A troubled gaming addict takes his life

Associated Press ^ | May 25, 2002 | MARTHA IRVINE

[Dog Gone]

No reported cases of Freepers becoming this addicted, but...

[basil]

Some of us seem to working on it--LOL!

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

[SamAdams76]

This is more of a case of mental illness than of an online addiction. Throwing chicken bones to the floor. Yikes! His place must have been a real pigsty.

[Tuor]

"I can't just sit here," she says. "I cannot let him die in vain."

He did die in vain, you fool. He became nothing and died for nothing.

Yes, EQ and other online games can be addicting. So can drinking, drugs, eating, and a thousand other things. If a person has has a susceptibility to addiction, then it is only a matter of what he or she becomes addicted to.

I once played an on-line game (a MUSH) for an average of 14 hours a day...every day. I did it not so much because I was addicted to MUSHing (though there was some of that), but because I so passionately wanted to avoid life...to avoid confronting failure and the situation I was in. Did I blame the MUSH for my addiction? No. This woman didn't even understand why her son did what he did, and now she's going to boldly assert it was the *game's* fault? She's clueless, just as she was when he was alive.

Tuor

[Hildy]

As sad as this is, if it wasn't this online game, it would have been something else.

[Tuor]

Damn skellies. They attack you even when you're *way* over their level. I always hate it when I'm just sitting down, minding my own business, when suddenly some stupid skeleton is whacking on me for pitiful amounts of damage.

All Skellies must die! (Even when you don't get any XP for killing them.)

Tuor

[usadave]

Officials at Sony Online declined to comment on the Woolley case or the possibility raised by Liz Woolley that she may sue.

So instead of just accepting the fact that her son had a problem, the mother wants to try to strike it rich by filing a lawsuit against the game maker. I guess she just can't get those visions of driving a nice Mercedes or Lexus out of her head.

[gcruse]

 money she might get from a lawsuit

Bitch.  I hope they laugh her out of court.

[Dog Gone]

Liz Woolley just started setting up an organization called Online Gamers Anonymous and a Web site to help people like Shawn -- with plans to use any money she might get from a lawsuit to help fund the organization.

So, she does plan to sue, after all.

I don't even have to ask which political party she belongs to. There's one that teaches that the individual has no responsibility, and anything that happens is someone else's fault.

[Tuor]

I don't even have to ask which political party she belongs to.

Like I said. She's clueless. She wont win, either. Cases like this have already been persued: they plantiffs lost.

I think her local state child service should monitor her other son to make sure he doesn't develop the same tendencies, since she is obviously a poor mother. Yeah... maybe they can eat their own (socialist child agency and socialist mother).

I feel a total lack of sympathy for her.

Tuor

[grimalkin]

Yep. Blame the game and not the person to avoid the *real* problem. What a maroon. I hope she gets nothing.

[gonzo]

Well, personally, Sam, I prefer yer beer!

Hope this dick-wad made the Darwin awards! I don't want to deal with any offspring!

"What's for dinner, sweetie?...Brocolli?!?!?!...BLAM!!!

Oh, wait... that was the Swedes!

I love the Saturday-Nite funnies! Stay well and vigilant, pal............FRegards

[Jalapeno]

Experts say pornography Web sites appear to be the biggest draw. Others spend hours chatting via computer with friends or people they meet online. Still others -- often teen-age boys looking for an escape from the stress and awkwardness of adolescence -- are pulled in by games.

EQ (aka Ever-Crack) is not as much an online 'game' as it is a fancy chatroom. These massive multiplayer games are very social, with guilds and friends list, conventions, etc. They have been the cause for Real-Life Marriages, Fights, Murders, and even Income for many people. The social aspect and real cause is something the mother and writer definitely miss in this article. Might as well sue the telephone comapny for enabling people to talk to each other.

[ChadGore]

Let's get some terms straight. It's not a rainforest, it's a jungle.
September 11th wasn't an event, it was an attack.
and
It's not gaming, it's gambling.

[Hot Tabasco]

No reported cases of Freepers becoming this addicted, but...

20 hrs. a week? Sheesh, what a wimp. By the way, what day is it???

[jlogajan]

[blackbart.223]

"So instead of just accepting the fact that her son had a problem, the mother wants to try to strike it rich by filing a lawsuit against the game maker."

I wonder how many ambulance chasers are drooling to try this one. Hell, they might even go for a class action suit ala big tobacco.