In May 2023, French President Emmanuel Macron boasted on Twitter that France was investing 300 million euros in promoting films and video games. But now games are “poisoning” young people in France and contributing to the outbreaks of violence.
What’s going on in France?
“Like in the video games they poison”
What do video games have to do with it? In a statement, Macron condemned the violence and called the situation “unacceptable and unjustified.”
Among other things, he blames video games for the current situation, alongside social media and parental failure.
So says Macron: Parents should keep their children away from the riots. Social media played a role in the escalating tensions and was used to organize the protests:
There’s a vibe that some people live on the streets like in the video games they poison.
The culprit here seems to be the “violent evil game” once again, like GTA 5.
Macron seems to have missed the fact that “riots in the suburbs of Paris by angry young people because politics have failed” is such a well-known problem that French action films have been addressing it for 20 years (“Banlieu 13”).
Why does that seem so strange? Less than 2 months ago, on May 18, 2023, Macron had announced on Twitter that they were investing “massively” in “our cinema, audiovisual and computer games”.
300 million euros would allow the state to double production capacity.
We too had a discussion about “killer games” in 2023 after riots broke out over New Year’s Eve:
Journalist revives the killer game debate in 2023: “Young men sit in front of these games and chase others”