Game Boy Murders Child

Smells Like Fox News at Eleven

In a stunning example of overly sensational (i.e., poor) journalism, The Sun, a UK-based newspaper, reported yesterday on the death of a seven-year-old British child who was vacationing in Phuket, Thailand, when he plugged his Christmas Game Boy into a wall socket while allegedly still wet from being in the pool. The full story can be found here.

The sensational part isn't the article itself. The article is fair about pointing out that the hotel's electrical system is more likely to blame than the Game Boy; that the authorities are calling this a tragic accident and attaching no blame; and that the child was both (allegedly) wet from playing in the pool and (assuredly) unsupervised at the time of his death.

The problem is the headline: Connor, 7, killed by Gameboy.

When a child dies of an electric shock (or any other common household hazard, like ingesting toxic cleaning chemicals or drowning in a swimming pool) it's a tragedy. It's not front page news. But if a Gameboy killed that child, that's a juicy story. Jack Thompson is probably salivating all over this as I write.

The Sun article is clearly biased against Nintendo. They fail to mention that this child's death could just as easily been caused by a Sony PSP. Or a deadly, deadly piece of Oneida silverware. But the media is so intent on sensationalizing the "dangers" of video games that this story must have seemed heaven sent. Usually newsmongers only get to report on video games inciting children to kill one another. When the video game actually killed the child, it's a whole brave new world of opportunity for agitating widespread panic in the nongaming public. Mothers, don't let your children grow up to be gamers.

Meanwhile, gamers everywhere should try to ignore the media circus and focus on the tragic fact that a promising young gamer has been taken from among us long before his time.