19 Apr 06 Russian Lawmaker Blames Surge in Racism on Computer Games
A member of the Russian State Duma has blamed computer games and the Internet for the rise in violent crime in Russia, especially for the sharp surge in racist attacks and killings.
The Rosbalt news agency quoted Alexander Gurov, a member of the parliamentary security commission as saying that the Russian crime rate has risen to become the highest in the world, with 21 murders per 100 thousand population committed in 2005.
“The spread of violence into all the pores of social life is evident,” Gurov said. “The Internet is awash with violence and computer games have gangsters and killers, Nazis and Japanese militarists as main characters,” he said.
The MP said that the spread of such information technologies was one of the causes of the rise of nationalist and extremist tendencies in Russian society.
“In Russia, only games where the Nazis always lose should be available, but so far the opposite is happening,” Gurov said.
Yes, if only the games had Nazis losing all the time then the murder rate would be lower. Could it possibly be that people playing these video games are well, too busy playing games to kill anyone? Especially if they are playing a game like Civilization 4. Russia’s social problems run much deeper than video games.
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