The fact that he reacted so badly doesn't help him in any way. No one may critisize him yet he has the right to bullshit something about being the "saviour" that will use this "9/11 of school shootings and videogame involvement" to save America.

JT....why is 9/11 mention so much in your bs, wtf has the deaths of all those people have to do with this, your just cheapning their memory.

Oh, btw, for my last message ^^ I obviously replaced "MSNBC" with "Fox News" for my letter to Fox.

Not only that, but I also tried searching through the New York Times archive for the past thirty days and could find nothing about Seung-Hui Cho and Video Games.

[...] Gotta say, being called an idiot (advisedly) and a jackass on national news by Jack Thompson feels like a special milestone for me. Not so much for the name calling, but just to see good old Jack get all flustered and frustrated. [...]

@p51

Agreed. Start this petition.

Michael Brooks: Do it yourself, you lazy boob. Dennis has his hands full doing a fine job covering politics and games, he doesn't have to be your personal executive to promote your view, regardless whether he agrees with it.

@Mr. Gone

"The recent Imus fiasco showed the damage that can be caused by allowing a nut job with a skewed view on reality free reign on the air."

Imus was a Radio Shock jock, that had been on the air for 50 years (an impressive run in the radio industry), he made a poor joke, that was very out of taste, was also the victim of a slow news day (nothing else was going on so the media ran with this, despite the fact that it's really a non-story), he was not a nut job with a skewed view on reality


unless the nut job you were referring to was Rev. Al, i think that statement comes off a little ignorant of what the Imus controversy really was

Jack Thompson reminds me of this simpsons clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ8kraRzE7A

OWWW!!!! My head hurts!!!! Mr. JB Thompson's theories make my head hurt.

@ Roger, and anyone who decides to write these news stations
I would advise to use proper grammar and punctuation. A letter written professionally will have more impact on those who read it than letters that are just written off the top of your head (which would typically be ignored).

I would also like to suggest to call the "massacre chaser" by his full REAL name 'John Bruce Thompson,' when making reference to him in your letters to these news stations

@Michael Brooks

"Listen pal, you think the major news channels in the country are going to give a rat’s ass on what a sophomore in college writes to them? I asked Dennis to because he’s actually a professional journalist, unlike myself."

Yea, they are. The 18-35 demographic is covted by these compaines. It's like gold. So do they care what a sophomore in college writes to them? Damn straight they do. If they get enough letters saying "hey, what do you think you're doing? We don't like this. And if you keep doing it, we aren't going to watch it" will get them to stop it.

You heard of Don Imus right? What he said was wrong and all, but not worth getting fired and kicked off the air. But enough people get behind an issue, write to them, results happen.

And you know what? Lay off of Roger. At least he's got the balls to write them himself. Yea, the formatting, spelling, and punctuation could have been better. But at least he's trying to defend his hobby. He's doing it better then you are.


@Roger

Writing is a skill. Its one that has to be practiced over and over, like anything. Keep at it, you'll only get better.

The truth hurts.

@Dog_Welder

That is a likely reason. Unfortunately since Counter Strike both lacks a hot coffee equivalent to use as a weakness and it's developer Valve is on safer ground than T2, that game is even more of a brick wall than GTA ever was.

The poor fool failed on GTA, and now he's choosing an even stronger target to break himself against? That's just bad planning.

So, Jack says there is ethical killing!? And that the military is there to kill people? LOL...

@Michael Brooks
whats your problem at least i tryed instead of saying the hell with it or acting like a noob and writing JaCks A N00b. until you at least thank people for trying than you can go save your own fucking games.

Well were talking about the guy who tried to pin the columbine murders on Marylin Manson, come on who can take this guy serious anymore..

I like his statement that kids "train by playing CS"
sure.. okay so because you play CS you can handle a gun??

*shrugs* expert witness my ***

Yep. Tompson is still a loser.

"I'm saving lives!" No you're not. You're creating noise pollution.

Yeah, it seems the question "Should violent video games be banned?" was largely asked in a rhetorical way. This interview mostly felt like "Here is what the people saying games should be banned look like. Ooooooh. Now let's poke him and see what happens."

This man is making me sick. I work in the industry and he still keeps on bringing up the same old tired arguments. I get the feeling Jack couldn't get past Wave 1 of Space Invaders and since then has got a vendetta against them.

"I'm no genius".

Only correct thing you've said, Jack.

@A-wel Cruiz

Yes, he might run with this. After all, it's not like used facts for the basis of his arguments before. EVen his parents didnt know what videogames he played in his teenage years. What I find funny know that I think about it is his arguments while he insists that Cho still played Counterstrike. Something like:
"His suitemate said he didnt know him very well yet he said he never saw him play videogames. He doesnt know what Cho was doing on his computer".
Yet he bases his "fact" only on the Washington Post statement that some korean kids said that he played Counter-strike in his highschool years and that you don't usually give it up. Based on nameless Korean kids while every other newspapers quote his parents and neighbors saying he didnt have many if any friends.

He bases his "fact" that there was some kids that knew what he played in his highschool years better than what his suitemate said he didnt play in his college years.

In responses to A-wel Cruiz
Hmmmm..... Again there are flaws in Mr. Thompson logic. I guess he still does not know the mean of percentage. Three school shoot and he see a pattern? I see it too. But I only see it among violent psychopaths rather then gamers. Of course none of this matter because he has truthness. There are, after all, more nerve endings in ones gut then ones brain (note a Stephen Colbert reference). He is, after all, a lawyer and an expert at modern psychology.

@Hackangel

His email is somewhere on this site. amendmentone@comcast.net

@Vansau

ty I'll do that

So does any one else wonder if MSNBC had Jack on the air just so he could make a fool of himself reacting to their online article painting him in a negative light?

I've just got this sneaky feeling that they consider him to be a ratings getting, not an expert to consult.

You know, when you send e-mails to places such as NBC or Fox, it would probably be a good idea to spend a few seconds to write it properly with capitalization and broken into paragraphs when needed.

Anyway, along with Andrew Kehoe do we know what videogame ex-Marine Charles Whitman trained on before he climbed that tower at his University and killed 15-17 people? I almost completely forgot about this until that NBC article reminded me of it. There was even a scene in an old (well not that old but from the late late 80s or early 90s) movie called Parent Hood that scene where Steve Martin's character is invisioning his son doing something similar while yelling "YOU MADE ME PLAY SECOND BASE!" Didn't really make the connection until after I looked up Charles Whitman.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Whitman

@upgray3dd

There's a few questions I'd like to ask but I probably know the answers already. Where did you get his email anyway? What is it?

I just realized I had a typo. Oh well, I guess Jacko has won.

BTW Mr. Thompson

still havn't heard from you yet.


mr-gone@mn.rr.com

Here's the letter I sent to MSNBC

To who it may concern,

Recently I viewed an interview between Alex Witt and self proclaimed "Anti-Video Game Crusader" Jack Thompson, and I felt I needed to vent my frustration at you network's continued use of Mr. Thompson as a viable source for information. This is another perfect example of the scare mongering tactics used by today's media outlets. Jack Thompson will be the first at any murder scene involving a teenager or student, stepping over bodies to try and coheres a grieving family member into blaming mass media, in most cases video games, for the instability of thier child.
This kind of blatant and unjustified finger pointing is a double edged sword. To the uninformed viewer, it creates an immediate negative reaction to whatever this "credible" source is bad mouthing, and worse, to the viewers in the know, it paints MSNBC as a news network with no ability to check the facts. The recent Imus fiasco showed the damage that can be caused by allowing a nut job with a skewed view on reality free reign on the air.
For the sake of your views and the image of your network I would advise highly against allowing anyone without proper knowledge or facts to spew rhetoric over any form of broadcast carrying your banner. This is a tragedy and the families and friends of this student are grieving, the last thing they need is a finger pointing glory hound like Thompson trying to be noticed by standing on the corpses of their loved ones.

@ Timothy: "Michael Brooks: Do it yourself, you lazy boob. Dennis has his hands full doing a fine job covering politics and games, he doesn’t have to be your personal executive to promote your view, regardless whether he agrees with it."

Lazy?

Listen pal, you think the major news channels in the country are going to give a rat's ass on what a sophomore in college writes to them? I asked Dennis to because he's actually a professional journalist, unlike myself.

Meanwhile, this "lazy boob" is trying to keep his ass in school, get good grades, so some day he can write something that people will actually read.

@ Roger: "well i wrote them the best i could. it might not be good with puctuation but i mean this is grade A or B- tops!"

No. Finish elementary school before you write a professional news organization. Until then, your F- paper only hurts the cause.

Hey guys, anyone wanna start a complaint going to MSNBC that they shouldn't allow guests like him on air due to his use of foul language? It's prime time TV and the "children" are watching afterall ;)

Jack has done it again. He even used such offending words. Now, if that clip were to be a game, what rating would the ESRB give it? I'm sure we wouldn't want our kids to emulate on Mr. Jack Thompson, saying 'idiot' or 'jackass' and all.

What a fool. This guy's a joke. He doesn't have anything better to do than to pick on video games. Does this guy even know that doctors also play video games? And so he's implying that these gamer-doctors, more talented and more caring, are people to be feared at for the risk of us being killed? Oh, and I've got facts to prove my question. I won't accept his lousy excuses.

“No, let’s just ban idiots like you. It would be a start. duh"

And this is exactly the stuff these major news organizations need to know about. This is exactly what makes him an uncredible, unprofessional source of information.

OMG it IS! It's the clanwars movie!

Clan vs. Noob!

"C'mon guys, I'm trying to make a skill video."
"Dude, no-one's going to believe you're that good..."

It's a freakin comedy!

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-4764310433047518174&q=counterstr...

This latest on-air piece is simply one more example of how Laddy Jack can dish it out but can't take it. After years of calling us "knuckleheads" who engage in a "masturbatory" hobby, after erroneously tagging Bully as a "Columbine simulator," and after labeling Paul Eibeler a "child molester for hire," we've stood toe-to-toe and fired back with appropriate names for him: "hearse chaser," "litigation terrorist," "massacre chaser," and of course, hypocrite. Didn't Laddy Jack once say name calling is appropriate, because Jesus name-called the Pharisees? Typical, hypocritical Jack.

From this day forward, I shall call him "Massacre Chaser, Jack Thompson." And on that note, I go to play The Godfather: Blackhand Edition, for Nintendo Wii, to practice my brawling and sniping with a tommygun, while waiting for them to come out with a really good boxing game so I can further train my fighting skills. ;)

Heh, reminds me of when Mary Whitehouse claimed Tom and Jerry trained children to be violent.

I loved the comment 'I've worked with families who's loved ones are now in the ground.'. I hate to say it, but Jack didn't WANT to know them until after their loved ones were in the ground and he saw them as a profit opportunity.

From here on out, in any postings or e-mails I write, he will be referred to as "massacre chaser, Jack Thompson."

If he can keep calling Bully a "Columbine simulator," I certainly have the right to do this.

Of all the sensible rebuttals coming from our side MSNBC could have used, they take the most rhetorical one and strip it of context. To think this is the same network that posted an article that refuted many of JT's claims. Talk about a flip-flop.

Once again, they're trying to portray this man as a hero and gamers and mindless killing machines in-the-making.

@jer

wrote it the best i could and the only time i used massacre chaser is the insult

My emails:
Dear MSNBC

since the beginning of this week ive heard almost every theory about the shootings at virginia tech and the one that hits me at home is the fact that before even evidence was released; Mr.Jack Thompson pounced right on the subject. Now let me inform you to do some research before you let him on your shows. Every time you tell this "massacre chaser" to discribe the game in question; you give him the power he needs to spew his rederic which if you listen carefully you can see that his informations plain dumbfounded hoopla. you seen him get mad when called a "massacre chaser" and his comments were those of a angered 6th grader. so please if you value the honesty of your news station; please don't let Mr.Thompson on or at least do research on the subject. i too like a lot of people are a gamer and ive played violent games since the age of 5! ive been picked on in school and ive got a lot of stuff happen in my life to drive anyone to kill but i know the diffrence from right and wrong and this is what many people have. but you have people like mr.Thompson who constantly trying to boost his career; saying that all gamers are mr.thompsons quote: "Idiots who aren't conserned about public safety" i am a caring person! so are all gamers. if you seen game sites like Gamepolitics, Kotaku, and Joystiq you see that as soon as the shootings hit; every gamer cared. every person cared! anyone who doesn't care about events like this or people who don't feel saddened by this can be easly called monsters by our culture. and like ive said at the beginning of this email; mr.Thompson hopped right on the subject blaming video games so please for the sake of your viewers; do some research or just plain don't let this man boost his career! thank you.

and to Fox:

Dear Fox News

As of Monday the 16th ive been a respected viewer of your news program. and as soon as the shootings at virginia tec happened i was saddened by the fact that this travesty had to happen! but a even bigger travesty happened right on your news program. Before the name of the shooter was released, the number of bodys counted or even before the shootings were over; you let so called "School shooting expert" Jack Thompson spew his illogical rederic on the concerned and saddened masses! now if you had done some research and have seen how this man has reacted before about shootings or anything that happened in his career. and on MSNBC they had a man from the industry tell how mr.Thompson is a "Massacre chaser". this is 100% what he is. Any normal human being would care deeply about what happened and would at least wait until evidence and information was released before spreading jibberish about how videogames caused this very sad event. For every shooting there has been, for every time there has been any crime where teenagers and guns or teenagers and schools is involved; mr.Thompson was there saying how games make people do horrible things. i have been a gamer since the age of 5. ive had some major stuff happen in my life and im only 16! but i know the diffrence from right and wrong. millions of people are gamers and they aren't crazy. none of this clicks with mr.Thompson. so please if you dearly respect your viewers and the quality of your news; please don't let this man on your show or at least do some research before you let him on! if you do this than you will insure that you have quality news and respected viewers. Thank you.

please share your thoughts about my emails. it would be appreciated. and i already sent them so don't copy please thank you.

Damn, I'm glad we don't have pricks like him in Australia.

He keeps saying the same things over and over again. It's like he's brainwashed himself and when someone asks him something he doesn't expect he resorts to name calling.

I still can't see how video games can train you for real life experiences. Will playing NHL 2006 train me to play hockey? No! Will playing Need for Speed make me a better driver? No! Will playing Duck Hunt make me a better marksman? Hell no!!

Someone really needs to get him on the air and put him on the spot and question his so-called facts!

I think I could do a great Jack Thompson impression in any kind of interview.

Canned Jack Thompson response:
"Hub bub video game violence hubabuba training simulator military habhoob dibitydow 9/11 baduka hahafofo nanypoo poo columbine police have found bladyboody bo bo trained on the game blah bo no no haha I represented dodap doap doom"

Wait -- the Doom *movie*?

Didn't that, um, just come out?

Just wrote MSNBC and Fox, time to tell those outlets not to give MASSACRE CHASER any air time:

viewerservices@msnbc.com

Yourcomments@foxnews.com

Nice choice of YouTube video; because Counter-Strike is completely typified by shooting a poorly-mapped schoolbus.

Anyone can predict another school shooting, JT. School shootings will never stop, as long as troubled teens can get easy access to hand guns, these shootings will keep happening, anyone with an IQ of 1 could figure that out. I'm so sick of the media giving this hack airtime. How many MILLIONS of people play video games every hour, every day? why hasn't a massive killing happened everyday then? The guy is a hack and any TV station that calls him an "expert" should lose their FCC license.

Maybe it was just me, but I think this is the first time that JT didn't come off as a complete Righteous Crusader. The anchor came back with the "But kids play video games . . ." and that seemed to be her general direction, especially with throwing out that last quote.

I think he made a fool out of himself, and he actually _did_ feel embarrassed on national TV, which is why he got so mad at the end. I can't believe he resorted to name calling and such language!

Devil's Advocate for a short second, I do understand that he's trying to "sound the alarm" for morals and advocate for less violence in video games influencing our children, but Thompson of course has little tact in which he executes his agenda. He still comes on TV and spouts random baseless facts and "connects the dots" to non-exsisting dots. He insults people who are merely sounding the fact that he IS a massacre chaser, and that he uses these massacres to get on the national news spotlight and get his "wrongful death" lawsuits, which both equal $$$ for him. He's being PAID to be the "moral voice" so frankly he has no leg to stand on calling Della Rocca a "paid voice" either.

"Massacre chaser, massacre chaser, massacre chaser."

Say that three times into a mirror, and he'll come to get you!

He connected Columbine with the Doom movie? It didn't come out until years after that tragedy

He again mistakenly quotes the APA report that found no correlation between violent behaviour and video games.

He claims to not deny the link between smoking and cancer yet has stated before that there is more evidence that video games cause violence that there is that smoking is linked to cancer. And given that there is NO evidence about violence connected to games...

It's a horrific double standard. If a video game developer went on that show he would have been demonised. But this man gets to go on and spread his lies once more. Someone should put together a professional media package which documents all of this mans behaviour and lies, going right back to the Janet Reno incident, his numerous troubles with the Florida bar, his unethical behaviour, and give the proof about his lies. This pack should be sent to every news station he has been on to say "This is the man you are calling an expert? He is an unprofessional, biased, incredibly rude liar who seeks only to spread his own agend through the suffering of others."

So John Bruce Thompson has to resort to calling people names...TWICE?

Shows publicly how weak his case really is. "Massacre chaser" is a great description of John Bruce Thompson.

Am I the only one that laughed out loud? Seriously, I can't hear him speak anymore without me starting to giggle, because I know he's gonna say something outright stupid.

I'm not even gonna start to argue against him. I just gotta state that he should do standup.

Jack, you should first save yourself.

To summarize: "GRAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHH!!!!! JACK SMASH!!!! JACK SAVE GRIEVING FAMILIES OVER AND OVER AGAIN!!!! 9/11!!!!!!!"

It sure would be nice to hear someone else actually say "Jack Thompson has been right on more than one occasion" than to just hear it repeated from him over and over and over and over again.

He called Della Rocca an idiot on the air? He said Rocca is on the air is being paid to say these things, which I'm not so sure about. And then he tries to draw him trying to warn people for the public safety to people trying to warn about 9-11? What an attention-monger!

But what offended me more than anything is that the whole focus was put just on games and didn't put enough focus on the guy's mental illness. I'm sure with the guy's history of instability and even his being a mental institution that the games are what did it! Sure, I really believe that...

Honestly, it may have been an anachronism, but he may have a point about THE FILM Doom inciting violence. After renting it I felt the fleeting urge to drive to Hollywood and punch everyone involved in the production in the face.

You know, now he's trying to launch an FBI investigation on kotaku.

http://kotaku.com/gaming/original/thompson-calls-for-fbi-investigation-o...

Sometimes, I find it hard to believe we're talking about a grown man here.

Well, everyone is entitled to their view, free speech and all. But let’s take what Jack uses as an example. Counter Strike, today on Steam (a program that lets you connect to the different servers that let you play Counter Strike) 333,791 players logged on to play. According to Steams stats 2,946,860 players logged in this month. Now even if Cho played Counterstrike and used it to train, compare that to the 2,946,859 that didn't kill 30 something people this month. This is a waste of time, effort and money. Handling a real gun is nothing like handling a mouse and a keyboard. The human body is extremely fragile there are thousands of ways to kill someone. So instead of blaming the video game industry blame the kid who was definitely deranged (I read his "play".) Also blame the gun laws and lack of security. Counter Strike is only 1 of the FPS (First Person Shooter) games out there; every month new ones are released. This blaming of video games happens because these people have never played the games themselves and have no idea what it’s all about and how you "feel" when you play the game. Games already have a rating and they are rated for a reason, Young children who are still learning right from wrong cannot distinguish if shooting someone is good or bad should not be playing games like Counter Strike under any circumstance and if they are able to play it, it's the parents fault for not guiding the children and not paying enough attention. If you cannot guide children and pay enough attention to children, don’t have them. He uses Doom as an example, now Doom is shooting demons to save the planet. Now I don’t know about you but if demon’s from hell tried destroying a planet and taking it over, I will start shooting them to save the planet, in this case the planet is Mars (It’s in the future.) The fact that Jack Thompson blamed Video games even before the investigation was completed says more about him than it does about video games.

All I have to say is wow. He just blamed Columbine on Doom, the game AND the movie.

Damn those video-game-playing, time-machine owning crazy kids!

[...] Gamepolitics has been covering the story since it unfolded. In his latest television appearance, Jackie became really red under his Superlawyer costume’s collar after being read a quote from the executive director of the International Game Developer’s Association: It’s so sad. These massacre chasers — they’re worse than ambulance chasers — they’re waiting for these things to happen so they can jump on their soapbox. [...]

Jack Thompson, making friends and influencing others, one news show at a time.

Seriously, good going JT. Way to come off sounding like a loon. And could you please get a new script? You stick to your talking points far too closely. Blah Blah Shooting, Blah Blah Germany. The only time you actually sounded like you were a person was when you started to pop off about how you're so great and mister reporter said you had no clue what you were talking about.

He blames Doom, yes, but obviously not the movie since it never existed then and anythine Uwe Boll made is crap and doesn't even deserve to be mentioned.

The media is obviously not reading the signs, "please don't feed the Jack."
we need more of them.

@finaleve-

Actually, he does/did blame the movie right there in the clip. The fact that it didn't exist then doesn't stop him. That's kind of what made it funny, see?

I don't think he mentions any Uwe Boll movies, does he?

i say fuck jack thompson. everybody is always looking for someone to blame for some wrong doing. and how dare he attempt to pin the virginia tech shooting on violent video games. that is just to far. so to sum up, fuck jack!!!