Backward parents in the US have ordered the burning of adult computer games believing that they must be responsible for the spate of gun murders in the country. Book burnings were popular with the Nazis and the Roman catholic church as a method of distracting the populace from the real issues. In the US rather than blaming the murder spate on disaffected children who had too much easy access to guns, parents are blaming (roll the eight ball) violent video games. (Back in my day it was Judas Priest. Ed)

A community group formed after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, is offering gift tokens to people who turn in their violent videogames to be destroyed. Based in Southington, Connecticut, less than 30 miles from Newtown, the group, named SouthingtonSOS is holding a trade-in event on 12 January as part of its Violent Video Games Return Program where videogames and other violent media can be exchanged for gift certificates donated by the Greater Southington Chamber of Commerce.

The group claims that it wants to promote responsible citizenship but strangely it says that its actions are not intended to be construed as statement declaring that violent video games were the cause of the shocking violence in Newtown. However it is saying that there is ample evidence that violent video games, along with violent media of all kinds, including TV and movies portraying story after story showing a continuous stream of violence and killing, has contributed to increasing aggressiveness, fear, anxiety and is desensitising our children to acts of violence including bullying.

We will only believe they are sincere when they demand that all media is banned. Of course they will be disconnecting their kids from all forms of knowledge, but when 46 per cent of the US believe that the world is only 10,000 years old, you have to think that education is an optional extra in some parts of the US.