Loitering on the Dark Side
The Columbine High killers fed on a culture of violence that isn't about to
change - By Steven Levy, Newsweek, May 3, 1999
Now for the recriminations. Was the Colorado tragedy a
legacy of our technoculture: Doom, "Natural Born Killers," hate-amplifying Web
sites and pipe-bomb plans from the Net? Or simply two teenage killers' ability to collect
enough ordnance to sustain a small army? Gathering the potential culprits seems less an
exercise in fixing liability than tossing random darts at the violence-fixated cultural
landscape. After the massacre, there were calls to cancel two upcoming Denver events: a
Marilyn Manson concert and the NRA's annual convention. Guilt has to be spread pretty
widely to make bedfellows of the androgynous Goth crooner and Charlton Heston.
Still, we've got to look for answers to prevent further massacres, if not to
clear up the mystery in Littleton. The Internet has been getting heat not only as a host
for some of the sick enthusiasms of the Trenchcoat Mafia, but as a potential source of
explosives information. Defenders of the Net rightfully note that criticizing the reach of
the increasingly pervasive Web is like blaming paper for bad poetry. Still, it's
undeniable that cyberspace offers unlimited opportunity to network with otherwise
unreachable creepy people. What's worse is how the Net makes it easy to succumb to the
temptation to post anything—even Ubermensch song lyrics or murderous
threats—without the sure sanctions that would come if you tried that in your
geographical community. The Internet credo is empowerment, and unfortunately that also
applies to troubled teens sticking their toes into the foul water of hatemongering. As
parents are learning, the Net's easy accessibility to the netherworlds is a challenge that
calls, at the least, for a measure of vigilance.
Hollywood is also a fat target. From Oliver Stone's lyric depiction of random
murder (rabidly viewed by the Columbine killers) to stylish slaughter in "The
Matrix," violence is the main course on our entertainment menu. We are a nation that
comfortably embraces Tony Soprano, a basic-values type of guy who not only orders hits but
himself performs the occasional whacking. The industry's defense is summarized by Doug
Richardson, who's scripted "Die Hard II" and "Money Train." "If I
were to accept the premise that the media culture is responsible," he says,
"then I would be surprised that the thousands of violent images we see don't inspire
more acts of violence." In other words, the sheer volume of carnage is proof of its
harmlessness.
Then there are the shoot-and-splatter videogames like Doom—cited as a
possible template for the Colorado killing spree. Some are concerned that hours of
participating in a killing-machine fantasy might make a real-life version more
palatable—a concern made more alarming since millions of people regularly play Doom
and its cousins. Doom's creators aren't talking, but Bob Settles, who works on similar
games for Bungee software (which makes the popular Myth II game), disputes that racking up
virtual body counts is a prelude to real-life mayhem. "Mostly people who play our
games get a little relief—it allows them to let out anger," he says. That may
be, but isn't it logical to assume that a kid on the edge, after spending days immersed in
these killer simulations, might gain a comfort level with the experience? "I'm less
worried about Myth II in the hands of a troubled teenager," says Settles, "than
the danger of having a gun in the household."
But it's not an either-or situation: guns are all too available to troubled kids
steeped not just in videogames or slash movies, but the entire volatile stew that's, well,
America. Videogames, the Net and Hollywood are just the low-hanging fruit in this blame
game. The violent-entertainment complex survives because it caters to us: its brutal
images and dark-side pursuits exist because they're popular and profitable.
Traditional media exploit this, too; the week's news coverage speaks directly to
our fascination with home-bred violence. The killers may have been steeped in a crock pot
of fantasy carnage, but now the nation is willingly marinating in its very real aftermath:
a tissue-consuming orgy of victim interviews and 911 tapes. As a TV-anchor magnet,
suburban-school killers easily outpace a complicated conflict in a consonant-ridden corner
of the world. (To be fair, Newsweek sent its share of correspondents, too.) Like it or
not, the dramatic personae of Columbine High School were destined to be familiar
characters in the ongoing American docu-drama.
Katie Couric's emotional interview with two bereaved victims was great
television, but as NBC and its cable sisters reran it as frequently as an MTV video in
heavy rotation, the line between news and tear-jerking entertainment got fuzzier. ABC's
"Nightline" arranged a "town meeting" where victims in Jonesboro,
Ark., still smarting from last season's school massacre, were recruited to offer guidance
to freshly grieving Littleton victims. Perhaps such communication can be helpful, but
should it be conducted under the gaze of millions of onlookers, and broken up by
commercial breaks? This is what comes when victims become "gets" in the
increasingly intense competition to win the ratings war for the tragedy du jour.
What we're left with is a vicious cycle where even the examination of a disaster
reinforces the violence-obsessed culture that may have helped trigger it. How can you pull
the threads of violence from a society when those strands are so deeply woven into our
character? We're left with a bromide: make sure that your kids don't get in so deep that
fantasies cross over to horrible, heartbreaking reality. It'll have to do because the
culture isn't changing. We like it too much.
