Eric Clapton Never Did Shoot A Sheriff...

That tends to be my generic answer to any argument about how violent some music (sub) culture that the speaker doesn't really understand is. Though pedants will then point out that it's a cover of a Bob Marley song, which combines astonishing pedantry with a high level of point missing. Most notably due to Bob saying this about the song:

"I want to say 'I shot the police' but the government would have made a fuss so I said 'I shot the sheriff' instead... but it's the same idea: justice."

That is, Bob Marley realised he could be in a lot of trouble for the song. I doubt it ever troubled Eric in quite the same way.

Anyway, notable humanitarian Bono is caught up with a lot of similar silliness about a computer game, Mercenaries 2. The original Mercenaries was an addictive GTA-alike, but with better weapon control, that involved blowing up large parts of a fantasy version of Korea. It's a lot of fun when it's not being totally frustrating — the boss levels ramped up the difficulty while not allowing you to save. Bono bought into the company that made this game and now they are making a sequel that will involve blowing up large parts of a fantasy version of Venezuela.

Naturally any number of leftys have called foul:

The Case for Impeachment co-author Dave Lindorff [...] say[s], "This kind of right-wing war game plays to the propaganda message that the Bush White House has been pushing for years: that Chavez is a dictator oppressing his people... Bono should use his financial interest in the company to kill it, or better, he should pull out entirely as an investor, and condemn such imperialist garbage."

Penny Arcade get to the root of just why this is so daft, only using a different kerfuffle over Las Vegas' protrayal in game.