GAMING'S EFFECT ON THE CHARLIE KIRK ASSASSIN

When tragedies strike, the rush to explain them often falls into ideological trenches. However, in the case of the Charlie Kirk assassination, there may have been something beyond ideology that moved the shooter to act violently. Much has been made of the shooter's supposed left ideology and the claim that it is his left-leaning politics that moved him to act in this violent manner. This claim falls neatly into the prevailing trade winds of discourse that embraces a simple dichotomy and frames everything into black and white, cut and dry, left and right. For me, this is a little too neat.

Interestingly, the shooter's family says the shooter's "political" interest is a very recent thing, and that the shooter is not affiliated with a political party or group; he hasn't voted in any election, and he hasn't participated in any protests. He seems not to be the usual political animal we've come to know. Rather his interest is narrowly focused on homosexual and transvestite issues, he having a biological male friend who wants to be like a female, calling this person "my love".

This being said, I propose (from a physician's point of view) an alternate explanation as to why this young man acted on his passions; that it was not so much driven by political disagreement as much as it was driven by unbridled emotional impulse caused by the effects of something else, that something else being gaming. --- Here me out.

Those in the know say the shooter and his friends were avid and regular video game players. Also, a pundit shared that investigators made the connection that the shooter's messages on the bullets and elsewhere are similar to the slogans and revolutionary chants found in video games like Far Cry 6, a game where players navigate immersive, often brutal campaigns involving guerrilla warfare and insurgency. Its dark themes, like power, rebellion, and destruction, may resonate differently with impressionable minds struggling with identity, stress, or gender disorientation.

The FBI has shared the chat conversations between the shooter and his paramour on the platform Discord, a popular platform for gamers, in which the shooter purportedly incriminates himself.

Why would playing a video game matter?

Turns out that studies have assuredly found that young males between the ages of 18 and 25 who regularly watch violent video games undergo changes in their brain cells (brain plasticity) that in turn affects their cognition, ability to think clearly, and their behavior, with their behavior tending to the violent side of life.

One does not need to stretch imagination to see how hours of immersion in violent, aggressive gaming worlds can reshape perception and decision-making. Neuroscience has begun to show us that such entertainment does not just entertain—it rewires. This detail deserves more attention than it has received.

What the Science Says

Two strands of research support this concern:
Brain Plasticity and Aggression\ A study published in Molecular Psychiatry (Kühn et al., 2018) found that frequent engagement with violent video games led to structural changes in brain regions linked to emotion regulation and aggression. Specifically, reduced gray matter was observed in the anterior cingulate cortex, a key area involved in impulse control.
Cognitive Function and Behavior\ Another study in Frontiers in Psychology (Bediou et al., 2018) analyzed over a hundred studies and concluded that violent video game exposure can alter executive functions, attention control, and risk-taking behavior. These shifts are subtle but cumulative—gradually shaping how young males think, feel, and act.
Put simply: repeated immersion in digital violence doesn’t just stay on the screen. It leaves fingerprints on the brain itself.

A Pattern Worth Studying
It is worth considering a broader question: what role does gaming play in other recent shootings? In recent years we've seen about twelve school and church shootings involving persons who called themselves trans. While gender identity draws much of the media spotlight, little effort has been made to study their gaming habits. Would patterns emerge if we investigated what types of games these shooters consumed? Were they also immersed in violent virtual environments that rewarded aggression and blurred the line between choice and consequence?

Why this Matters
It is tempting to reach for political labels when explaining tragedy. But the human brain is not shaped by ideology alone. Environment, family, stress, isolation, and increasingly—technology—all leave their mark. Violent video games are more than mindless entertainment. They engage the brain in repetitive rehearsals of aggression, and over time, practice makes permanent.

If Charlie Kirk’s assassination teaches us anything, it is that we must look beyond partisan blame. Understanding how repeated exposure to violent virtual worlds reshapes cognition and behavior may help us prevent the next tragedy. Politics may color the story, but neuroscience may explain it.

The Remedy?
The astute physician, and observer, is cautious not to sink into "anchor-thinking", where that which is most familiar to us is allowed to crowd out other options and possibilities in our thinking when it comes to considering the cause of disease or cause of event. Deductive reasoning is paramount in diagnosing and treating. Only by arriving at the correct diagnosis is an effective treatment applied. How do we treat the young males enthralled with violent video games? There's probably not a treatment unless there is consensus in legislating the content of video games, which I doubt would ever be possible. Until then, parenting teens and young men to moderate their time and frequency on these types of video games may be the next best thing. And even with that, that's a small hope. These days many parents take the path of least resistance and let technology "babysit" their children rather than summon the energy required to stay the course in the more nobler path of childrearing.

References
Kühn, S., Kugler, D., Schmalen, K., Weichenberger, M., Witt, C., & Gallinat, J. (2018). The neural basis of video gaming. Molecular Psychiatry, 23(2), 399–407.

Bediou, B., Adams, D. M., Mayer, R. E., Tipton, E., Green, C. S., & Bavelier, D. (2018). Meta-analysis of action video game impact on perceptual, attentional, and cognitive skills. Frontiers in Psychology, 9, 307.