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California Violent Gaming Bills Fail To Advance
Thanks to Reuters/Yahoo for its article discussing the failure to progress of two California violent videogame bills, since they "failed to clear a committee of California's state Assembly, killing them for 2004 unless the committee changes its mind." However, "One bill, which would expand the definition of 'harmful matter to children' to include certain types of violent games, received a favorable 5-1 vote, while the second, regulating how some games are displayed in stores, got a 3-1 vote" - but "both needed 7 votes in favor to be approved." Bill sponsor Leland Yee has released a statement claiming: "I am deeply disturbed that money ruled the day here in Sacramento... Rather than protecting our children and giving our parents a tool to help raise healthy kids, the multi-billion dollar entertainment industry was allowed to shoot down necessary legislation."
Another Victory for us parents who want to raise our kids without endless regulations and laws. It is my job to make sure my son does not have access to games I think are not suitable for him, not the store. So far this has worked out quite well.
Well done legislators!!
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible, make violent revolution inevitable" - JFK
I think the reason that video game violence gets more attention than other media violence is because of the way we intereact with video games. Or rather, that we do interact with them, rather than passively watching. A parent concerned about their child and violence will probably be less concerned about their child watching a person murdered in cold blood than about their child actually performing the murder in cold blood, albeit in a virtual sense. In video games, the player is not just watching the violence, but participating. This makes games all the more threatening to folks who feel violent media is a danger. Thus, laws against video game violence get more press than laws against movie or television violence.
Don't feel too bad. You can still try to pass off a law restricting access to other types of violent content, like movies or maybe books (remember all that stuff in the bible?).
I wonder if this kind of thing will stop happenning in a few years, when most voters will have grown up with videogames. Or do people lose all sense of freedom when becoming parents?
P.S. It's such a shame money ruled the day. Let's all work together to make sure it never happens again. If it were up to me, I'd just outlaw it outright.
How is this any different from other special interest groups? We see laws shot down by the movie industry, by the NRA, by Grandmothers Against Rubber Sheets, and no one says anything at all.
It's not, really, and a quick check on Google will find that Leeland Yee is backed by a couple of special interests himself, in areas where much of the "what about the children?" and "violent media is corrupting our youth" comes from in the first place.
If lobbying groups working on behalf of the video game industry were responsible for this bill's failure, then it's probably more a story of one lobby against another than they'd like it to appear. On the other hand, if the failure was not the result of some lobby, it makes the whole comment that much more of a joke.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
Rather than protecting our children and giving our parents a tool to help raise healthy kids, the multi-billion dollar entertainment industry was allowed to shoot down necessary legislation."
For someone to be able to use a tool, they must have the knowledge on how it works and what to do with it. Lots of stupid parents still buy their ten year old games like Vice City or Manhunt because the kids beg and the parents say "Ok". I highly doubt this 'tool' would be used effectively (if passed,) it would just make parents bitch that they have to go to a different part of the store to buy their children the 'cool' games.
Yes kids should not be allowed to play these kinds of games till they are mentally ready to. But laws will not prevent this! Parents will have to. Too may times I have seen parents buy games for their kids that the clerks would not sell them (never mind the question where a 12yr old gets $60us to buy the game) due to their age (store policy for most places I have visited lately).
And I have seen the manager answer the complaints when they return with this: "We sold the game to you, you gave it to your child."
Yes there is a need for responsibility in the industry to regulate itself, but parents need to do their job as well. And their job does include making sure their children's friends are not playing the wrong types of games when they visit (Parents and the community have to work together).
We are the future of humanity... be afraid, be very afraid...
It isn't that parents are concerned that their kids are "actually performing the murder", because kids will do things like play superheroes or cops and robbers or cowboys and indians. It is that their children are doing so in a way that they don't understand.
EVERY new form of media that appeals to kids has come under attack from confused parents who don't understand it and simply go by what someone else is saying about it, thinking (hoping) that they understand it. For example, when comics were first printed in newspapers, there was an outcry that the mixing of reality and fiction would warp young minds. They wouldn't be able to discern the real from the fictional. Then, superhero comics (not in newspapers but magazine form) were supposed to be the cause of all juvenile delinquency and homosexuality as they became popular. Then music was corrupting our kids, making them devil worshippers. Then movies, then TV as each became more "realistic" and popular.
It's bullshit that people are opposed to it because their kids are active in the violence in a game. Previously, people said that being passive and soaking in violence from the TV was the worst thing we could do to our kids. It's all about parents not understanding their kids and their lives and feeling that something is wrong. There is something wrong. You're not trying to understand or talk to your kids, you're just trying to control their lives through environmental factors. Get to know your own damn kids! Just make sure they are relatively decent people (from their words and actions) and let them live their lives. They will naturally want to have their own space and rebel against you. Every generation wants to differentiate itself from the previous one and the older generation always thinks that there's something wrong with the newer generation.
There has never been a time in history when the older generation didn't think the newer generation were terrible and not quite right and leading us all into destruction. Guess what? Pretty much every generation eventually grows up into people fairly similar to those of the previous generation.
Oh BTW, this isn't an attack on the parent poster, it's more of a general rant against the argument that parents are against videogames because the children are "actively involved in the violence".
"But I trust in the people's capacity for reflection, rage and rebellion." -Oscar Olivera