Given that I'm on EBT and don't play video games, I'm going to challenge that characterization a little bit. But I'm a woman.
It's my understanding that video games play an important role in sustaining the mental health of some jobless and impoverished men. If you don't have to pay for your food because "Father Government" pays for it, you can put your limited cash that you scraped together from day labor into buying your next video game title. You can mow down hundreds of enemies in Call of Duty, or you can kill people in real life. We all know what the better option is.
Men want to work and provide for their families. That's how God made them. If they can't do it because of economic conditions, it's a source of rage for them. Where do you want them to put that rage? It has to go somewhere. The mischaracterization is that they want to play video games and not work, and there's not a man I know like that. Men want to work. People want to work. Everyone works at something, it's just a matter of getting society to approve of your passion and thus pay you fat money.
Likewise, I enjoy fighting. That's part of my wiring. If you're like me, you can go around threatening everyone and run yourself in and out of jail, or you can sign up for a marital arts class and go to the local chess tournament to play every once and awhile. We all know which is the better option. So I'm not looking down on the men who play video games. In fact, I'm probably too close to them and I like them way too much. I had to get a relationship to contain that emotion. It's frankly disturbing to realize that the person next to you will not only stand up for what they believe is right and fight you on that, but that they will actually like it. I don't know how to deal with that disturbance except to make what I believe very clear and adopt a soothing, gentle female voice to back down and comfort people when people blame me for being myself. I've learned to be okay with losing fights and also to assess whether a fight is worth starting, whether the other person will enjoy it as much as I do, and if it is worth taking the damage to the relationship for temporary enjoyment. Usually I end up forgoing such pleasure. Well, aside from select forum debates, chess matches, and thwacking martial arts dummies with sticks.
But I don't think that most people who commit political violence are like me, otherwise they would be using wiffle bats or staffs or fists instead of guns. A gun promises easy relief that a staff does not. A person who enjoys fighting wants to live to fight another day, and may even lose the fight for the privilege of survival. A person who wants relief will reach for the gun to stop the problem that they can't stand for another day.
My post was merely trying to address your dismissal of "crying for help" as a factor in these shootings. Admittedly that leads to an oversimplified and narrow view, and I will concede that there are other factors involved. I'm just trying to put the factor back on the table, as that factor is something I know about, both in my own life and the lives of others around me.
