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'Games a bigger problem than guns' senator says

Lamar Alexander (R-Tennessee) says games "affect people"

Words: on January 30, 2013
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Not to be outdone by the Democratic senator who said violent games may have given the Sandy Hook shooter "false courage," a Republican senator from Tennessee said video games are actually a bigger problem than guns. Lamar Alexander's comments to MSNBC on the interplay of gun control and media violence were recorded by Daily Kos.


"I think video games is [sic] a bigger problem than guns, because video games affect people," Alexander said. "But the First Amendment limits what we can do about video games, and the Second Amendment to the Constitution limits what we can do about guns."

A senior elected representative of the U.S. government (who served as Secretary of Education from 1991 to 1993) believes video games affect people more than guns do, or at least that's what he tells national news outlets.

Guns seem pretty good at affecting people, at least judging by all the first-person shooters we've played.

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Topics:

Lamar Alexander, politics, violent games

63 comments

  • angelusdlion - February 1, 2013 6:04 p.m.

    Does this senator have any connection with the gun lobby at all?

  • zelta38 - February 1, 2013 5:15 a.m.

    So, the gun lobby saw people were actually learning that guns are dangerous so they found a scapegoat to distract the entire country while they continue with their firearm proliferation. And everyone is falling for it. Typical.

  • GrandmaSlayer - January 31, 2013 2:12 p.m.

    Ignorant senators are a bigger problem than both! what a backwards country

  • Unoriginal - January 31, 2013 11:15 a.m.

    Guns actually happen to affect people, Mr. Senator. It makes them dead. That's kinda major.

  • tahunua001 - January 31, 2013 2:04 p.m.

    you know what also 'makes people dead'? Knives, baseball bats, fireworks, car crashes, alcohol, tobacco, vitamins, water and a million other substances that can kill you if you use them incorrectly. who's calling for ban on those things?

  • FOZ - January 31, 2013 3:36 p.m.

    I think everyone is thoroughly tired of that fallacy. Knives are used in craftsmanship and cooking, baseball bats are for sports, fireworks are entertainment, car crashes are not an object and also not something that can be regulated, alcohol (recreational, of course) is a leisure activity, vitamins? What? And life can't exist on Earth without water, so good luck banning that. All of those objects were created for a practical application. Guns were created to and have primarily been used for, in literally millions of instances, killing.

  • Eightboll812 - January 31, 2013 7:30 p.m.

    Only a PETA member would say guns have no practical use other than killing. The rest of us rational people would say that killing animals isn't the same as killing humans. And killing in [true instances of] national defense is preferable to, let's say, being the French. I suppose sports like the biathlon also aren't "sports" but rather just killing targets. Not such a fallacy after all....

  • FOZ - January 31, 2013 10:01 p.m.

    Killing animals is still KILLING. It is an instrument intended to harm, you know, a weapon, unlike, say, alcohol, baseball bats, or uh, vitamins, apparently. Just because you can shoot something other than living beings with it, suddenly it has nothing to do with the very-deliberate and often legally-sanctioned deaths of millions of people? Alcohol is a substance, not an instrument of death (also bizarre to bring this up, because quite a few people do get in trouble for misuse of alcohol), cars are vital for transportation, you use a knife to cut your food. What practical application does a gun have around your house or for transporting you?

  • FOZ - January 31, 2013 10:04 p.m.

    And no, shooting targets or clay pigeons is not a "practical application" for guns because neither of those things serves any practical purpose.

  • Eightboll812 - January 31, 2013 10:50 p.m.

    Do you eat meat, or are you a vegetarian? Because if you eat meat, like the vast majority of everyone else in the world, then killing animals is a practical action, ergo, an instrument that is used to kill an animal is also a practical thing. Go eat your veggies, and quit sounding like a loon.

  • Eightboll812 - January 31, 2013 10:52 p.m.

    In your opinion.... Because the same argument could be made of sports and just about anything else that is strictly "entertainment" based. What practical value does playing a sport have, other than entertainment? Um, sort of like shooting a clay pidgeon. Hey, you picked the terminology, I'm just showing you how silly you sound.

  • Eightboll812 - January 31, 2013 11:18 p.m.

    because if you ask me, since you defend baseball and baseball bats as practical while condemning killing animals as not practical, I'd say that cutting down a tree to make a bat that is used to hit a ball of cork and wool covered in COWHIDE as far as you can and then running around bases on a field that has no other use than this "sport", in order to score "runs", isn't terribly practical as a use for those killed cows or the land it's played on either. But hey, you say it's practical... Where did the cowhide for the balls come from though, if it wasn't cows that were killed? Strange.

  • Garrett92 - February 1, 2013 12:59 a.m.

    HEY MAN. GET OUT OF PETA. PETA ARE BAD PEOPLE THAT DO LITERALLY KILL ANIMALS. Seriously, they kill a ton of animals and it is really bad. BUT STILL, YOU ARE A PETA MEMBER BECAUSE YOU DON'T LIKE GUNS. DONT YOU KNOW THE SECOND AMENDMENT?!?!?!

  • Garrett92 - February 1, 2013 1 a.m.

    And seriously, eat some meat. Be a real american. I mean, if you are from the US.

  • FOZ - February 1, 2013 11:55 a.m.

    Wow, I never knew we used guns to slaughter our livestock. Those farm animals are VICIOUS. You've really opened my eyes.

  • tahunua001 - February 1, 2013 2:21 p.m.

    "shooting targets or clay pigeons is not a "practical application" for guns because neither of those things serves any practical purpose." guns used in this manner serve just as much practical purpose as a tennis racket or baseball bat. to be perfectly blunt, sports as a whole serve no real purpose other than entertainment, a function that shooting clay pigeons serves very well to many circles. nobody questions the practicality of guns when they are used to shoot the tires out from under a criminals car or to end a hostage situation but when that criminal kills someone in cold blood all of the sudden 'guns are only able to take lives', got off your high horse. the argument that guns are not used in slaughter houses is irrelevant. I hunt. my method of killing a deer with a gun, dragging it home and butchering it myself is no different than you walking to the corner IGA and buying a cow that was butchered in house and slaughtered by someone else, I just cut out the middle men and use a more practical method of slaughter than trying to run up and use a pneumatic hammer to crush it's skull. if you eat meat, which I haven't heard you confirm or deny, then you are no less guilty of killing hundreds of animals as I am, whether you pay someone else to do it is irrelevant and the method that they use is irrelevant. my shotgun has just as much practical use as your PS3, I bet if you plugged it in and threw it in someones bath water that it would be just as deadly too, anything can be used as a weapon, regardless of it's original intended use, it's how the individual chooses to use it that matters.

  • FemJesse - February 1, 2013 3:06 p.m.

    "... neither of those things serves any practical purpose." IN YOUR OPINION. I happen to think shooting for sport is very fun and stress relieving. Do you enjoy video games? One could say "those things don't serve any practical purpose." I enjoy both activities. You don't have to pick sides. I'm against any politician that wants to restrict what I perceive as freedom. Go ahead, pick a side and be a hypocrite.

  • angelusdlion - February 1, 2013 6:04 p.m.

    Nobody, just like nobody is calling for a ban on pistols and shotguns, the two weapons even the NRA says is all you need for home defense. Nice try though.

  • angelusdlion - February 1, 2013 6:05 p.m.

    I'm not a PETA fan, but you're saying a tickle gun would work when you pulled it against someone who wants to harm you?

  • angelusdlion - February 1, 2013 6:06 p.m.

    Oh yes, and there's also skeet and other target shooting that harms nothing that's not clay.

Showing 1-20 of 63 comments

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