Russian roulette

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A revolver, as used in Russian roulette.

Russian roulette (Russian: Русская рулетка, Russkaya ruletka) is a potentially lethal game of chance in which participants place a single round in a revolver, spin the cylinder, place the muzzle against their head and pull the trigger. "Russian" refers to the supposed country of origin of the game and roulette to the element of risk-taking and the spinning of the revolver's cylinder being reminiscent of spinning a roulette wheel.

The form of the game can be as varied as the participants or their motives (displays of bravado, boredom, suicide, etc.), but typically a single round is placed in a six-shot revolver resulting in a 1/6 (or approximately 16.67%) chance of the revolver discharging the round. Regardless of any player's position in the shooting sequence, his initial odds are the same as for all other players. The revolver's cylinder can either be spun again to reset the game conditions, or the trigger can be pulled again. Using revolvers with fewer chambers or increasing the number of rounds are variations that increase the risk of being killed in any given round of play.

History

Most of the legends abound regarding the invention of Russian roulette are, predictably, set in Russia or occur among Russian soldiers.

In one legend, 19th-century Russian prisoners were forced to play the game while the prison guards bet on the outcome. In another version, desperate and suicidal officers in the Russian army played the game to impress each other.

Whether Tsarist officers actually played Russian roulette is unclear. In a text on the Tsarist officer corps, John Bushnell, a Russian history expert at Northwestern University, cited two near-contemporary memoirs by Russian army veterans: The Duel (1905) by Aleksandr Kuprin and From Double Eagle to Red Flag (1921) by Pyotr Krasnov. Both books tell of officers' suicidal and outrageous behaviour, but Russian roulette is not mentioned in either text. The standard sidearm issued to Russian officers from 1895 to 1930 was the Nagant M1895 revolver. A double-action, seven chambered revolver, the Nagant's cylinder spins clockwise until the hammer is cocked. While the cylinder does not swing out as in modern hand-ejector style double action revolvers, it can be spun around to randomize the result. It is possible that Russian officers shot six and kept the seventh cartridge live. Due to the deeply seated rounds unique to the Nagant's cartridge and that the primers are concealed, it would be very difficult to tell from the outside where the live round was and which were spent; this would add to the uncertainty of the results.

Several teen deaths following the release of the film The Deer Hunter caused police and the media to blame the film's depiction of Russian roulette, saying that it inspired the youth.^[1]

Variations

It is assumed, probably solely based on some cinematic depictions, that two players either take turns spinning and firing the revolver so that each successive turn has an equal 1/6 probability of failure or that the players simply take turns without spinning the cylinders until one is shot. If playing with more than two players, without re-spinning, the initial probability of each player for being killed is 1/6th, but the probability of being killed changes every time the trigger is pulled. The second player has a 1/5th (20%) probability of being killed, and the probability of the third player 1/4th (25%). Until player #6 when the chance of being killed is 1 (100%) assuming the bullet properly works.

In the former case, where they respin the chamber, the game could continue indefinitely and gamblers could presumably only wager on which players will survive and how many turns the game will last.

Demographics

A retrospective study in Kentucky, USA showed that about 80% of the victims of Russian roulette were white, all of them male, the average age was 25 years and alcohol drinking played a much bigger role than in other cases of suicide by shooting.^[2]

Notable Russian roulette incidents

Numerous incidents have been reported regarding Russian roulette. Many are teenagers, with some players as young as 14.^[3]

• British author Graham Greene claimed that in his youth he often played Russian roulette as a means to provide "excitement and get away from the boredom". But he later decided that "it was no more exciting than taking aspirin for a headache".^[4]
• In his autobiography, Malcolm X says that during his burglary career he once played Russian roulette, pulling the trigger three times in a row to convince his partners in crime that he was not afraid to die. In the epilogue to the book, Alex Haley states that Malcolm X revealed to him that he palmed the round.
• On December 24, 1954, the American blues musician Johnny Ace killed himself in Texas after a gun he pointed at his own head discharged. Many sources, including the Washington Post^[5] attribute this to Russian roulette, though witnesses to the shooting have claimed it was actually an accident after Ace had been playing with his weapon.
• John Hinckley, Jr., the man who attempted to murder President Ronald Reagan in 1981, was known to play Russian roulette, alone, on two occasions. Hinckley also took a picture of himself in 1980 pointing a gun at his head.^[6]
• PBS claims that William Shockley, co-inventor of the transistor and winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics, had attempted suicide by playing a solo game of Russian roulette.^[7]
• On October 5, 2003, psychological illusionist Derren Brown played Russian roulette on British television Channel 4. The stunt was broadcast live with a slight delay allowing the program to cut to a black screen if anything had gone wrong. The stunt was condemned by some as being irresponsible, and a statement by the police that they had been informed of the arrangements in advance and were satisfied that "at no time was anyone at risk"^[8] made it clear that the incident was a hoax. However, it was proved on the prerecorded segment of the program that at point blank range even a blank cartridge is potentially lethal, and may cause concussion to the head, deafness or burns.

See also

• Russian roulette in popular culture
• Quantum Suicide
• Russian Roulette (game show)
• Russian Roulette (song)

References

External links

• The Deer Hunter death roll
• Teen Wounded Playing Russian Roulette
• Man, 18, Dies in Russian Roulette
• "Russian Roulette" Olympics Death
• Kablamo, a tongue-in-cheek board game with a Russian roulette theme.
• Gimp Roulette, a Shockwave webpage game that simulates Russian roulette.