For many poor virgin souls, World of Warcraft has become an alternate version of life. This appears to be the case with the young man in this video. His mother symbolically kills him by deleting his WoW account and he does not suffer the injustice in silence. What follows is a textbook vision of an adolescent tantrum:

This display of frustration and anger is without a doubt impressive, but the question still remains as to whether the video is real or fake. I would like to believe that the whole thing was staged because it really is a sad vision of the modern youth. If this is how kids react to a deleted computer game account, how will they cope with getting rejected by girls, unfulfilled dreams, and the second great depression.  Unfortunately though, there are aspects of this clip that are too organic, too savage, and too similar to a demonic possession to have been unauthentic.

The first suspicious aspect of the video is how perfectly the camera is set up (0:10). If the first young man in the video really set this camera up on the fly, he has some serious director of photography potential (at least for hidden camera pornography). The framing captures every moment of the tirade with the exception of the young man’s brief trip into the closet. It may be too good.

Also, some of the statements that the young man makes during his fit of rage are questionable. “Get out of my room!” (0:13) “I want to run away! I want to run away and never come back!” (0:35) “Is this what you want!” (1:20). They come off as being too close to the stereotype of the angst ridden child. Still, I believe these statements are consistent with the cliche filled speech patterns of a true child in crisis. The object of the tantrum is to paint yourself as the victim. The young man establishes that his privacy has been violated and his mother has caused him to exit the family. The classic “I hate all you assh*les” impulse.

Finally, the outlandish actions caught on camera are deserving of close investigation. In addition to the rampant flailing and pterodactyl shrieks, the young man expresses his anger with some fairly absurd actions. At one point, he takes a television remote control and tries to forcibly insert it into his anus (1:10). To me, this act is so embarrassing and so revealing of an unstable subconscious that it could not have been planned. Later, he hits himself repeatedly with a shoe (1:21). This is problematic because it is a very intelligent choice for someone who is in a very irrational state. The sole is hard enough to cause some pain, but soft enough to not cause serious injury. At the end, the young man gives his bed a stiff punch before exiting the room (1:49). I believe this moment is a genuine kid reaction. He wants to feel tough and unleash his strength, but he knows not to punch the wall because putting a hole in the plaster will only get him in more trouble with his mother. An amazingly accurate representation of the feeble adolescent state.

For humanity’s sake, I hope that this video isn’t real. But I think it is just too insane not to be.