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Aaron Alexis, PTSD, mass shootings, mental illness and video games: the real...
As more details emerge about Aaron Alexis, the gunman in yesterday’s Washington D.C. navy yard shooting that left 13 people — including Alexis — dead, many news outlets have been focusing on claims...
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Tom Bissell on GTAV: ‘Play is hardly ever valued’
If you haven’t been living in a bomb shelter, you probably know by now that Rockstar Games released the latest installment in its Grand Theft Auto series this fall. Like its predecessors, it’s an...
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New book, “The Columbine Effect,” Dec. 1
I have big news! My new book, “The Columbine Effect: How five teen pastimes got caught in the crossfire and why teens are taking them back,” will be released Dec. 1. Those pastimes — violent video...
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Should war video games be more humanitarian?
A few weeks ago, an unusual Red Cross effort caught my eye. A special unit in the agency has been working with video-game developers to create in-game scenarios where players face consequences for...
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Dorkly Comic: “Parental Guidance”& games
I don’t normally post cartoons like this without comment, but this so perfectly echoes the message of my blog, I couldn’t resist. Comic by Julia LePetit and Andrew Bridgman of Dorkly.
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Books, violent games and the bias of brain science
Photo by Flickr user bucaorg. A new study into how reading fiction and literature affects our brains is finding that — gasp! — it changes our brains! More specifically: “The neural changes that we...
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Throwback Thursday: The Comic Book Panic
Every decade or so, we seem to have a cultural panic about something teens are into. These days, it’s violent video games, but that was far from the first target. Before that, it was heavy metal and...
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On Adam Lanza and That “School Shooting” Game
Much has been made of the supposed connections between Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza’s horrific crimes and his love of video games which, a state investigation revealed, not only resembled the gaming...
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Interview With Adam Lanza’s Father Makes Clear: We Need a New Approach to...
I’ve been thinking a lot about this interview with Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter Adam Lanza’s father, Peter Lanza, since it ran in the New Yorker a couple of weeks ago. I read about it before I...
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On Politicians and Villains, Real and Imaginary
There’s been quite the kerfuffle the past day or so about Florida U.S. Congressional candidate Jake Rush, a 35-year-old Republican who also apparently plays Camarilla, a live-action vampire...
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On Free Speech, Silence, And Backward Messages
Sometime over the holidays, I dreamed that I started blogging here regularly again, but focusing only on music. In a way, it makes a kind of sense; I’m not a gamer or an occultist, but I do love,...
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