Must be those new video games that give them the ideas. Steal a 12 year old's hat, now that's ignorant.

Oh yeah and hoodies too. Sounds like all teens in PG

Video games?

If you honestly think VIDEO GAMES are the problem, then you've got some issues in the head.

"WIGGAZ".........

Honest Abe, if you think video/computer games are not contributing to the problem, then check out this article by a magazine called Fast Company. The article is called "Virtual Darkness". Web address: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/94/labtest.html

It was probably one of those scavenger hunts ....

A gun? Was it real? ... not that it matters, I suppose.

I used to have a gun too when I was even younger than 15 or even younger than 12 .... a six shooter cap gun in a holster with Roy Rogers written all over it ...

Greatest repeater action when I palmed the hammer backwards quickly .... could outdraw everyone on the block ....

Of course I eventually grew tired of Roy and switched my blue cowboy hat to a coonskin cap and rifle when I saw Fess Parker in the Alamo. My hero!! 1955 ..... shows were 25 cents for a three movie Saturday matinee just two blocks walk from where I lived. I forget how much the popcorn was.

And I also watched the roadrunner and daffy duck .... lots of living things getting killed over and over again with those huge boulders falling on them from overhangs way up high over the highway ...

Now that I let out the secret, y'all know why I am such a violent person.

Why do people always blame others about things that they have the most control over?

"My son is so bad because of video games."

Yeah right!!!

I agree with Owl! I think if one has to put the blame somewhere then it would have to be on the people who raised the kids. I do remember a lot of such stuff going on when i was growing up ( i suspect the gun was a pellet or toy gun which we played around with when we were teens.) Still we never progressed into more serious stuff.
For me the disconcerting thing is the obsession with gangs. I remember in the 80's and early 90's when kids were first starting to pretend that they were in gangs (because of all the glorification in movies, etc) and were walking around with south LA colors on. I thought then that it was silly. I think now that the parents who allow, or even encourage such things are the real problem. Kids will be kids. Gangs are cool and dramatic (teenagers and melodrama do tend to associate with one another). However, things like swarming, petty (and not so petty) crimes and an attitude that lawlessness is justified are all problems associated witht the gang mentality.
I never thought gangs were cool when i was young. I would never have joined one. What the heck happened between then and now ? BTW, before anyone talks about poverty, my friends and i were raised by low to middle class parents. We had a lot less to live on and a lot fewer options for the future than the so called poor of today.

If we didn't have so many bleeding hearts making excuses for bad behavior, we could begin to actually deal with the problem.

Fear, deterents, penalty's, removal of privileges and outright public scorn of these individuals would help steer them back from where this behavior may have started. We don't care where it started or why, we care about helping them see where they have not made the best choices.

There has to be a cost and a consequence for their bad behavior that deters them from continuing it. It's our responsibility to provide it. Chester

Sorry "Said" and "A C Rider".

If kids are committing crimes because of "video games", then the problem lies a lot deeper than just the game my friend. It begins & ends with the parents.

If shooting a gun at animated humans in a game gives one the urge to start doing it in real life, then they ar criminals. Not poor mis-guided youth that have been brainwashed by the video games.

I can see it now. "Your honour, it's not my fault. You see, I played Grand Theft Auto right before the murders. It was all the video game."

Give you head a shake.

The old "nature" vs. "nurture" argument.

Survey says:

- genetic makeup or predisposition is a small part of it

- developmental delays or learning disabilities may contribute slightly

- parental involvement, discipline, guidance, and proper socialization and social education is the single biggest contributing factor to non-criminal behavior

The shocker:

- Women who smoke cigarettes during pregnancy is the single biggest contributing factor to criminal behavior, due to the reduced development of the frontal part of the brain that controls impulsive behavior, it never does develop completely or properly, and without it we would be just impulsive wild animals.

Throw drugs and booze into the equation too, and we have ourselves a ward of the state on our hands.

That's the facts, Jack.