Lack of video games incites teen to violence, says teen's grandmother
A 17 year old boy shot in the thigh by a state trooper after he attempted to choke his grandmother was apparently in a rage because his grandmother had taken away his "violent games". As is usual with the mainstream and local media, the report in Today's THV links the violence to video games in the first paragraph yet offers no explanation for the boy's extreme reaction to his grandmother's ban. When normal kids have their games taken away, they usually don't attempt to kill the enforcer. Wikipedia's entry on rage tells us that contributors to irritability can "include fatigue, hunger, being in pain, sexual frustration, recovery from an illness, or the use of certain drugs." We wouldn't be surprised to find one or more of these factors was a greater influence on the boy's behavior.
From my vantage point of the gun restricted UK, I'm shocked that the state trooper found himself with no choice other than to shoot the boy. With another fatal accident occurring only a few days earlier (a trooper shot and killed a mentally and physically handicapped man after mistaking him for a fugitive from Michigan) analysis of the trooper's actions shouldn't have been left to the single line: "the shooting is under investigation."
[Image credit: Rob Rogers. Thanks, striegs]
