That's Not Why

I'm going to make this brief because I had thought that we had already gone past this. Apparently not. Remember last summer when some lunatic in Norway went on a rampage and shot and killed 77 people? He was a most prolific lunatic indeed. Now he's in a Norwegian court (whatever that means) and this is the crap that he's pulling. Behold!

In case you can't read that (and have forgotten how to click to make the pretty pictures bigger) the caption on the left reads: Killer Breivik trained on video games for massacre. Anders Behring Breivik, who admits killing 77 people in Norway last summer, tells a court he used a video game to train for the shooting spree on the island of Utoya. (Wasn't Utoya Michael Jackson's sister? No, wait. That was LaToya. Honest mistake. Never mind.) And the asinine caption on the right reads "Anders Behring Breivik posted details of the murderous intentions online before last year's Norway massacre. Andrew Keen questions whether the internet, social media and video games encourage his actions." Aaaaarrrrggghhhh!

Do people really think that playing video games can lead them to kill 77 people? Really? Why would that be? Because there's killing in video games? And since there's killing in video games then that would influence someone to kill in real life? Well, in order for that to be true, wouldn't one have to look at the overall influence of video games as a whole in order to determine their effect (if any) on human behaviors? It wouldn't just be the violent stuff that influences people, right? It would be the non-violent stuff as well, wouldn't it? I don't see how you could argue a theory about video game violence encouraging violent behaviors without seeing if the video game influence encouraged other behaviors as well.

Seriously, if video games were that influential over people wouldn't the majority of people on Facebook be farmers right now? Do you know how many times Farmville has been installed? Over 110 million times. Over 63 million people dink around with that ridiculously annoying game every month. 32 million people waste time with that game every single day. Where are ALL THE FARMERS?!

Let me explain something that, if you're reading this blog, you probably already know. Sometimes, the most likely explanation for something is also the easiest explanation. I guess people don't like easy very much because those explanations almost never come up. In the case of this nutjob in Norway, I'll explain to you exactly what happened. And I'm going to try not to get all technical so that I'm easily understood. Stop me if I go too fast or there's something confusing about this. Ready? Here goes...Some people are just freaking crazy.

That's it! That's all there is. Simple enough? You'd think that it would be. But I guess that the news outlets wouldn't get enough ratings if they reported the news like: "Today in Norway, a man killed 77 innocent people. Some folks are just freaking crazy. Now we go to Bob with the weather. Bob..." I'm sorry that sometimes crazy people get in the way of not crazy people. But it happens. And it certainly isn't going to do any good to blame video games for the aforementioned craziness, all right? Video games didn't make that guy kill all of those people. He just did. And I'm sorry that it happened, but not so sorry that I'm going to start feeding into BS theories that have absolutely no basis in fact. Now for the weather...

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The Force Doesn't Dance

I have a little blasphemy for you today. See, apparently, a new Star Wars video game came out for the XBox360 Kinect. Kinect is the thing where you don't have to use a controller and can essentially just flail about to get your character to move and do things. Well, in this game, I guess you're Han Solo. And the things that it has you do are not anything that Han Solo would ever do! That's right. He dances.

I...I...I really don't know what to say. And while it's funny, it just makes me too darn sad to actually laugh. (Also, it kind of has a tune that is similar to Jimmy Kimmel's spoof "I'm F***ing Ben Affleck" in parts. A little tidbit that you might notice makes it even sadder AND even funnier, especially when the words "GREAT" or "AWESOME" come pulsating out of Han's crotch.) Here you go. Don't say I didn't warn you. As always, if it doesn't load, click here.

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California Extreme 2011

Look, I know that I almost never post anything about myself (because that's not what this is for). And this is pretty much not really an exception to that. See, yesterday and until 2 this morning, I was down at the Hyatt hotel in Santa Clara at something called California Extreme. It's a video game and pinball show where there are hundreds of arcade games and pinball machines all set to free play. That is how I spent my day, my night and my early morning yesterday. Today shall be no exception. It's two days and it's once a year and I must be there. So in lieu of a real post (but this still counts as a post, so my "post every single day" streak is still in tact!), how about some cell phone quality pictures of my nerd fest?

Here we have an Addams Family pinball machine hooked up to some sort of exercise-ish bike. From what I could tell, if you wanted to play, you had to pedal! Yes, it's quirky, but who the heck wants to exercise when they're playing video games. Lethargy is implied!

Here is a very, VERY small section of the floor. Multiply this by about twenty and you'll be close to imagining how many games were there.

Long live GORF.

And the game that (kind of) started it all, PONG:

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Then What WAS The Motivation?

If you're on a quest to find who is possibly the world's worst psychiatrist (or minimally, the least observant psychiatrist), stop right now. Have I got a lead for you.

Let's go to Waterloo, Iowa and learn from the fine, fine reporting of KCRG. That's how we learn about the misdoings of a one fifty-three year-old (and obviously old enough to know better) Larry Twigg. Mr. Twigg, who is a former teacher, was arrested in February 2010 after being accused "...of having a 17-year-old student shower in chocolate syrup and play strip video games". Let's just stop right there for a minute, shall we?

I don't even think that I know what the majority of that sentence even means. You can "shower" in chocolate syrup? Like...through a shower head? A squirt bottle? It's a rather thick substance. How do you shower in it? Is that just a metaphor and they really meant just "pouring"? I don't know, but I can't spend too much time on that because I'm really scratching my head over "strip video games". What the what? I fancy myself a video game enthusiast. A connoisseur if you will. But I am rather unfamiliar with the strip video game arena. And really, while I thoroughly enjoy video games and I thoroughly enjoy what can come from stripping, the two really don't go together. How can you concentrate on both of them at the same time? You can't! They both deserve your utmost attention and probably should not even be combined.

But back to the issue at hand. So, this guy gets arrested for, in short, being a weirdo. Now he's trying to have the case dismissed because in Iowa the "...law says the offense requires that the act is done to arouse or satisfy a sexual desire." No problem, right? Wrong. See, that's because "...the psychiatrist hired by the state will offer an opinion that Twigg's acts weren't sexually motivated." Wait. What now?

Correct. You have as much information as I do. Showering at 17-year old with chocolate syrup and playing strip video games is not motivated by the need to satisfy a sexual desire. To which I must ask the seemingly obvious question: How so? That seems to be the only thing that would be motivating this sort of activity. What else could it be? A love for chocolate syrup? A fondness for the suspense filled moments of who is going to have to remove an article of clothing following a loss after an exhilarating round of Mario Kart? Could it be either of those things? Technically? Yes. Was it either of those things? Hell no.

This psychiatrist hired by the state...is on glue? I'm dying to know what in the world he thinks was the motivation behind this very, very odd, odd behavior. I would expect this sort of lunacy from a psychiatrist hired by the defense, but this guy was hired by the state. I don't get it. I really don't. But I'm open to hearing an explanation. In fact, I look forward to it. In the meantime, I'm going to go play some video games with all of my clothes on and without a drop of chocolate syrup in sight. Boring, perhaps. But legal and totally explainable.

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She's a Wii Bit Nuts

I just have one thing, real quickly, about the OctoMom who is now, apparently (allegedly) receiving or has received death threats. (Insert shocking gasps here.)

Let's just remember that usually when the "Death Threat" card is played, it's usually because the individual on said receiving end has been so raked over the coals in the media that by the time the "Death Threat" card is played (and it sounds like great fun! Someone should really invent a game where there is a "Death Threat"card.), it's pretty much the only thing that will cause some people to rethink their position (which usually doesn't need to be re-thought to begin with). They'll start to think something along the lines of, "Oh, well, I thought she was an idiot and irresponsible and crazy and wants to look like Brangelina over there, but death threats?! Well, that's out of line. Maybe we've all gone too far and should just leave her alone for a while and let her collect her thoughts or something." Whatever.

I'm going to suggest holding off any judgment that might let OctoMom off the hook. There is very little that I have read that would indicate in any way at all that these "death threats" are either a) real or b) something to be concerned about. For starters, the number of death threats started off at a couple. It suddenly became 500. I would have almost believed her if she had left it at a few. That's because there are a few nutjobs out there that would actually take time out of their nutjob schedule to send a death threat. But 500? Even nutjobs are lazy. There aren't 500 out there willing to write. There just aren't.

But let's see how worried OctoMom really is about these "death threats", shall we? AND as a BONUS, let's see just how worried OctoMom is about her finances as well. (In case you missed it, OctoMom has 14 children and no job and no source of income. Yep, that's quite the pickle there.) Here we go....According to the NY Daily News, here's OctoMom on Friday, February 13, shopping for Wii video games. Behold!

OK, as a California taxpayer, I am unaware of the clause in my agreement to pay for her video games. Actually, my sales tax just got hiked up another 1 percent (which makes it a lovely 9.25 in this county now. Joy.) because the state is $40 billion in debt. Did I mention that she receives disability benefits from the government? She does. Lots. So she's really part of my problem right now. See, if she can afford video games (when she still has no job and also still has fourteen children) then I'd like her to stop taking money from the state so that I can someday go back to paying a normal amount of sales freaking tax!

Aside from her spending money which I can't even delve further into at this moment, lest I have a coronary, she doesn't seem to be all that concerned about Death-y McThreats-a-Lot if she's out in public. Clearly, the majority of people in this country would recognize her if they saw her and I'd think that the majority of that majority, while not threatening her with death, might have some rather harsh words if they bumped into her. If I saw her buying video games, she'd find herself suddenly in the middle of a rather rapid-fire interview/interrogation session given by me. "I take it you're buying video games because you've already paid the state back for all that you've received from them, correct?' Yeah, it wouldn't be pretty. But my point is that she doesn't seem worried about it. If I were her, I wouldn't be showing my face in public until my last kid was 18 and even then I'd think it over.

But she doesn't seem to be a real honest sort, from what I can tell. Everything seems to be rather inflammatory with her. Everything is either better than it really is or worse than it really is. Here's what she said to The Sun over there in the UK: "There were letters and emails saying we deserved to die. There were protesters in front of my house. There are mentally disturbed people in the world.” Yes. There ARE mentally disturbed people in the world. You're one of them! How do I know? Here are the "protesters" that were in front of your house. Behold!

That would be a one Ulysses Gutierrez. That's it. Just him. And a photographer, but the photographer had no sign. You know, he doesn't really seem mentally disturbed in that photo. His sign indicates that he is not happy about her situation. He, himself, does not look particularly angry. But given that he's standing out in front of her house with a sign, I'm guessing he is rather angry. I know the feeling, dude. Good for you!

So, please, don't stop judging just yet. I'm sure there will be plenty more to come out and be judged by everyone quite soon! And judging isn't always a bad thing, you know. See, it's the "not judging" that might have contributed to enabling her to end up with fourteen children who are all under the age of 8 by the time that she is 33. I definitely would have liked to have had a little judging in place then!

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