Most families bond over shared videogame experiences. In Italy, one family got into a knife fight over them. An Italian teenager stabbed his father in the neck with a 15-inch blade after the two got into an argument over the best strategies to utilize in FIFA 2009.
46-year-old Fabrizio tried to offer 16-year-old Mario some tactical advice for the soccer game, but Mario became petulant and the father decided to switch off the television. This action crossed a line with Mario, who retrieved a knife from the kitchen, stabbed his father in the neck, and then proceeded to clean the knife in front of his mother.
The mother didn’t know why Mario was cleaning the knife until Fabrizio staggered bleeding into the kitchen. One can imagine she was relatively surprised. After the attack, Mario shut himself in his room and waited for police, who arrested him without incident.
“We bought him FIFA 2009 because we didn’t want him playing violent games,” explains the mother.
Well, I think this pretty much makes it clear that whether or not the game itself is violent doesn’t matter. If you’re mental enough to stab people in their necks with kitchen knives, it doesn’t matter what you’re playing. Of course, I fully expect the tabloids to conveniently ignore the fact that this was a sports game and then wait for the next GTA “inspired” crime.
Italian teen stabs father in PlayStation row [Reuters via GamePolitics]
