Jack Thompson Challenged by Kotaku

[nathanlawliet]

Original Article: http://kotaku.com/357305/dissecting-...s-niu-shooting

Originally Posted by Brian Crecente

Jack Thompson must have Fox News on speed dial, because every time a student shoots someone it seems like he's there, head hanging low, like a vulture, dishing out his special brand of truisms.

Seeing that Jack went out of his way to email me this morning to point out that he was "right" about the shooting being spurred by Counter-Strike, I thought it was probably worth another round of Dissecting Jack's Lies.

Hit a jump for his confusing quotes and how accurate they were:

1: We find from brain scan studies out of Harvard that if you get started playing, for example, violent video games you can more likely copy-cat the behaviors in the games.
Verdict: False
Evidence: While the study of adolescents by Harvard and Indiana university researchers found that video games can spur "emotional arousal" and lower self-control it never made that final leap. In fact David S. Bickham, a research scientist at the Center on Media and Child Health at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, told the Washington Post that the study, while interesting, wasn't conclusive.

2: The disturbing thing that keeps popping up in many of these as in Va Tech, Columbine, Paducah, where I represented the six parents of the three girls shot and killed, is that you can rehearse these types of massacres on simulators which are called video games. And you can therefore made more proficient in doing this.
Verdict: False
Evidence: Va Tech shooter Seung-Hui Cho only had a passing interest in gaming years before the shooter. A lawyer tried to draw a connection between the game Doom and Columbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, but that was tossed out by a federal judge. Paducah shooter Michael Carneal also played Doom, but that was found to not be connected to the shooting. Video game as murder simulator and training tool just doesn't hold any water.

3. The worst school shooting in history until Va Tech, was by Robert Steinhauser in Erfurt, Germany who trained on Counter-Strike Half Life. That's the game that Cho at Va Tech trained on in High School.
Verdict: Not exactly true
Evidence: While it is true that Steinhauser and Cho both played Counter-Strike at some point in their lives, with more than a million copies sold, that could probably be said of a lot of college students. Saying that Cho "trained on" the game is a bit of a stretch.

4. And um the effect, the affects the psychological affect of the shooter, plus his attire is suggestive of a couple of the games in which the "hero" wears this type of attire.
Verdict: Likely false
Evidence: The description by those present don't make it sound like he had a flat affect. One person said "It looked like a theatrical thing the way he walked onto the stage." Others described his behavior leading up to the shooting as erratic. Not surprising of a man who had recently been dumped by his girlfriend and had stopped taking his medication, possibly anti-depressants. Simply wearing black doesn't mean he was dressing up like the "hero" from Counter-Strike.

5: I lost my train of thought. I wrote a book...
Verdict: True
Evidence: Jack did indeed write a book, and I think he lost his train of thought about two decades ago.

Jack just got owned. Especially on that last one

[Deiparous]

meh, he didn't get "owned" he got disproven, this is far from an "owning"

[Gregory]

He is crazy. I suppose he blames his birth to TV.

[nathanlawliet]

Originally Posted by Nurta

meh, he didn't get "owned" he got disproven, this is far from an "owning"

Yeah, whatever. He got owned.

[Deiparous]

Originally Posted by nathanlawliet

Yeah, whatever. He got owned.

no not really, an 'owning' requires much more wit, that was too boring for an 'owning'

[Trogdor]

Originally Posted by Nurta

no not really, an 'owning' requires much more wit, that was too boring for an 'owning'

I agree but this was still good because i dislike Jack

[nathanlawliet]

Originally Posted by Nurta

no not really, an 'owning' requires much more wit, that was too boring for an 'owning'

I don't know man, people say someone got owned for the simplest things these days. The fifth thing was close enough to getting owned for me to say:

Jack got owned.

Plus, you can say he got owned since he got disproved so many times in that article.

[Deiparous]

Originally Posted by nathanlawliet

I don't know man, people say someone got owned for the simplest things these days. The fifth thing was close enough to getting owned for me to say:

Jack got owned.

Plus, you can say he got owned since he got disproved so many times in that article.

Just because it's popular doesn't make it right.

[EndUnknown]

Not "owned"
exposed yes, but not owned

[nathanlawliet]

Originally Posted by Nurta

Just because it's popular doesn't make it right.

Ohh but the article IS right. And he did get owned...

Let's just end this discussion, it's pointless.

[Deiparous]

Originally Posted by nathanlawliet

Ohh but the article IS right. And he did get owned...

no he did not

Let's just end this discussion, it's pointless.

as are you

[nathanlawliet]

Face it Nurta, he got owned whether you like it or not.