Geek Pride

Exploring the intersection of pop culture, mass media and the geek/gamer mind

Ethan Gilsdorf is a journalist, teacher, poet, geek and the author of Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks. See full bio

November 6, 2009, Stress

Could fantasy have prevented the Fort Hood slayings?

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan should have been a gamer.

Is it possible that fantasy or gaming could have prevented the brutal slayings at Fort Hood? Perhaps.

The motive for the shooting wasn't clear. But Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the accused shooter, was said to have expressed some anger about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Too bad he did not find the proper venue to express that anger.

The power of simulations and make-believe have been proven. By play-acting scenarios --- be it Civil War re-enactment, a model UN, the classic role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) or an online game like World of Warcraft (WoW) --- we can imagine different outcomes. We can pretend to be good and chivalrous, or evil or villainous, all within the safe realm of a play. And by role-playing, which is a kind of inhabiting other sides of ourselves, and other possible personalities, we imagine how others live.

Gaming and fantasy play give us the chance to take risks in controlled ways. They let us sort out complex feelings of fear and anger. They let us blow off steam. Contrary to the fears of a post-Columbine High School world, gamers don't mix up reality with fantasy. But some people, and perhaps Nidal Malik Hasan was one of them, let reality become too burdensome. Obsessed with their own emotions, they lose their sense of what is right and wrong. And then they make a huge mistake.

In a book like Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter, we are reminded again by what is good and what is evil. These narratives ground us. They recalibrate our internal moral barometers. A swords-and-sorcery or futuristic realm has conflict, and when there's a conflict being acted out, just like in all great literature, we learn useful stuff about the human condition. In a way, D&D is a huge exercise in empathy.

I'm not saying that had Hasan played D&D or WoW, these shootings would not have happened. But they might not have happened. Perhaps by finding some venue to express these dark thoughts, he would have found catharsis. And not, as it turned out, gut-wrenching tragedy and pain for countless others.

Perhaps, had Nidal Malik Hasan played a first-person shooter game in an imaginary realm, he would not have felt compelled to create his own first-person shooter game in the real world.

Ethan Gilsdorf is the author of the new travel memoir Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms.