EDITORIAL — Not just the games

After another school shooting, this time in the Ateneo de Zamboanga University, where one student killed another before taking his own life, fingers are again quick to point to violent video games, blaming them for causing recent violent behavior among youths that many of us don’t fully understand yet.

In fact, Department of the Interior and Local Government Secretary Jonvic Remulla last Wednesday urged Congress to regulate children's use of games that allow them to act like a shooter. He added that such platforms could be used to "radicalize" youngsters.

"I call upon Congress again to help us control and curb the use of first-person shooter games that influence these young minds," Remulla said at a press conference.

We understand how it is; people want answers quick. They want someone or something to blame for this sudden rash of violent behavior among students. Of course, it’s understandable for violent games to become a convenient scapegoat.

However, we think Remulla and those who are quick to blame violent video games are oversimplifying it a bit.

This young generation now wasn’t the first to play violent video games. That distinction goes to the previous ones before it that were introduced to classic first-person shooter games like Doom, Quake, and the ever-popular Counter-Strike, among others.

However, we don’t have any school shooters belonging to that particular generation of gamers. We don’t remember anyone become radicalized because of playing shooting games.

So we don’t think that violent video games alone lead children down this very dark and violent path, or that banning their access to it will solve the problem.

As with anything else complex, we think the decision to grab a gun and start shooting others in school was influenced by many factors and influences that were present as well as absent.

But, to be on the safe side, sure, why not try and ban violent video games for those of a certain age and see what that does? It might seem like that solution may work for a while --until the next unfortunate incident, that is.