the kid the gun and told him: "I'm gonna give you award points if you shoot Granny."

But seriously, why is it that that every time something like this happens, it's GTA? Like, that's the only somewhat violent video game in existence? Or simply news outlets using GTA because everyone heard about it?

I like how these people blame GTA yet these incidents simply don't happen in countries with strict gun control, the same countries that also have GTA.

How about that.

Edit: Also today I learned GTA IV is a realistic game.

So while looking for information on the town of Fucking, Austria, I came across this article, which has this absolutely golden line toward the bottom:

Local mayor Franz Meindl added: "I always wanted the name to stay but it's just got too much now. The only problem is that we need all of the Fucking residents to agree to the name change, everyone needs to agree for it to happen.

Oh, yeah, should'a kept the gun put away and all that. I don't know if I can get angry at this song-and-dance again.

Just around the time GTA V is ready to launch. I think Rockstar has gone too far this time in their promotional campaigns to get people talking about GTA.

A lot of our (more right wing) politicians have a hard time imagining that other countries exist so their laws and the positive effects of those laws matter even less to them. Despite the best efforts of hundreds of millions of people (read: 92% of the population) calling for stricter gun laws, Congress has so far failed to pass anything because the gun lobby and NRA are huge, huge lobbying entities in Washington DC. It's disgusting and disgraceful but Congress has decided that doing nothing at all is a solution to this problem.

Awful. How the hell do you leave a gun easily accessible to a child? How? Also an 8 year old shouldn't be playing GTA but that's beside the point.

Clearly all that time playing Civilization is just 'practice', so it qualifies me to run a country.

Tell the citizens of Boston I want them to begin production of an aqueduct.

Raleigh, North Carolina; you build horse archers. Chop chop!

side note: I know a lot of gun control nuts will use this as an excuse to take away a citizen's right to possess an object we allow police and military to possess, but the facts of this case don't support it. It is possible to have gun rights and still be able to keep loaded weapons away from 8 year old children. I know it sounds crazy. If this is proof that you need to take away citizen's rights to own a firearm, or that a citizen needs to pass a series of licensing tests to own one, then we universally must also require licensing to purchase Draeno. Because, much like a loaded firearm, Draeno is dangerous when handled by children.

Take-Two's viral marketing campaigns are getting really aggressive these days.

@seppli: Isn't a kotsu the blanket thing that Japanese people put on their tables during the winter to keep their legs warm while they're eating, watching tv, etc.?

@omega: That's a kotatsu.

Oh, America.

You so crazy.

what?

This would be a case where the game might actually have been an influence. A kid that young could get a really skewed sense of reality if he got absorbed into a game like GTA. A friend of mine a few years ago let his son who was about the same age play all the GTA games. He was at the store with his son and as they were leaving his son said loudly, "Hey dad, let's go kill some cops." My friend is an idiot.

"awards points to players for killing people"... Why does EVERY accusatory article about GTA say this?

I want to write an article about how Apocalypse Now is military training for viewers, and dispenses cookies every time a character dies. Maybe it'll get me a job as a reporter.

I'm gonna ruin your joke and be real for a sec: kotatsu and kotaku are two different things.

Why was 8 year old playing GTA IV to begin with? And why did he have access to a firearm?

It's Kotatsu

This is actually a pretty unfortunate event though either way.

Also if @blu3v3nom07 was talking about kotatsu, kotatsu is pretty fucking delicious.

@mcghee: I played GTA around that age and never thought like that...?

You think that's bad, some idiot in the GS comments section claimed to let his four year old play The Last of Us. Holy fucking shit.

He was probably looking for some excitment cus GTA4's tutorial is like 2 hours long.

Good? I'm glad you didn't blow your grandmother's brains out.

You must be watching the original cut of Apocalypse Now because the Redux definitely gives me cookies for every dead character.

My kneejerk reaction was going to be "how the fuck is blaming video games still a thing in 2013," but then I remembered we live in a country where we discovered (or rather, finally got proof) that our government pretty much said fuck your privacy and the only thing the news seemed concerned about was whether or not they caught the guy who blew the whistle in the first place. So, in a way, I'm not shocked at all. Disappointed, yeah. Terrified for the future of this country, maybe. But shocked? Nope.

I played GTA IV all weekend and I didn't even kill one person.

I also didn't have access to a gun and I'm not 8.....

I guess I have the unpopular opinion here. I believe video games can influence the minds of children. I don't blame the game, though. I blame the parents who let an 8 year old play GTA and allow him easy access to a gun. Also keep in mind that I am not saying GTA caused this, but I don't think that kids should be playing it.

@mcghee: Just saying, don't act like all 8-year olds who play GTA automatically want to kill everyone...(Vice city was seriously common among 8-year olds around and none of them became psychopaths). Plus, we have gun control here so not really possible to blow your granny's brains out.