Feinstein: Congress will have to step in if games don't stop glorifying big guns

XMNR: California Senator Dianne Feinstein is currently pushing federal gun control legislation in the U.S. Congress which has become a hot topic since the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings last December. The senator had some words of warning for the video game industry though during an appearance before the Commonwealth Club on Wednesday.

[cl1983]

Time to remove Feinstein from office.

[sengoku]

it's not that simple, having little kids being killed by other kids is says something about the community these kid grew up in.

i agree it's not movies or games or guns that caused this kind of behavior, but trying to clean up this mess will require some hard measures and if no new gun laws can be passed then the there might be the need for movies and games laws to pas.

because the amount of guns available there glorification combined with these games and movies amongst a lot of other things is whats causing these sick kids to act like this.

it's like drinking and driving.
done separately it's good wholesome fun nothing wrong with it.
it's doing the two in combination is what kills people!!

[Themba76]

I think it's pretty ignorant to say guns in videogames causes violence Iv'e been gaming for 30 yrs now and 90% of the games Iv'e played through those years have been very violent. I also watch nothing but horror movies.
so by your case or should I say theory I should be the most violent human being on the face of the earth. I should have killed over a thousand people by now.

[sengoku]

nope, thats what you read from it.
thats not what i said.

[Jobesy]

It's our politically correct society that is to blame. There used to be a time when we culled the mentally ill from the herd, now we just turn our heads and hope not to offend anyone by saying Timmy( or Adam) is not like the other kids, he needs help. But no, lets ban guns and violent video games/movies instead. Punish the majority because of the few.

[Donnieboi]

Is this still America?

[Mr Blings]

It is the Parent who is responsible to take 5 minutes to go into the settings and censor what they allow their children to play and watch on not only consoles but the internet and T.V.....Not the Governments.

[Ser]

Feinstein needs to step out.

Stop trying to mess with people's freedoms.

[Rusty515]

I'll have to step in if congress doesn't back the hell away from my games.

[knifefight]

Big guns are in games because of the culture, not in the culture because of games.

[showtimefolks]

Yeh congress do that I like to see someone try because they are so scared of loosing elections they don't want to mess up anything lol

Stop blaming the gaming industry for this world issues, 99.9% of us are actual gamers who play for fun and aren't looking to kill or hurt people, it's the .1% that makes everyone look bad and that .1% exist in our society whether it comes to gaming or any ther entrainment or religion

If parents aren't monitoring what their minors are p,ain't or watching than how is it entertainment's fault?

[nan0]

Now you know how gun owners feel.

Millions of owners have positive experiences with guns daily. People who don't have guns in their lives have 0 experience with them, but every once in a while the TV says "oh something bad happened, but every day for the past years millions of gun owners have been perfectly fine" so they associate that limited vicarious experience with guns in an absolute sense and thus, push guns further away increasing the circular fear and feeding the people who intend harm to have unarmed victims.

Becoming a victim is never superior, especially if you bow to tyrants.

[Megaplaynate]

Except a game owner can't kill someone with the game. I'm not against people owning a weapon yet I don't see the need to have an assault rifles or shotguns.

[Ser]

@Megaplaynate

It's the same reason why we're allowed to carry handguns. It's called the Second Amendment.

You can kill people with handguns and rifles just as easily as you can with shotguns and assault rifles.

Technically speaking, you could kill someone with a video game. Take the disc, break it in two, and proceed to stab your victim of choice through the eye sockets. The item doesn't kill the person, the person using the item does. Shall we ban all the crazy people?

[LightofDarkness]

@ser

That's not exactly true, now is it. There's a reason why the US Army don't storm strongholds with handguns, isn't there? Assault weapons are built purely for just that: assaults. They exist to be used in situations where superior firepower makes all the difference, and they are simply overkill when applied to any other situation. You won't be going hunting with a M4A1, let's be honest. You're also incredibly unlikely to just have it in your enormous back pocket at the bank right when a heist kicks off. And having a shotgun in your home is more than enough to protect you from armed invaders.

I don't mind people having guns to hunt or engage in sporting activities, but holding on to them as a "just in case I need to kill a guy" measure is a big part of the problem. It shows a willingness to go there; a foregone conclusion that you will end a life simply because the power is available and in your hands with minimum effort. Point and click, "press 'X' to win" style.

It takes significantly more hate and will to murder someone with your bare hands or with a sharp/blunt object. You're not likely to kill someone in your first strike, so you have to strike repeatedly in sustained rage, and use all of your physical exertion to do it in many cases. You basically give people the chance (more time) to snap out of it and rationalize what they're doing before they do something everyone will regret. Not to mention, gunshot wounds are often far more life threatening than slash/stab wounds and blunt force trauma.

[Ser]

@LightofDarkness

If someone were to ever harm my family, you'd better believe that I'll be shooting to kill. Defending your life is legal if you're assaulted. Assaulting someone with deadly intent? That's illegal and punishable by cold steel.

I own an 870 shotgun, an M4A1, a glock 19, a vintage M1911, a modern M1911, an M40 sniper rifle, and an M14. Some are for hunting, some are for taking to the range, and some are for "just in case I need to kill a guy". I have trained with all of these guns, and am licensed to own them. I have a clean record, and I've never been in trouble with the law. I am not the problem in society, the criminals are.

My firearms will not be taken away from me just because a few bleeders cry foul when a psychopath finds daddy's rifles. Every person that purchases a firearm should be required to be checked out by a psychiatrist.

Firearms, knives, blunt instruments, my fists - whatever it takes to kill someone. If there's killing needs to be done, the human being will find a way, with or without firearms. Is it easier to kill with firearms? Of course. Would not having firearms stop the killing? No, absolutely not. Go and ask Chicago if you find this hard to believe.

Let's agree to disagree, though. Because we both think we're right and neither of us are going to budge on this subject. You people fail to realize why law abiding citizens carry firearms. They're for lethal defense against a lethal assault. If someone in that theater or school would've had a firearm, the shooter would've been dropped as soon as shots were fired. Fight fire with fire.

[Rooted_Dust]

@LightofDarkness

You're confusing Assault Rifles with Assault Weapons. One is an actual type of firearm and the other is a coined name designed to confuse people.

Assault Rifles are fully-automatic firearms that you can't simply walk into a store and purchase. There is a years worth of paperwork to go through and they are extremely cost prohibitive.

An assault weapon is anything that looks scary, uses a box magazine, yet operates no different than any other semi-automatic firearm. The Politicians looking to ban these guns benefit from the fact that people think they're machine guns.

Also no law abiding person carries a gun because they want to kill someone. They carry them because someone may try to kill them, and you should be able to meet force with force.

[cl1983]

@LightofDarkness

You are severely misinformed. The military and police swat teams us automatic riffles and sub machine guns. The supposed assault weapons that people are trying to regulate are semi automatic riffles and some pistols. A semi automatic only fire a single round for every time the trigger is pulled.

[GamersRulz]

Hello America, North Korea is about to declare war. Leave Video games alone and solve that s**t

[Quelqui]

Sigh. Always blaming video games. Doesn't all of the entertainment industries glorify gun violence in some way nowadays? Just think about the last action movie you saw recently. I can also think of a lot of books and music with gun violence. I just figured it was a reflection of our culture. Why do they expect video games to be the first to move away from gun violence when entertainment from that very thing is so prevalent in our culture?

[rezzah]

Those who glorify big guns are those who speak against it.

[Ricdog]

I swear if we werent in the 21st century that jew of Feinstein would have been hanged long ago.

[humleren]

American politicians are seriously retarded... damn. I suppose this retard can't read, because it was his damn brother who played videogames - not the shooter. And even if he did, the kid was nuts. He would have done it either way. I play loads of violent videogames, and i never killed anybody, never wanted to. And i would not like to even own a gun. I'm really glad i live in a country, where it's not even a possibility for normal people to own assault rifles.

[Ser]

Wow, that must suck for the firearm enthusiasts in your country. I bet they hate being told what they can and can't own like children.

[GreenRanger]

Go ahead and ban violent games and guns.
Then you'll see that the crazy people will just find some other way to commit murder.
Blaming games is stupid.
There have been countless acts of genocide and mass murders in the history of mankind, and those people who committed those disgusting acts didn't have games, or guns, for the most part.

[C4BL3]

does anyone remember the wild west? No video games or movies then. The fact is no one in congress wants to solve issues. Heck I doubt most of them understand the issues.

Americans need to understand that these people work for US. WE are their bosses. At what point do you as a supervisor let your subordinates tell you what to do. hat's like telling your child they can have candy and then them telling you that you aren't allowed.

With our tax money we allow the Armed Forces to have the large weapons they have but somehow we are not allowing ourselves to have them.

It is always funny that the 1st amendment can apply to Twitter, FB, or any other social media but the 2nd only applies to muzzle loaders.

Fact is WE allow these despots to control us because again we vote and pay them to do so. WE need to wake up

Sorry for the wall

[refocusedman]

So let me get thus straight; you want to ban big guns in video games but u don't want to ban large capicity clips and large automatic weapons on the street. Lol lol ok

[goldwyncq]

America: The only country that sees video games as a threat more than guns.

[thebudgetgamer]

I think you should tell her how you feel about this.
https://www.facebook.com/Di...

[Ogygian]

What she says: "stop glorifying the use of "big, powerful guns" or else Congress might have to step in and do something about it"

What she means: Despite evidence to the contrary, video games scare me, and I feel that because I'm scared by them, I'm going to try and get my friends to help me ban freedom of expression in video games so that I can sleep safety at night. I know better than all of you because I'm a senator, representing the people (I may have been elected on a different platform but meh, I'm in power now so I can do what I want) and so I'm going to exert my will upon you all.

Why she's saying this now: She saw a Call of Duty advert on television and almost had a heart attack.

I don't think games cause gun crime. That's an absurdly stupid idea; gun crime is caused by psychopaths being able to buy guns, and so IF gun crime is a problem, then controls simply need to be tightened so maniacs can't actually acquire guns to begin with.

[danthebios]

i use to game on the atari,sega genesis,ps1,2 and 3 and really what i see games now seems violent.When playing tomb raider remember that head shot scene?!But i have to admit tomb raider was fun but you know what i mean.I just hope parents do their duty and watch what their kids are playing coz seriously i wont want my kids to play games like that.

[Scorpio018]

This horse has been dead for so long now that people are simply beating bare bones at this point.

Every other medium has guns or excessive violence portrayed in them, and yet people have been going off the deep end and doing heinous things for times long before these mediums existed.

TL;DR: Games =/= Violence. Stop being ignorant of the faults of the human condition.

[mydyingparadiselost]

If I remember correctly the world has been a much more violent place than it is now without all the game and movie violence. If Congress is incapable of passing gun reform then Congress needs to look at itself as the problem instead of saying 'Oh well, lets go after entertainment next!'.

[Scorpio018]

Yeah, but that would imply that they have the intelligence required to make that assessment of themselves. :P

[ShaunCameron]

This is really more a war on men than a war on either guns or video games. Video games = men's past-time. Guns = men's ability to defend himself. And this is yet another attempt by feminists and the government to keep men under control.