by Giana Bacordo

What once seemed unimaginable is actualizing itself as a dangerous problem in the Philippines: school violence. On August 18, a student entered the Ateneo de Zamboanga University (AdZU) and opened fire. Public discourse has been reignited, spiraling into discussions of school safety and youth radicalization. Authorities are now examining his digital footprint as they try to understand what drives a young student to commit such violence. Among the questions being examined is what role, if any, his online activities may have played. Consequently, the investigation has spilled into a familiar context — video games and the cultures that surround them.

The question is not new. Following a similar instance of school violence in Tacloban in June, public attention has shifted beyond the perpetrators themselves and more to the factors that may have influenced them. This can include the media they consumed, the people they interacted with, and the games they played. Such topics can be subject to great scrutiny, especially when creating the profile of a suspect. In the aftermath of the AdZU shooting, which claimed two lives, authorities have even begun investigating the shooter’s gaming chat history.

The mere presence of video games in a perpetrator’s digital history, however, should not be treated automatically as a signifier for violence. Unlike what has been suggested by the DILG, the mere correlation of Roblox being played by two shooters is not enough for the game to be at fault. Instead, it is more pertinent to examine the online communities that are built around these games and the way they expose their users to exploitation or radicalization.

Gaming Culture

In the Philippines, over 95% of Internet users play video games, making it one of the most prevalent forms of digital entertainment in the country. More importantly, games themselves are increasingly difficult to separate from the cultures that surround them. Adjacent to these applications is the growth of various social spaces online, both in-game and on social media.

For many players, these external spaces are an extension of the gaming experience. User BushyGround, a member of various gaming communities on social media platforms such as Discord, described these platforms as a venue for coordinating with other players.

This is especially given the fact that many games’ built-in communication channels have insufficient features. For Roblox, it is said that users go out of their way to search for these communities. “It’s a way to synchronize time,” he said. “It’s, like, oh, you’re online? Let’s go inside.” These external platforms often serve a practical purpose, as a way to coordinate outside of the game itself. 

An important distinction to be made here is that they are not necessarily radicalizing or toxic spaces. Most gamers use them for community, as a way to interact with like-minded individuals who share the same hobby. However, it is also important to note their capacity as borderless social spaces, particularly when it comes to how young users may encounter dangerous personalities that could expose them to exploitation. There are approximately 12 million minor gamers in the Philippines, and a general lack of maturity makes them more vulnerable to targeted exploitation. Despite this, it remains that this susceptibility is not an inherent danger of video games and their use despite fear-mongering, and instead an aspect that requires further monitoring.

For BushyGround, most interactions within these spaces remain centered on the games themselves despite the existence of external channels. “For the most of my interactions, it’s all just memes,” he said. Harmful spaces are not necessarily representative of the gaming community as a whole.

As another way of putting this distinction: “Nasa chat group ang panganib, wala sa Roblox.” It is the environments cultivated around these games that make them so risky, especially for younger users. Being able to focus on this can help cultivate better, more effective solutions, especially in serving to protect users from exploitation while allowing them to engage in gaming communities. Stigmatizing the topic can create unnecessary isolation, further insulating these extremist groups into further radicalization.

In fact, these communities have also become part of the effort against online extremism. According to the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC), several Filipinos have tipped authorities regarding possible instances of extremist behaviors online. It is this cooperation that will allow authorities in the future to further probe into this exploitative phenomenon and protect younger users from patterns of extremism.

Into Darker Corridors

It is important to acknowledge, however, that an aspect of these communities can facilitate the spread of violent and extremist ideas. Radical online groups become insular by creating an environment immersed in harmful or violent ideas. As members become more invested in the group, increasingly extreme ideas are proportionately normalized. Such polarization can contribute to environments where increasingly extreme ideas are normalized. 

This process happens gradually. Gaming communities are interconnected, and it is easy for users to shift between several groups at a time. BushyGround believes that one possible pathway is to have met someone who introduces a certain player to another community. In this sense, games can serve as an entry point into a network of several sub-communities, some of which may be exploitative, especially for younger users.

For younger users, this kind of activity can be relatively difficult to monitor. BushyGround described age verification as a prevalent weakness on many online platforms, noting that it is easy for users to falsify their birthdays when creating accounts. While some Discord communities require identity verification, he said these remain a minority. This results in an environment where young, vulnerable users can enter radicalist spaces without their guardians knowing, interact with exploitative strangers, and do so with little friction.

According to the UN, “Violent extremist actors are increasingly believed to be shifting towards gaming and gaming-adjacent platforms, using them for recruitment, propaganda and communication through in-game chats, private servers, cultural memes and modified game content.” It is precisely the reach of gaming communities combined with the vulnerability of minors that makes these groups so dangerous. 

One standout in terms of ideology is nihilistic violent extremism (NVE). It is a relatively broad term, referring to the general glorification of extreme violence as an end in and of itself. As patterned in the Philippines, minors are lured from games into certain communities online, grooming them into NVE. Ultimately, it is these online communities that provide social connections that may be exploited by people deliberately seeking to influence vulnerable users.

BushyGround has encountered violent, hateful, and explicit content on Discord, but said that such content usually came from outsiders or “trolls” rather than established members. “In Discord communities, there’s always going to be a troll,” he said. Indeed, not every instance of violent content is going to be representative of the community as a whole.

However, he also describes a certain difficulty that comes with identifying these bad actors as genuine or not. When asked if gamers have an increased responsibility in reporting possible extremist activity online, he mentioned that these activities should first be verifiably harmful. A major aspect of the gaming community, he said, is the existence of trolls. This particular aspect of gaming culture can make it even more difficult to distinguish budding radicalism from simple trolling. Treating every provocative user as evidence of extremism in the gaming community risks creating more unfair generalizations.

At the same time, he noted that many communities have moderators who monitor users who violate community rules. However, such moderation is not always effective; harmful content can still make its way through existing safeguards. Such content should still not define these communities as a whole.

Beyond the Blame

What authorities know about the AdZU shooter’s online activities remains subject to internal investigation. As of August 20, the CICC was still awaiting a warrant for investigation; according to its Executive Director, however, the information often takes months to be returned from the initial investigation. As per the investigation, the PNP has started using “digital forensics” in order to establish if there were any prior warning signs in the shooter’s behavior that may have signified the planned violence.

Whatever the results of the investigation may be, it is still a subject of dispute whether or not video games should be blamed for the resulting violence. Studies done by the American Psychological Association show a small correlation between violent video games and general aggression, but find that these do not necessarily cause violent outcomes in users. Moreover, a correlation of violent content in video games does not establish causation in which someone is urged to commit real-world violence.

Therefore, it follows that parents have a responsibility in upholding the content that their children consume online. Active monitoring from guardians can protect children from being drawn into exploitative online groups and becoming victims of grooming. A recent case involved such responsibility, where several parents were able to report their children’s planned shooting based on their concerning web history.

Malacañang said on Tuesday that it has started considering a blanket ban on social media platforms, including gaming apps, if it is found that they “pose serious risks to public safety.” However, such a broad response does not necessarily constitute effectiveness.   Greater attention should be placed on the communities and systems behind ideologies like NVE and the violence that they bring. 

Particular focus should be placed on the way in which young users are exposed to increasingly radical online spaces and how these communities are allowed to develop. Rather than letting the platforms overshadow the ideologies themselves, the government could strengthen the Philippine National Police’s capacity to direct its Anti-Cybercrime Group to further investigate and monitor these gaming communities. Moreover, they could expand channels that currently allow citizens to report suspected extremist activity, which subsequently act as a safeguard for users. This targeted approach would allow for structured intervention, such that authorities are able to disrupt the harmful environments in which violence is bred while still preserving the communities that they are built around.

Gaming culture has always been bigger than the game. It comprises the people, the attitudes, and a million other things that create both inherent character and inevitable risks. Not doing so diminishes focus on the increasingly prevalent extremism that should be more emphasized as a red flag for the violence that is arising all over the Philippines. The AdZU shooting exists as a case study for the complexity of violence in the ecosystems and communities that surround it. Recognizing these nuances helps impede a culture of violence, shifting attention to the digital spaces that serve as pathways to radicalization.