Trump Discusses Violent Games in Wake of Stoneman Douglas
President Donald Trump met with video game industry leaders, members of congress and senate, and critics of video game violence in a private meeting yesterday to discuss video game violence in response to the school shooting in Florida last month.
The meeting included Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO), and Rep. Martha Roby (R-AL). Industry leaders included representatives from the Entertainment Software Association (ESA), the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), Take-Two Interactive, and ZeniMax Media. President Trump’s own brother, Robert Trump, serves on the corporate board of ZeniMax Media. (ZeniMax is the owner of the Doom franchise and wholly owns Bethesda, Arkane Studios, iD Software, and Battlecry Studios.) Other participants included known critics of video game violence such as Lt. Col Dave Grossman, author of “On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society,” Melissa Henson, Mother from Parents Television Council, and right-wing writer and activist Brent Bozell of Media Research Center. The meeting had no researchers on video game violence present.
The meeting is just one of a series of meetings Trump is hosting to discuss methods on how to stop mass shootings. Although Trump has displayed some surprising support for enforcing stronger background checks, the White House has walked back Trump’s comments since then. An NRA representative who spoke with Trump a day after Trump declared support for tougher gun regulation stated he had a positive meeting with Trump over gun control and he would retreat from enforcing gun regulation.
Although direct discussion of tackling gun regulation had, briefly, been considered seriously by President Trump, he hasn’t stalled on lobbying rhetoric at video games. The meeting Thursday was blocked off to media so knowing what happened during the meeting is difficult to ascertain. But critics of video games blaming the interactive media art for enabling troubled teenagers towards violence is an old argument. Video games, specifically Doom, gained media attention in 1999 after the Columbine High School shooting when two teenagers killed 12 students with semi-automatic weapons.
The meeting held yesterday isn’t the first of its kind. Former President Barack Obama held one five years ago hosted by the former Vice President Joe Biden in response to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. The meeting was part of a series of meetings on gun violence that touched on multiple avenues that may, or may not, contribute to gun violence. Biden admitted during the meeting that was no evidence that video games lead to real-life violence. However, the meeting wasn’t without its bumps. At one point he grew frustrated and slammed his fist on the table. Biden didn’t think he saw enough collaborative goodwill from the industry leaders in the room and proclaimed the industry had a “PR Problem.”
Data typically backing industry leaders is quite strong and was what lead Biden to his conclusion that there was no causality between games and violence. President Trump has been railing against video games for a few weeks now and the Office of Science and Technology Policy that provided the data and research for Biden prior to his meeting has been without senior leadership since Trump took office. It is unclear if President Trump was as well informed going into his meeting.
However, the evidence does not back the regular refrain that video game violence is an influencer on real-world violence. Many studies have been conducted on the subject, one as recently as last month by University of York with 3,000 participants. It concluded no link between video games and real-world violent actions. Some studies in the past have found some links between video games and an increase in aggressive behavior, but the evidence has always been insufficient in proving that a link exists extending video games to criminal violence and delinquency.
When the White House met with industry leaders last time, the discussion over video games and gun violence quickly dissipated in the following weeks after the talks ended. Some critics have already labeled President Trump’s meeting a farce and a scapegoat for tackling the guns used in gun violence. The days to follow will tell how serious President Trump is about violent video games.
