Grand Theft Auto Ban To Be Decided By Courts

Wingchild writes "Haitian civil rights groups in Florida have filed a lawsuit with the circuit court in Palm Beach County, which Rockstar Games has asked to be moved up to a federal court for a final decision on whether or not their game has to be banned from stores. This move happens as the court of media opinion begins weighing in on the subject (facts irrelevant, of course), a fact which Slashdot Games noted a scant two days ago."

Comments

From an american italians perspective

[t0qer]

I should be suing the HBO for the soprano's, I should sue MGM for the Godfather, I should sue tristar for Goodfellas.

Every time some idiot hears that i'm italian, suddenly they start thinking i'm some stupid mafia goomba, and they start doing the whole Robert Di Nero accent when they talk to me. Fact is, I was raised in California, and so many of my family members were trying to hard to be "American" that most of them talked like John Wayne.

But I do enjoy afformentioned films and shows, as well as GTA. It's not like rockstar made a game that promotes Haitian genocide. They just did the whole voodoo momma stereotype(which *IS* a part of Haitian culture, just like the Mafia is part of my heritige)

I think these people need to get a life. It's a game, liven up.

Re:A Game Is Freedom of Speech

[clarkcox3]

Why is a video game not free speech, but a book is? Or a television program, radio program, painting, song, sculpture, etc.

What is so different about a videogame that suddenly makes it non-speech? Is it that it's on a TV? no, can't be that because TV programs are on TV.

Is it that it is interactive (i.e. the end user can change the outcome)? No, it can't be that because I read several books as a child where one could change the outcome. And books are protected speech.

Is it that videogames are relatively new, and didn't exist at the time of the framing of the Constitution? No, it can't be that because TV and radio didn't exist then either.

Re:A Game Is Freedom of Speech

[kfg]

One might well ask where you get off denying Alexander Hamilton's (a "conservative" Federalist) admonition that the Bill of Rights is not to be interpreted as in any way being a restriction on the rights of the people and pointing out that even in the absence of the Bill of Rights the Constitution gives Congress no authority to pass laws that would violate the rights enumerated in it?

The Constitution overtly restricts the government, not the people, and your post is exactly the sort of thing he warned an explict Bill of Rights would lead to.

Your view is radical, antiliberty and downright unamerican.

From your tone one might surmise you consider yourself a conservative. Well sir, I am a conservative. As an American that also makes me a liberal, as the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are overtly liberal documents. I have taken an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic, and you sir, are an enemy of the Constitution.

KFG

Re:Let me play devil's advocate

[YomikoReadman]

I grew up in a military household, with a father who was an officer in the US Navy. This means that for over half the year on average, my mother who worked in excess of 50 hours a week was the only parent raising myself and 2 siblings. As a result of this, I was in the same situation that these children who have gone out and 'played' GTA and committed other senseless acts of violence were, from a standpoint of the amount of time my parents were around. It is quite likely that they saw more of their parents, mostly due to the fact that one of their parents was not gone for 6 months out of the year. However, that does not mean that my parents were not involved in everything I did, from school activities, to the friends I hung out with to all of the video games I played. The reason that there is a deluge of comments about "where were the parents?" is not so much a literal one, but a figurative one pertaining to why were they not more involved.

I feel that a large part of the issue here is that all the parents of children who do these things is that the parents don't get involved in their lives, so in a somewhat desperate cry for attention, or perhaps to lash out at what they perceive to be a society that carries no love for them they act out the one thing that brings them comfort; a violent video game. While I don't think that the games are entirely to blame, I'm sure that with access to firearms and other weapons they would be quite capable of finding source material in movies or TV, the issue at the heart of all of this is parental involvement, moreso the appalling lack thereof which has come to be the norm in todays society.

Conservatives still don't like big government.

[Chris Burke]

That's (part of) what conservative means.

Just because "Republican" has meant "conservative" for several generations doesn't mean they are now. Political parties change beliefs from time to time. The Republican party used to be the progressive/liberal party, if you recall.

Conservatives are stil Conservatives. Our Republican adminstration, however, isn't ver Conservative at all. Bush has a very large government that has sought to increase federal and executive power at every turn.

People need to dissociate their political beliefs from political parties. The party that used to represent what you personally believe may change to represent that which you abhor.

The downside is you don't get to vote in primaries. The updside is you can remain true to your actual beliefs, instead of subverting them to the cause of someone else.

Anyone who isn't an indepenent is a tool, or someone who wishes to wield tools.