There's evidence suggesting that violent video games don't really lead to mass shootings and other firearm-related homicides. As I noted in today's column, Germany, Japan, Australia, the UK, France, South Korea and the Netherlands all spend more per capita on video games than the U.S., but the rate of gun violence is significantly lower in those nations. Much lower.
In graph form (click to enlarge):
Click to enlarge.
There was also a discussion about this lack of correlation on yesterday's edition of The Cycle:
Regardless of whether there's evidence of a connection, I always get a little uncomfortable when we start talking about censoring the arts. Certainly we can do more to keep violent material out of the hands of children (and irresponsible parents, too), but that's where it has to end -- no matter how much I personally dislike the realistically violent war games and so forth.
In fairness, however, here's a study showing that video games make teenagers more aggressive (if that's possible). But there's nothing in the study that correlates gaming with the kinds of gun violence we've been witnessing here.
(h/t Karin Riley Porter)