The NRA and the Video Game Violence Red Herring

According to the NRA, the problem of firearm violence has nothing to do with firearms, and everything to do with everything else.  I can't blame them, it would be problematic for them to say that to curb firearm related violence, guns should be targeted rather than assault weapons, as I am guessing the gun industry sells many more guns than it does assault weapons.

In previous years they often successfully shifted the discussion away from firearms and to Hollywood, or video games.  In the past this was partially successful because at the time the people playing video games were mostly young males (usually introverted). 

Just as the race, age and gender demographics of the country has shifted under the GOPs feet, so has the demographics of video game players shifted under the NRAs feet.  The problem they face is that most adults have now played many of these games, they have played them with their kids and by themselves.  It is now much harder to portray people who play these games as 'the other'.

 I won't post most of the statistics as many before me (10 country comparison suggests little or no link between video games and gun murders, Gaming Audience getting older and slightly more female, Myths about video games and violence (PBS.org)), have done a pretty good job of this.  But it is pretty clear, that most research shows little correlation between video games and violence, with a few exceptions here and there.

For example even as violent crimes have dropped over the years the number of games played, bought and the types of people playing these games have increased dramatically.

(This is not my graph if found it here)

At the same time, there is the inescapable fact that nobody yet (that I know of) had been killed by video games, while many people (regardless of the reason) have been killed by firearms.  

 And yes I will post this graph again, because it is important as most people (and most children) are killed with handguns, not with assault rifles, normal rifles, or anything else.

Actually I agree with the NRA on one point, the answer to the problem is much more complex than just getting rid of guns, guns might be lethal weapons, but someone has to shoot them and if we could figure out how to prevent people from trying to kill others, then everyone NRA included would be happy.

Would it not be amazing if there was a march on DC of all the parents and families in the US who have lost their kids to violence?  All of them holding pictures of their kids (our kids) to remind us of the real magnitude of gun violence and violence in general?  Perhaps we should also add the parents and families of all the kids who have lost their kids to suicide (yes firearms play quite a role here as well).

So we are probably going to get stricter gun laws, but they won't matter because they will target the 'wrong' guns, and they won't remove from circulation all the assault style weapons obtained legally.  This means that kids in the inner cities will continue to die, because the real problems that cause violence in general, and gun violence specifically will not be addressed.