Couple Raises Virtual Baby, Starves Real One to Death

A South Korean couple who had become addicted to the game, Prius Online, allowed their premature child to starve to death. Authorities say they only managed to feed their premature baby once a day - in-between 12-hour stretches at an Internet cafe. They were picked-up some five months after reporting their child dead and autopsy reports confirmed the baby had died from protracted malnourishment. A police officer working the case said the couple had become despondent after losing their jobs and sought to drown their sorrows in the online roleplaying game.

While the mother was only 25, the father was 41-years old! Perhaps this has more to do with cultural differences than anything else, but I find it hard to believe anyone can become "legally" addicted to either the Internet or a video game. So sorry. While many in the West, like myself, remain skeptical, several Eastern societies - including China - fervently believe in "Internet addiction." Many alleged sufferers have been sent to treatment camps where deaths have occurred.

I've frequently discussed how I do not actively play video games, specifically because I've known far too many people who literally wasted their lives on them, but these people are actual losers. They knew full-well what they were doing; they were not addicted to the extent that they needed to play, nor were they delusional to such a point that they believed this to be the case. They simply chose to skip work, let themselves go, and withdraw from normal society in order to play their stupid games. I've known people who did this with tabletop roleplaying games, as well.

A 41-year old man simply cannot be assumed not to know better than to let his infant child starve to death unless he is found to be a functional retard.

© C Harris Lynn, 2010