Grand Theft Auto V has been accused of promoting violence plenty of times, such as when a petition pulled it from Target's shelves, but we still weren't expecting it to be blamed for the recent terrorist attacks on the French magazine Charlie Hebdo. Nevertheless, an Italian newspaper did just that earlier this month.
The article doesn't make a particularly strong connection between the terrorists and GTA V, but instead claims watching the attack would be almost like watching a scene from GTA V. From there, the author moves on to focus on the cold efficiency of the terrorists... but why bring up GTA V at all?
He might have only meant to use a video game comparison to explain the surreal nature of seeing such a terrible event, but lines like "It is not by chance that the jihadist sympathizers have created their own version of GTA to attract would-be recruits" seem to toss an accusation against the game, at least by implication.
By this point, there have been enough studies that prove video games do not cause violence that we should be beyond this. For that matter, given GTA V's popularity, the crime rate should have skyrocketed since its release if it was truly to blame.
We sincerely doubt GTA V is responsible for these recent acts of terrorism.
