Media Reminder: Research video games before reporting on them
Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, once pursued a career in video game development. This raises a lot of genuine questions, such as which Discord communities he frequented, how gaming culture influenced his political beliefs, and whether or not he used multiplayer gaming’s notoriously uncontrolled communication tools to share his plans with others.
That doesn’t mean Among us turned him into a murderer.
This is a brief, sincere reminder to reporters unfamiliar with gaming to learn about the medium before reporting on it – the same way they would try to research the specifics of their subject before publishing a story, or whether it is a foreign war, a scientific breakthrough, or the drama behind the scenes at city hall. A reporter cannot be expected to be an expert in everything he reports; They can be expected to speak to experts and learn from them.
Unfortunately, mainstream reporting has a decades-long history of broadly failing to confidently report on video games, especially as they relate to real-world violence. In the late 1990s and throughout the 2000s, both local and network news infamously responded to shootings by flooding televisions with stories about Doom training a generation to kill. Today, the moral panic is often more subtle, but no less absurd, often nodding to a connection between games and violence without explicitly stating it.
It’s also a reminder for media consumers to be skeptical of false or overreaching connections between video games and murder. There is no causal link between violent video games and violent behavior in practice, research shows the University of Oxford in 2019the American Psychological Association in 2020and the University of London in 2021.
The author of that third study, Dr. Agne Suziedelyte, said: “These results suggest that violent video games can annoy children, but this arousal does not translate into violence against other people – the kind of violence we care about most. ”
Which brings us back to Among us. Today, NBC News reports this that a member of a Discord group in which Mangione participated claims the suspect had been playing Among us. NBC News builds an entire story around this detail:
Luigi Mangione, who was arrested and charged with murder in the shooting of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, was once among a group of Ivy League gamers who played assassins, a member of the group told NBC News.
In the game called “Among us”, some players are secretly assigned as assassins in space performing other tasks while trying to avoid suspicion from other players.
But context is crucial. Among us has been downloaded 500 million times and is popular among people of all ages – many (if not most) of whom are children. That’s because Among us is a family-friendly game in which players use social deduction to spot a ‘killer’ among their crew of astronauts who looks like colorful, anthropomorphic beans. It’s a lot like the classic personal board games Mafia and Werewolf. Among us became popular during the COVID-19 pandemic thanks to its simple gameplay and cartoon aesthetic that has more in common with Looney Tunes than military training simulators.
In the NBC News report, the Discord member noted the irony of a suspected killer playing a game that involves murder. And it’s ironic. But it’s not a national news story without more context, just like it’s not a national news story if a corrupt landlord ever played Monopoly.
Video games have become the dominant entertainment medium of today. Mangione’s connections to the hobby will and should be part of the messaging about his identity. But like everything else – his upbringing, his education, his relationships, his politics – Mangione’s gaming habits should be treated as part of a bigger picture.
It’s not national news that someone simply played one of the most popular games in the world. Even if they are accused of murder.