Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is running for president as an independent, is not immune for non-traditional theories and his latest on does not disappoint.
Critics have challenged Kennedy’s stance that guns are not the problem — antidepressants and video games are to blame for mass shootings in the U.S., according to the HuffPost.
Kennedy espoused these claims in a January interview with TRT World’s Tim Constantine and shared by Democratic strategist Keith Edwards on X, formerly Twitter.
Kennedy wants the National Institutes of Health to look into “the etiology” of gun violence, per the HuffPost.
“NIH needs to be studying them to see if there’s connections to some of the SSRI and psychiatric drugs people are taking or there’s connections to video games,” Kennedy said on “The Capitol Hill Show.”
“His campaign previously shared a clip of the interview that highlights a Mayo Clinic definition of SSRIs and cuts to footage of kids playing video games,” per the outlet.
A couple of news organizations have reported that, according to experts, there is no link between psychiatric drugs nor video games and mass shootings.
PolitiFact.com reported in 2019 that there is no link between psychiatric drugs and mass shootings, while CNBC reported there’s no evidence that video games cause mass shootings.
Several people spoke out against Kennedy’s theories, including Parkland school shooting survivor David Hogg.
“Wow I had no idea America was the only country with anti-depressants and video games,” Hogg wrote on X.
Wow I had no idea America was the only country with anti-depressants and video games. https://t.co/T32eCMWrY8
— David Hogg(@davidhogg111) April 4, 2024
