This is the 90's version of the famous Twinkie defense from the 70's where it was argued that a kid who gorged on Twinkies was so full of sugar it made him commit criminal acts. The kids perpetrating the high school massacre never used the above type of phrase since they were dead. They never wrote it anywhere either, but some inspired individual assumed that they would have if they could.

It seems a lot of things are assumed these days and reported as fact. I believe that games and simulations relieve stress and anger and do not fuel them. Sure, if you create a Manchurian Candidate atmosphere you could probably alter someone's thinking through mental torture using a game. But playing games/sims every day for extended periods won't do it. That's what we all do!

IT'S NOT MY FAULT

The other contention is that the Internet was a factor in the "war page" of these felons. Yes, let's discount all the good that is out there and focus on the bad. The fact that pipe-bomb-making instructions are on the web is the same argument used by previous anti freedom of press individuals.

In the 60's it was books in print that described the structure of atomic bombs that worried certain people. I read a book by one of Fidel Castro's mentors revealing the formula for Molotov cocktails. By the way, you use 1/3 oil and 2/3 gasoline. He mentions other explosive brews too. Gee, acquiring that knowledge didn't force me to make a bomb.

Should little flashing lights activate in some Gestapo-style bureau when anyone goes to web sites deemed questionable, as your name and life history scrolls onto some CRT in a dingy cubicle of the Safety Police? Who should police the internet? Should it be policed?

And let's not forget the demon firearm as the cause of the high school massacre. Never mind that they obtained them illegally as other perpetrators of similar crimes have done. No waiting period would have helped since the killing was planned for a year. And the guns were not assault-style weapons; the shotgun was made illegal by cutting the barrel off.

The fact that firearms simply exist in the U.S.A. has certain people gnashing their teeth in dread that the Utopian society they picture in their mind's eye cannot flourish. I purchased a Glock 17 and a Colt Python within the calendar month of April. I have yet to fire either. Certain factions want to limit what I want to buy in a month. Should I be scrutinized? Are games next?

Even if a game is labeled "adult," isn't a high school Senior at eighteen years of age adult enough to make the purchase alone? Oh yeah, dark music forces people to commit criminal acts, like the kid who committed suicide after listening to Ozzie Ozborne music for hours on end. Why blame him? With all due sarcasm, did Ozzie raise that boy? And musically, some of the darkest, most depressing and violent rhythms I've ever heard were timeless classical pieces.

Everyone with good sense knows that there is much more to it than the above trivia. If a profile existed, with these things pointing to a probable felon, then I'm on the list. Many of you are too. I've been messing with computers for a decade and have been seriously into flight simulations since 1991, having spent countless hours in them on a daily basis. I learned safe firearm handling and have what the news media would call "a small arsenal."

Of course "arsenal" has no number defining it in the Webster sense. Today it is a buzzword. When does a lifetime collection become an arsenal? I own recorded music of all types; is that an arsenal? I have a huge library of aviation, history and war. I find wonderful things on the web. Some would say COMBATSIM.COM™ glorifies the violence of combat, I suppose. And one last item that hasn't been a factor in most of the lunacy of the multiple murders yet, I like high performance cars. I can see it now, "the Lamborghini murders!" 18 WHEELER AT 12 O'CLOCK HIGH

I have countless times been mentally battered in the Los Angeles traffic in a manner that no sim could match. I've been cut off, flipped off, and pissed off. But I get home and into my virtual world and start thumping on enemy bombers. Sure, I've said I'd like to have a MK 103 30mm from an Me 262 behind my car's grille. The reality is that those danged trucks become B-17s and the yuppy lane cutter in the Bimmer becomes a wise guy Fw 190 pilot. Oh yeah!

That bumper to bumper gaggle of vehicles is transformed into a big box of B-24s and I'm blasting a path through them! Those cars going 15 MPH under the limit on a clear freeway are later a vehicle convoy that I'm strafing. That jerk riding my bumper at 70 MPH no matter what lane I choose is a Bf 109 I'm soon combating in the sim. That careless guy weaving along well above the traffic flow speed is soon a MiG eating my AIM 9M.

And when I'm simming I want to kill the enemy. I have continued to pump rounds into planes so they'll explode and the polygon pilot will perish. I've been known to gun them in their chutes too. But after a session with the joystick I'm a much relieved cowboy. Certainly I am not driven to steal a Piper and kamikaze into a 747. But this is tantamount to what is being said about these criminals as a contributing cause.

First person shooter games are different but not so much as you think. The goal of the action is the same as in a military combat sim: kill the bad guys and stay alive. Granted, they are more graphic in terms of blood and gore; it still does not equal a cause/effect relationship and that playing them inspires murder in the real world.

BAD BOYS, BAD BOYS

There are a lot of catch phrases that the media use to connote political correctness or to imply "badness." This subliminal approach to education conjures up images of the Bureau of Peace in Orwell's 1984.

Granted, the "hunters" that destroy property or illegally kill game are "criminals." "Motorists" that lead police on 300 mile chases are "criminals." "Students" that burglarize a building are "criminals." All these "people" truly are criminals. But it is never stated that the perpetrants actually did this or that; the news media is just hell bent on labeling. Will "video game players" be the next innuendo ("those damn "VGPs!!")?

I am certain that the "Safety Police," those self appointed saviors, will want to take some reactionary, draconian measures concerning video games other than just putting a parental advisory sticker on them. After all, your insurance company forces you to pay high rates because certain cars are deemed dangerous. Never mind your excellent past driving record.

Don't auto racing simulations cause people to recklessly race in the streets? Never mind that 99.xxx% of all firearms are never used in crimes. There is a contingent that think they are all bad and you should not have them. They've made toy guns garish colors so kids will less identify with "real." I'm certain that they'd love to include "simulated weapons" in their crusade.

ROUND UP THE USUAL SUSPECTS

Yes, you there with the simulated Brownings, Mausers, Vulcans, Atolls and Mark 84s. A simulated machine gun makes you want to get an illegal Uzi from a guy on the street and wreak real world mayhem, right?

If your car and firearm doesn't "look" like some do-gooder's myopic concept that must be bad. The Internet has just too much information for some people. It makes them nervous to think that you, the average person, can access data from all over the world for free. After all, someone might do something bad with information they found on the web. Of course they just might do something good with it. But we are criminals by association.

It's the same rhetoric. There is this misguided need to place a singular blame and compartmentalize the whole thing. There is no ONE cause for the homicides we see on TV news.

In actuality, violent crime has decreased across America while, as a country, we may be desensitized to violence over all through multi-mediums of exposure. Passing some "feel good" legislation does zero to quell the causes. To believe that these things we put blame on are themselves meaningful is a national self-delusion.

I do not know the causes for multiple homicides. I know that in 1959 nobody went to school and began shooting classmates. You could walk to the neighborhood hardware store and buy any rifle, pistol or shotgun they had and walk out with it. There were no video games and the most violent thing on TV was Davey Crockett.

Hitler Didn't Play Doom

Hmm. A loner roaming unregulated throughout the vast country hunting with muskets and knives. If you attempted to live like that today it would be "red alert" time.

Throughout world history there has been gratuitous violence. Long before repeating arms, Dirty-Harry movies, TV violence, and lowly video games there was a constant parade of homicide. Atilla and Nero lacked modern firearms, as did the English king who strapped William Wallace to his bed of torture. In spite of that they managed just fine. Alexander and Napoleon were never inspired by the movies toward world conquest. And Hitler did not play Doom! Being damned because you have a fast car, target shoot, surf the web or play video games is sick. Should we all be suspect because of what we might do? The insidious undercurrent that propels this kind of thinking feeds on the reactions of the misinformed. At the risk of sounding paranoid, I believe that if the dark forces have their way it will make the Nazi Reich look like a Sunday school picnic.

It will not be so much in body count but in loss of individualism and personal freedom. It comes in the guise of the government or special interest group looking out for your best interests. Like Prohibition, "we know what's best for you." "It's bad for you so let's forbid it by law," is the concept. Their agenda is a total degradation of choices and liberties.

But lawsuits have been already been filed against 14 game publishers and developers by earlier massacre victims' kin stating they their games made violence "pleasurable and attractive." What did the parents do throughout their offsprings' lives to counteract that attraction? Or worse, what did they do that encouraged it?

By the way, who should decide what game you can play and what game you cannot? Should games be "edited" like TV movies are? If we shoot a bad guy in a dark corridor game maybe his image should just freeze and fade out a bit so you know he is not "active" any longer. Shouldn't the same for combat simulations prevail?

Perhaps you should no longer see simulated blood, explosions or damage of any kind. Let's just have enemy combat vehicles freeze and fade out with a big X to mark the spot. Let's accompany these demises with a "game over" Pac Man-like sound effect or a trombone's sad "wah-waah."

Since the dim beginnings of mankind murder has been a crime of man and law. Yet since humans arose from the animals some two million years ago, murder has occurred with alarming regularity. Remember Cain and Abel? In 1999 it is still illegal to murder, but that, or any law, is not going to halt those determined to commit a felony.

Think of the immense number of hours that have been spent by countless people playing video games in roughly the past decade and a half. In how many homicides have games been the major contributing factor? Most likely none. Even if it were a factor, relative to, say, drunk driving caused deaths, drowning, cancer, or heart disease, where do you think it would rank in relation to its deadly competitors?

In games people can escape from the humdrum and experience life from a different angle. They can control the simulated world if they cannot control the real one. Games are a break from the bleak.

Simulated worlds can be preferable to the real one at times. They can provide a model of discipline by requiring close attention and strategy. In the simulated world accomplishments are acknowledged and rewarded. The military admits that people with game/simulator experience do far better in the multi million dollar pro simulators and later on the real electronic battlefield. Most people like them because they are just fun.

Let's not allow ourselves to end up, after the book burnings, forced to drive speed governed, electric cars, listening to happy cartoon music, playing Tetris, watching "G" movies, and target shooting puff ball blowguns while the Internet is reserved for official government business. (Dear editor: Maybe you better erase that as it might give someone too many ideas.)

Always check your six! The Safety Police may be on your tail.