Between RFK Jr speculating that video games are a root cause of mass shootings, the Secret Service probing the alleged Charlie Kirk killer’s Steam history, and the US Oversight Committee requesting the presence of Steam, Twitch, and Discord’s CEOs at a radicalization hearing, you’d almost think we were back in the 90s (except for the part where social media has broken everybody’s brains and Square is now remaking Final Fantasy VII instead of just making it). But nope, we’re in the present, once again snoozing our way through the steps of a song and dance that felt tired the moment it was first trotted out. Video games don’t cause violence, but a small handful of very powerful, even stupider people sure wish they did. On the latest Aftermath Hours, we talk about what’s actually going on.
This time around, we’re joined by Morgan Sung of KQED’s Close All Tabs podcast to discuss shootings as shitposts and media censorship following the death of Charlie Kirk. While we still don’t know the killer’s precise motive, bullet engravings that reference video game memes and largely nonpolitical Discord activity seem to suggest that he was just a guy, possessed with the incoherent politics and general nihilism characteristic of extremely online young people in these times. What does it say that someone like him could still be pushed to this level of violence?
How, if at all, can mainstream media – which has shed most of its best internet-focused reporters over the years – accurately convey an online world that’s increasingly bleeding over into real life to aging normie audiences? And with the government moving quickly to crack down on free speech using Charlie Kirk as a cudgel, can independent media take up the torch where mainstream corporate media will inevitably falter?
Then we talk about Silksong!
You can find this week's episode below and on Spotify, Apple, or wherever else you prefer to listen to podcasts. If you like what you hear, make sure to leave a review so that Aftermath can rise to international prominence, take the place of the mainstream media apparatus, and buy NPR or something.
Here’s an excerpt from our conversation (edited for length and clarity):
Morgan: Our source for this episode [of Close All Tabs], Aidan Walker, is a meme researcher who literally has a degree in this kind of thing. The way he put it was really interesting. He pointed out how nihilistic a lot of the internet is – and how that nihilism isn’t really reflected or addressed in either political party. This is something that is so pervasive and also so overlooked that a lot of people just feel left out of the discussion entirely.
I’m just thinking of the way Twitter was so quick to try to blame groypers for this – trying to find a way that these references could be proof that this was the far, far right. Whereas conservative mainstream media was blaming the left. In reality, if you look at the court documents released after the alleged shooter was arrested, his politics seem a bit incomprehensible – just like a shitpost. It’s disruptive and incoherent.
Chris: Even Luigi Mangione’s politics were incoherent. If you’re gonna take a person’s life in a really high-profile way, chances are you’re both not mentally well and a median voter, and the median American voter has incoherent politics – particularly younger people. I feel like there is this sort of millennial, gen Z, gen alpha divide where politics, particularly post-2020, feels almost [hopeless]. I don’t know if younger people are gonna come around to politics in the way millennials did in the Bernie era. It does feel a little more like “Nothing really matters” nihilistic in younger groups.
Nathan: The most telling piece of reporting I’ve seen on all of this is Ken Klippenstein’s article about the Discord the alleged killer was in and the conversations that occurred between people in that Discord – and also the killer’s friends’ takes on what kind of person he was. They said he never really seemed all that political and mentioned that their Discord had a bunch of people of different political valences. They mostly just hung out and talked about video games. I think that’s very revealing: You don’t necessarily have to be a political radical to be driven insane by our current moment. This is bad for everyone. It leads to this prevalent nihilism where, if one thing pushes you too far or a few things do, that can lead to violence – especially when there’s not another pressure release valve on society in general.
Morgan: It’s like what we said earlier with Luigi Mangione: People were joking that Luigi Mangione was the OG radical centrist, but I think it’s less that and more that he and Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer are just guys who have been subjected to a system that is very broken and decided to retaliate in a horrific and violent way that isn’t right, but at the same time, all of the discussions people are having are missing those core causes of the reason they are retaliating.
Nathan: Yeah, that’s because I think – especially for mainstream media and the government – to talk about that element of things, they’d have to accept a degree of culpability, implicitly if not explicitly. And they sure as heck do not want to do that. So they’re going to point the finger at the typical scapegoats, like video games.
