Video showing 15 year old Florida, USA boy being arrested for mass shooting threat he made in a game; Mother's agony
Given below is my share comment for a Facebook post-video: https://www.facebook.com/VolusiaSheriff/videos/758159051269496, which I shared a little while back on Facebook.
This 4 min. 36 sec. video seems to have gone viral about a month ago. The juvenile arrest happened on 16th Aug. 2019 in Florida, USA. I saw it today on a news network video on youtube (The Sun, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=361ROwkenXU) and browsing on the matter led me to this official Sheriff's office Facebook post video (which seems to have been reproduced by The Sun).
My heart goes out to the mother who had to face this. The video clearly captures her agony. The 15 year old kid seems to not know what he has got into, though, hopefully a juvenile court would show some leniency to him, releasing him (don't know if he has already been released) with a warning about not ever making such foolish statements again even in jest (which is what he claims he did).
I can't blame the US security forces and these officers for doing what they had to do. They did their duty as per Florida law put in place to protect the citizens & residents of (& visitors to) Florida. They also tried to politely explain to the mother why they had to arrest her boy.
The underlying issue is the violent gaming culture as well as the gun culture of the USA, which can cause children to say, and sometimes do, stupid but horrible things like what this boy said (in jest, he says) but DID NOT do.
Even today, around three decades after my visit to a Toys mega store in the USA (a Toys "R" Us store, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toys_%22R%22_Us, if I recall correctly) where I encountered the gun toys section, I can still recall my shock at seeing the huge array of gun toys there conjuring up images of violence on a big scale. I mean, it was not just an ordinary rifle or revolver toy (which is common in India too), but machine gun toys replicating machine guns used in warfare. I recall wondering then what impact it would have on the minds of kids who play with such machine gun toys.
Then (late 1980s), we did not have the public Internet and I am quite sure that violent video gaming and computer gaming were not there. Gaming would have already been there I guess but in more benign forms as small personal computers were being sold among the public right from 1970s, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_personal_computers.
As of now, this violent gaming and violent toys culture among children/minors is a reality in USA, and perhaps in some other countries of the world too.
It is up to the parents in the USA, including this unfortunate mother in this video, to learn how to prevent access to these violent games (on the Internet) to their children till the children properly understand that making a threat to commit a mass shooting, even if he/she means it in jest, is a crime in some parts of USA.
Hmm. My God! What a world we live in today! Prayers and best wishes to the mother and boy in this video, to get over this sad problem they got involved in due to violent video games that the boy played.
This 4 min. 36 sec. video seems to have gone viral about a month ago. The juvenile arrest happened on 16th Aug. 2019 in Florida, USA. I saw it today on a news network video on youtube (The Sun, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=361ROwkenXU) and browsing on the matter led me to this official Sheriff's office Facebook post video (which seems to have been reproduced by The Sun).
My heart goes out to the mother who had to face this. The video clearly captures her agony. The 15 year old kid seems to not know what he has got into, though, hopefully a juvenile court would show some leniency to him, releasing him (don't know if he has already been released) with a warning about not ever making such foolish statements again even in jest (which is what he claims he did).
I can't blame the US security forces and these officers for doing what they had to do. They did their duty as per Florida law put in place to protect the citizens & residents of (& visitors to) Florida. They also tried to politely explain to the mother why they had to arrest her boy.
The underlying issue is the violent gaming culture as well as the gun culture of the USA, which can cause children to say, and sometimes do, stupid but horrible things like what this boy said (in jest, he says) but DID NOT do.
Even today, around three decades after my visit to a Toys mega store in the USA (a Toys "R" Us store, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toys_%22R%22_Us, if I recall correctly) where I encountered the gun toys section, I can still recall my shock at seeing the huge array of gun toys there conjuring up images of violence on a big scale. I mean, it was not just an ordinary rifle or revolver toy (which is common in India too), but machine gun toys replicating machine guns used in warfare. I recall wondering then what impact it would have on the minds of kids who play with such machine gun toys.
Then (late 1980s), we did not have the public Internet and I am quite sure that violent video gaming and computer gaming were not there. Gaming would have already been there I guess but in more benign forms as small personal computers were being sold among the public right from 1970s, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_personal_computers.
As of now, this violent gaming and violent toys culture among children/minors is a reality in USA, and perhaps in some other countries of the world too.
It is up to the parents in the USA, including this unfortunate mother in this video, to learn how to prevent access to these violent games (on the Internet) to their children till the children properly understand that making a threat to commit a mass shooting, even if he/she means it in jest, is a crime in some parts of USA.
Hmm. My God! What a world we live in today! Prayers and best wishes to the mother and boy in this video, to get over this sad problem they got involved in due to violent video games that the boy played.
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