Has violent game regulation gone too far?

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Okay that's pretty harsh, four years in prison because of selling a M rated game to a minor? The world's mad! I doubt major console compagny will agree to equip special locking chips for a very specific area (i.e NY state). And what about the previously bought consoles ? This is simply mad! I'm sure glad I don't live there.

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[ May 31, 2007, 18:49: Message edited by: Blackthorne TA ]

 

I agree that this provision is simply unenforcable. There's no way that any of the console makers are going to make a console specifically for New York State, and further, what about people who don't want the parental control? Heck, we can see things like, "rape, dismemberment, physical torture, mutilation or evisceration of a human being" on TV, and yet TVs aren't required to have parental control equipped in them. In fact, if you don't happen to have any kids, the parental control feature is actually quite useless to you.

I also think that 4 years in prison - and the crime being considered a felony - for selling or renting a mature game to a minor is crap too. Heck, you woulnd't get 4 years in prison for selling cocaine to a minor (if it was your first offense)! That having been said, I do have to say that many stores are probably excessively lax in who they sell/rent games too. Asking someone for ID before buying a mature game could be instituted the same way they card you when you buy cigarettes or alcohol.

 

Yes, it has gone too far. Putting the selling/giving of adult games to minors into the same group as murder and rape is ridiculous.
Just think about it. Two men are sitting in a prison. The other looks up and asks: "So, what're you in here for?"
The other replies: "Rape and murder. You?"
The other: "Oh... Well, I sold my copy of GTA:SA to some kid."

And the parental control technology-thingymajig? Ridiculous.

 

Four years for a class E felony? Better warm up a bunk for Jerry Bruckheimer and all those other producers of 'depraved' violence shows on US NETWORK TV; CSI et al., Bones, key-rist; I'd be willing to throw Gene Simmons and family in on that one - it was on cable, and I've got a fairly strong stomach, but I got seriously shaken by seeing graphic footage of his facelift!

I wonder if the proponent(s) of the bill actually expects it to pass, or is just doing some 'busy work' to look good on his/their constituency report(s)...

On a tangent, if video games is society's whipping boy now, any guesses what hobby/activity/etc will become the next focus once consoles either become fully mainstream (like rock&roll) or fade away from the gunsights (like RPGs)?

 

Let's face it, it's been going too far for 15 years (anyone remembers Lieberman's attempts at passing similar bills back in 1993?). I find it hard to believe that both parties have nothing better to do than come up with silly (and pretty useless) legislation like this.

Aldeth, I'm not entirely sure I agree with you. Yes, stores can be too lax, but selling a porn game to a 12 year old and selling Half-life 2 to a 16 year old is just not the same thing. Both however are a continent apart from cigarettes and alcohol, which are proven to have detrimental effects on physical health AND to be addictive. Video games are not intrinsically detrimental to physical health, and we're very, very far from any proof that they can affect mental health.

 

wont the law about part 2. simply make almost any game with teen rating or above impossible to sell in the state of new york?

Seems like another move towards a control-society, and ones again its old people who dont play the games themself and thereby has no knowledge about how a game works, who makes and control the law.

[ May 30, 2007, 21:20: Message edited by: Equester ]

 

Actually in certain situation video games can be beneficial, like in this case

 

Hmmh... I have to wonder, how many of these people actually have any experience in gaming (other than seeing the most gory parts on some propaganda film or trying it for five minutes)?

 

Chances are they never played a video game, which is kind of stupid really. How can you make a legislation without knowing the subject. Since video games are viewed as a stupid hobby at best and a dangerous tool to make criminal at worst, peopl don't have to know about it to speak about its evil.

 

Violent game regulation went to far the moment they started regulating it.

 

I can see where getting a really fair sample of opinions from this site

Well, I'm going to go slightly against the grain here and say that there is no reason that video games shouldn't have the same restrictions as movies have. But likewise, there is also no reason that they should have any more.

 

You misunderstand me. I'm not saying that buying a video game is the equivalent of buying cigarettes or alcohol. I'm saying stores that sell video games with mature ratings should card people to check their age - just like you would do for purchasing cigarettes or alcohol. So I'm just saying they should use the same basic policy - not saying that they are all equal. Anyone can tell you that when you reach the legal drinking age, you are commonly requested to prove your age to buy alcohol - for many years after reaching the age. So the same thing here - if someone looks like they are around age 18, the clerk should ask for a driver's license to prove it.

Having said that - if you are 18 you should be able to buy whatever game you want. I will further agree that M-rated games run a wide gamut. There are games that are M-rated due to violence, while others contain porn, or other adult material. The thing is though, once you're 18, it doesn't matter. I don't see a problem with writing a law requiring stores to card, with fines (not jail times) similar to what you'd get for inappropriately selling other age-restricted products.

 

Saw this in effect last week, some store clerk was telling a minor that they will not sell them a certain R rated game because they needed either ID to prove they were over 16-18 or they had a parent/guardian to buy it for them.

Then again I think it's just a massive hoo and cry about avoiding personal responsibility. It's so easy for parents to blame the TV or video games or rap music or whatever because they've failed to bring their kids up right. I've always had TV and violent video games in my life, ever since I was five (16 damn years ago) and I haven't comitted any crime. Blaming society's ills on companies for selling something that consumers want is just absurd.

The fact that the companys are producing the violent games isn't the thing people should be concened about, it's the fact that society wants these type of games. People don't buy a violent video game and then start to enjoy the idea of violence, people enjoy the idea of violence and then go buy a violent video game.

 

It's activist populism - quite simple - politicos making a name by regulating something they know **** about, but with what they can scare people.

And admittedly, show them a splatter scene from Doom4 or the like, and they will feel repulsed. I feel repulsed by it, and that's precisely why I don't play it. Show the pics in the context of a school shooting and they will be scared. They wouldn't even need to (falsely) claim that playing violent games makes you commit atrocities. It works on its own.
That's the way propaganda by implication functions, for those who still don't get that persistent mentioning of two things in the same sentence without explicitly putting them into context is an effective method to suggest context, with literal deniability: 'Heh, quote me, I never said that!'

And I agree about the unenforceability. Games are censored in Germany, and about the first thing an FPS player usually does is to download the 'blood patch'. Technically illegal, but I have never heared of anyone ever being prosecuted for it. If a game is for people aged 18 or older, then big bro buys it. Or the kiddos just play big bro's games when he's away.

 

We know advertising (at the very least) affects behavior (one need only look at Listerine's profits before and after it started advertising; they increased exponentially). We know that advertising can create demand and alter society.

We know that 24--in the judgement of the Dean of West Point and pals--affects value judgments and behavior.

Is it really a stretch, then, to think that games affect behavior?

Note that I'm not arguing that playing Doom 3 will make you a stonecoldpsychomofokiller.

 

Y’know, the interesting thing is, one of my reactions when I first saw 24 was that it seemed like a TV version of an FPS. And one of my later reactions with respect to how 24 “resolved” various crises was that the “resolution” could actually be seen as appropriate. Of course, the obvious rebuttal to this is that “extreme circumstances require extreme measures”, but the problem comes in defining “extreme circumstances”. And yet, if we resort to “extreme measures”, we become as bad as the enemy (whoever they may be).

My point (in a very roundabout way) is that, as AMaster said, “Is it really a stretch, then, to think that games affect behavior?”

But I’d still like to know how Rags got his hands on Doom 4.

 

Hoooray for yet another shift to a totalitarian government.

 

Ok... that's an insane propasition (so glad I don't live there)

Does the M rating count for shareware, warez, freeware and downloading from another country? There is NO WAY you could inforce this sucessfully without a major outcry.

 

One more thing I'd like to point out - and I think this is one major thing that the politicians don't understand. They think the video game industry is still focused almost exclusively kids, when that simply is not the case anymore. People in their 30s today grew up in the era when home game consoles were just getting started. I know - I'm one of them. People in this age range enjoyed video games from the time they were quite young. So adults in their 30s or less are still big into gaming.

The reason the politicians miss this is that most of the major politicians are a lot more than in their 30s. Most of them are in their 50s or older. They grew up during a time when home consoles didn't exist. To put it another way, they just don't "get" gaming. So what they do is try to enact legislation that will protect the children of our country, when in fact most of the people buying the particularly violent video games are already adults, or at least well into their teens.

I don't know about others, but my parents didn't like any of the super violent video games, and wouldn't buy them for me. Most of the FPS that I played, I didn't start doing until after I was 16 years old - which coincidently is when I started driving and got my first job. Very young kids can only get these games if their parents buy it for them - as they don't have money. And frankly I don't see a problem with a 16 year old buying Doom 3. Oh course, I didn't actually buy any Doom game when I was 16, as they didn't exist yet.

 

well i was around 8 or 9 when i got the original doom and some wierd mage-fps from Ironhawk. Doom never realy scared me or made me violent.