The Video Game Made Me Do It

Frivolous lawsuit of the week:

Victims Sue Take Two Interactive after 2 kids decide to emulate the game Grand Theft Auto.

Higher levels of intelligence have almost no practical money-making applications. It seems the best way to get cash is to be so utterly immune to logical, intelligent, and coherent thought processes that you even think this sort of lawsuit is a good idea.

Take Two should sue the parents of the braindead kids to recover anything they lose as a result of this lawsuit....

I don't which disgusts me more:

1. That the kids were so stupid they did this to begin with.
2. That someone thinks TTI is a fair target.
3. That there are so many lawyers out there with so few scruples to keep filing these types of lawsuits.

On point three.. not only are they trying to blame the wrong person for the events, they're capitilizing on the pain suffered by the victims in an attempt to make a name for themselves and a big wad of cash..... why don't GOOD lawyers ever get press?

Yea i dont know what those people are thinking, i've been running over hookers and taking back my money for years now and it has nothing to do with GTA

I agree that people that sue with idiotic reasons should be counter
-sued so no one else will try to be as stupid.


Case 1:
Two new York parents were suing McDonalds because there is fat
in their food and it made their kids fat!?!

Case 2: (this happened to the Tower owners that we rented space
from for our Wi-Fi)

A bunch of kids broke into a 20-foot fenced in tower area by
loosening the chain and sneaking through the fence. The kids
climbed up the 250 foot tower to the top without safety gear so
they could drink beer. The police caught them on the tower, red
handed. Two of the kids parents wanted to sue the tower
company because they endangered their ****ing children!!!

I think that these people should be executed! I am not joking when I say that!

Wise up! Stop being so ****ing lazy! An do what the rest of us do...
work for it!

I am sure that I am like a lot of you that have been plating video
games since the 70's. whether it was pong or the Atari 2600, And how
many of us started killing the aliens that were invading?

This is the same stupid argument about music and tv/movies causing
violence. Well...where were video games, tv/movies and music for the
'Civil' war? World war I or II? Do you think Hitler destroyed 20 million
Jews because he played Medal of Honor or something?

It's another example of not taking responsibility for your own actions, and putting the blame on others.

One of the problems with our legal system is the ease of which you can file a complaint in court. There is a very low requirement at the onset of the process. Only later are the merits questionable. And even then there are no penalties because the standard is so low.

This lets the scumbag attorneys file the complaints in the hopes that things will settle before anything real starts to happen. And because the costs of litigation are so high, most places settle to save $$. That only provides more incentive for friviolous suits.

Other countries force the loser to pay court costs, but that has it's own problems.

Here, you can file a countersuit to recover court costs if you can show that the suit had no merit to begin with.

I guess the problem is that, at some point in the process, somebody with some modicum of intelligence has to step forward and deflate the attention-grabbing lawyers, which rarely happens (Jack Thompson, the lawyer, has a long history of notoriously frivolous lawsuits - he's one of those people that just basically wastes oxygen and does nothing else).

Then, take a look at the ABC news article. "Did Video Game Drive Teens to Shootings" is the headline. I highly doubt it, but the negligence shown by ABC in an attempt to grab attention sure makes ME want to shoot someone over there. How the (*&%# do you get "driven" to shooting people by a bunch of pixels on your TV screen? Are they saying these two kids are so incredibly STUPID that they can't discern low brow entertainment from a lesson on acceptable behavior in modern society? Or, wait, more likely, are they so incredibly STUPID themselves that they have no clue what the merits of the case really are and they just want to work people into a frenzy and sell more adspace?

Besides.. to be "inspired" to do something, you have to already WANT to do it. How it could be TTI's fault that these children were mentally unbalanced to begin with is beyond me....

I think all lawyers should be used as test subjects for the first mission to Mars.... sans space suits.

There was a kid who listened to Ozzy's "Blizzard of Ozz" for the entire 24 hour period before he shot himself. On TV sometime later, Ozzy was questioned about the incident. He said "Any album that someone can listen to for 24 straight hours is a damn good album"

I vote for putting Ozzy in charge of civil suits claiming over $20 in this country. Each side gets one minute, then Ozzy tells you to piss off.

I second that!

The only problem with using Ozzy is that you can't understand a word he says. Unless he's singing it.

CTB,
Watch it, I'm an lawyer (among other things). I'll sue you because your avatar gave me nightmares and caused me lost sleep. Actually most attorneys believe suits like this are pretty ridiculous and damaging to the profession.

Attorney's like that are just like scumbag programmers that screw things up, or computer stores that rip people off, etc.

There's scum in every profession, unfortunately lawyers are on the newsworthy list and get a lot of attention.

Lawyer amoung other things....yeah, Law School is on that "In 5 years" list on my book. Took several Law classes in Germany about infromation Law and the EU, interesting stuff...

Anyway, on topic...

I have been playing rogue spear games now for several years, but my god, its never compelled me to go out and purchase an AR-15 or MP5SD and attempt a paramilitary/counter terrorism type event.

Now there are those out there that already suffer from mental conditions that leave them more adapt to being influanced by games, but those are rare folks and have an existing mental health problem.

One thing that just ticks me off to no end here in the US is the fact that NOBODY WANTS RESPONSIBLITY! I mean, if you child is acting strange, you need to pay attention and know what is going on.

I am one of those rare people that grew up with a stay at home mom, and guess what, I didn't get away with anything. And I am glad she didn't let me now. Then I saw the opposite spectrum of kids that got to do what ever and saw the trouble some of them got themselves into. Why nobody steps up and takes responsablity anymore until AFTER the fact is beyond me.

Bottom line, if your a parent, make sure you know what your kid(s) are doing!

When kids are involved it's always down to the parent. I am the same as kf, I had a stay at home mom and I never got away with anything, she was very strict with me and was always the first person to stand up and take responsibility for my mistakes as a child. At the time I hated her for it, but as kf did, I too saw the opposite side of the spectrum as I grew older and now I am thankful for the way I was brought up and I fully intend to bring my children up in the same manner.

The problem with all this lawsuit bs is that it is spreading, it started out in the US and hit the UK a while ago, we now get our fair share of stupid claims put through the system.

thedude -

I think jpenn has the creepiest avatar now.... mine's just campy, but his is really... weird!

Reminds me of other stupid things with the courts...

1. It's possible to go to jail longer for pot possesion than murder.
2. If you get drunk before you kill someone with your car, it's apparently not as bad as stabbing/shooting them.
3. If you have enough money you can crush "little people" by burying litigation under tons of paperwork until they go bankrupt.

And so on and so forth. It doesn't surprise me that lawyers like this disgust other people in their profession. Sort of like us and SCO, I suppose... they both don't do anything useful, have no point, but still get all the attention.

Ummmmm........

Young children go out and shoot people with a gun after playing a video game...

"The industry needs to cough up money so victims and their families can be compensated for their pain," attorney Thompson (from ABC)

"They need to stop pushing adult rated products to kids. These products are deadly." attorney Thompson (from ABC)

Which product is he talking about, guns or games?

No you idiot, Thompson. Video games are not deadly. GUNS are deadly!


"They told police they were emulating Grand Theft Auto on the night of June 25 when they took shotguns to Interstate 40" ABC

"The boys admitted they shot a rifle from a wooded hilltop overlooking a highway in June." IOL

"fired a .22-caliber rifle up to 25 times" slashdot

shotgun sounds best, rifle sounds better than a 22.

My question is;

Who allows children as young as 13 unsupervised access to GUNS!
Why does no one ask this question?
Why not take on the state or the NRA?

The GUN is the problem not the game!

You will not find any teenagers in Australia going on 'rampages' because they can't get hold of the GUNS!



Could this have happened if the gun was securely locked away or had a trigger lock?
But that would impinge on your rights to form an armed militia (should you so feel the need to overthrow the state).

thanks for the handy hint! i'll be sure to polish off a few bottles of henny next time i want to kill someone. i'll also be sure to have your post tattooed to my forehead so they know who to sue after!