On February 14, 2018, a 19-year-old killed 17 students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, using a legally purchased AR-15 rifle.
Getty Images/Joe Raedle
Margarita Lasalle (L-R), the budget keeper, and Joellen Berman, Guidance Data Specialist, and Holli Sutton visit the memorial in front of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School as teachers and staff are allowed to return to the school for the first time since the mass shooting on campus on February 23, 2018 in Parkland, Florida.
Less than a week later, amid a resurgence in the gun debate in the United States, President Trump suggested that the influence of violent video games plays a role in mass shootings.
"The level of violence on video games is really shaping young people's thoughts," Trump said on February 22. "You see these movies, they're so violent, and yet a kid is able to see the movie. If sex isn't involved, but killing is involved. And maybe they have to put a rating system for that, and you get into a whole very complicated, very big deal."
On Thursday, Trump is scheduled to meet with prominent video-game industry executives to discuss, "violent video-game exposure and the correlation to aggression and desensitization in children."
But there's good reason to expect that nothing will come of this meeting. Here's why:
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