Tonight, on Sick Sad World…
You’ve heard of playing SWAT games in Call of Duty, but what about actually sending SWAT to someone’s house because you lost to them in a videogame? On a scale of one to fedora-tipping, how pathetic is that?
An anonymous gamer called 911 on a Long Island teen this Tuesday with a fake tip to emergency responders that he had killed his mother and brother. Since these types of calls must be taken seriously, over 70 emergency responders arrived at the scene of a 17-year-old’s house who sat listlessly playing Call of Duty.
The reports may not indicate this, but the victim was probably able to dust the Doritos grime from his fingers long enough to answer the door — oh, wait. SWAT doesn’t have time for all that. I’m sure they burst in and scared the living daylights out of him and his poor, clueless mother, wasting taxpayers’ time and money when someone actually in need could have benefited. The tip was submitted online, and is traceable, but investigators are still trying to find the perp.
This isn’t just a one-off thing, either. It’s a game known as “Swatting,” a practice that began on 4chan where participants walk directly to the nearest cliff overlooking a large body of water and jump to their watery deaths, because they are wastes of space. I suppose there are “rules” or whatever to Swatting as well, but you just don’t need to do it. Ever. Dang whippersnappers.
Sore loser sends SWAT team storming into Long Island home of rival as revenge for beating him in ‘Call of Duty’ [NY Daily News]
