Video games blamed for the killing of Rhys Jones?

The suspects has not been identified yet and the motif has not been established by the police, but the unfortunate killing of 11 year old Everton fan Rhys Jones has resulted in certain quarters coming out to blame video games yet again.

In today's The Times' "Letters to the Editor" in which the headline was 'A nation brutalised by drugs and computers', a commentator from West Sussex wrote in reply to the clearly uninformed piece by Emma Majony that chastised the "violence depicted in PlayStation games freely available to children of all ages" claiming that with even reputable mainstream dailies reviewing video games, the battle against video games has been lost.

Video games are available to children of all ages only if their parents allow them to obtain it. It is the same case as television, films, music, books and magazines. And even then there is no clear evidence that video games (or indeed any forms of media, whether print of electronic) can act as a stimuli for violence.

And to Ms. Majony, your son kicked the shoe stand not because he was influenced by a crap Simpsons game, but because you did not teach him that it was wrong to kick a shoe stand.