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Illinois Gov. Seeks Violent Video Game Ban
Foobar_Zen writes "Gov. Rod Blagojevich of Illinois has apparently decided to build on past "wins". He seeks to impose legislation that will prohibit the distribution, sale, rental and availability of mature video games to children younger than 18. Breaking of this law would be punishable by up to one year in prison or a $5,000 fine." From the article: "The Illinois Retail Merchants Association blasted the governor's proposal as a way for retailers to become "the violence and sensitivity police for the state of Illinois." Update: 12/16 21:14 GMT by Z : Lum's take on this over at Broken Toys is excellent.
I'd like to see how this is handled if some kid downloads America's Army...
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
... than doing the job of parents?
I eat crayons
I don;t see the problem with this legislation. It's just like the R rating at theaters, or the fact that kids can't buy tobacco until 18, or beer until 21. I certainly woulnd't want my kids to (at age 9) walk into a store and buy GTA 8: Be a Porn Star. When he's 18, or I decide to buy it for him.. fine.
-Guns kill people like spoons made Rosie O'Donnell fat-
Kids don't buy games, they warez them. This is a broken solution to a problem that doesn't exist.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
"We already place limits on alcohol, tobacco, even adult movies. It's just logical that video games, which are so heavily marketed to young kids but many of which contain adult images, should not be available to young people or to minors," Ottenhoff said.
Ok, I see the connection with adult movies (and I'm talking about porn, not R rated movies) but I cannot see how they think this can cross over into alcohol and tobacco territory!
Alcohol and tobacco are PHYSICALLY HARMFUL. You can die from alcohol and tobacco. You *cannot* die from abuse of video games... Explicit or otherwise.
On a personal note: Yes, video games showing full frontal nudity or realistic depictions of death (and when I say this I mean watching actual video clips of people being tortured, decapitated, etc) should be looked into as we do with movies... But video games showing a completely unrealistic depiction of human characters (as real as video games are looking they are still not 100% on) in a fantasy world should be treated as such.
I thought that as we matured as a society that this type of conservative bullshit would cease. Perhaps we are regressing?
I don't see anything wrong with requiring a consumer to be 18 to purchase a game marked mature. I think it's a good idea to require proof of age when purchasing games marked AO or Mature by the ERSB.
If anything, this puts responsibility back onto the parents. You can't blame you're kid shooting someone on video games if the parents have to buy them for them.
Breaking of this law would be punishable by up to one year in prison or a $5,000 fine.
So, how big is the penalty for kids going to a NC-17 rated movie or buying hardcore pr0n?
Why is one so much bigger than the other?
Not yet, but I imagine that it soon will be. The Government thinks it is a better parent than you and knows what is best for your family.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
The governor of Illinois is a Democrat. Illinois is a fairly solidly "blue" state. People on both sides of the political spectrum find video games to be "scary".
What a joke though, in one article I read they listed Halo 2 and Half Life 2 along side Doom 3 and GTA. Like there's any real comparison between those games. It was clear they never played any of the games.
Absolutely ridiculous the way video games are the scapegoat for this generation.
Remember Judas Priest , Ozzy, et al being sued back in the 80s because their satanic lyrics caused all of the problems with young kids today?
Remember when it was Dungeons and Dragons?
The people are idiots though, if the movie and recording industries can police themselves (MPAA ratings / "explicit lyrics" stickers), whats the problem with the (incredibly coherent) ESRB rating system?
And once again, games are created for and marketed to adults, primarily 18-40 year old males. Just go google for any statistics (Nielson, etc) on who plays/buys games if you dont believe me.
The "think about the children" argument is a red herring. This is all about appeasing Hollywood by helping eliminate the competition. Pure pork. And politicians think it's win-win because it'll get them a lot of "cranky old bitch" votes.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The /. one that is. Ban? What?
Hello, how is this different than R-rated movies today? Mature games are intended for a mature audience and you better believe we shouldn't have 8 year olds playing GTA3 unless their parents approve of it and buy it for them.
What's the crazy backlash to this? It's absolutely sound to set up laws prohibiting sales of these games to minors (just as it prohibits sales of pr0n to minors).
If parents choose that their kids are mature enough for said games then they'll go and buy it for their kids. If not, then kids won't be playing games that they likely aren't ready for.
-Nic
"We already place limits on alcohol, tobacco, even adult movies. It's just logical that video games, which are so heavily marketed to young kids but many of which contain adult images, should not be available to young people or to minors," Ottenhoff said.
Methinks he subscribes to different logic than I.
The answer, of course, is to do nothing - allow the Invisible Hand of the Market to continue to do its work, driven by parents' enforcements of what little Johnny can and can't buy.
-ZOD-
My stock micro-rant on this topic is mostly just a quotation.
- Now that eighteen-year-olds have the right to vote, it is obvious that they must be allowed the freedom to form their political views on the basis of uncensored speech before they turn eighteen, so that their minds are not a blank when they first exercise the franchise. And since an eighteen-year-old's right to vote is a right personal to him rather than a right to be exercised on his behalf by his parents, the right of parents to enlist the aid of the state to shield their children from ideas of which the parents disapprove cannot be plenary either. People are unlikely to become well- functioning, independent-minded adults and responsible citizens if they are raised in an intellectual bubble.
Any elected government, be it Democracy, or Representative Republic, or otherwise, owes it to their constituents to allow unfettered access to ideas and information, praiseworthy or critical. To deny a citizen the right to know their own world is to deny them identity.--American Amusement Machine Assoc. v. Kendrick No. 00-3643 (7th Cir., March 23, 2001)
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I don't see a problem, per se, with limiting sales and rentals of M rated games to children under 17, as the "M" rating is equivalent to an "R" for a motion picture. But, I think that a year in jail for renting a kid a copy of the new Prince of Persia game is a bit harsh. That said, there is no way that this law, even if it passes, will get past the courts, since it's so poorly written. Here's why: In Criminal Law there are what is known as "Strict Liability Statutes". These statutes are written to basically regulate the flow of traffic, commerce, and modern issues that were introduced after most of the common law was already laid down. See, most actual crimes require an act, and a criminal state of mind. The Strict Liability Statutes are the exception - they require only an act. This law is a Strict Liability Statute. The courts have said on numerous occassions, that if a piece of legislation is going to get rid of the mens rea (criminal mind) component of a crime, that piece of legislation needs to have a very minor punishment (usually a small to moderate fine) that will attach no "stigma" to the one violating it. Well, a year in jail is a pretty major "stigma" to have to bear. Dumbass legislators have, on many occassions, tried to pass these Strict Liability Statutes with long jail sentences, and almost always, they've been overturned. This bill is doomed before it's even signed.
Yeah, that's a brilliant plan.
"The answer, of course, is to do nothing - allow the Invisible Hand of the Market to continue to do its work,
The invisible hand of the market would have 16 year olds consuming vast quantities of hard liquor and probably driving around afterwards. Not that this doesn't happen anyway but imagine if you weren't impeded by the need a fake id as a kid, I probably wouldn't even be here.
What if Digg added local news and a Slashdot inspired comment karma system? ---
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If the answer is yes, the law doesn't empower me, it takes away from me the right to decide what is fit for my children and what is not. It means the gov't meddling in my child-raising, which I wouldn't appreciate.
I just don't get it. What is the real problem here. If you are over 18, then this law DOES NOT APPLY TO YOU. If you are a parent, and want your kid playing Doom 3, then you get off of your lazy but and go buy it for him.
He is not censoring anything, unless you call not letting a 13-year-old into a hard-core porn store censoring.
In this society, we try to protect children. Children cannot vote, drink, buy guns, buy porn, etc. The fact that you might consider it to be OK does not mean that you get to make that choice for the whole country. With this law, if a parent wants to buy it for their children, they can. But at least they will be aware of what their children are doing.
I bet that most of the people flaming this law do not have kids.
"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
That's the fault of the parents, not of the ratings.
Parents don't know any better, and percieve games to be "for kids" simply because they don't understand them. Then they get shocked and outraged that their 9-year-old's GTA:SA christmas present depicts strong violence.
(OT: My grandma walked in with a shocked face after the Star Trek episode "Contact". (The one where one of the alien (in typical hippie/Roswell fashion states "I always wanted to have sex with an alien" (meaning Riker). In very "old-lady" tone of voice, my grandma shouts, in utter horror, "Star Trek's supposed to be a children's show!" Anyway, same principle here with games.)
Our fine IL Gov. Rod is just trying to get his name well-known across the nation. Its so obvious that he has political ambitions larger than being the IL gov. He constantly flails at supposed BIG NATIONAL ISSUES hoping to strike a nerve with people. There's this issue, the importating of drugs from Canada, etc.
Its just one pathetic attempt after another so that when he tries to run for president, the country is already familiar with his name and his being on the "correct side" of these issues.
Yes, I voted for him. I thought he'd be slightly better than this, but he was the best choice at the time. Oh well, hopefully next time around we'll have some good choices.
Umm, yeah, you see the problem is YOU ALREADY HAVE THIS authority. YOU are the parent. If your child goes into a store and buys a videogame that you do not approve of then how about TAKING RESPONSIBILITY for your child and disciplining them for doing so. Do NOT, I repeat DO NOT, ask the Federal Government, State Government, or anyone else to raise and be responsible for your child and his/her decisions. That is YOUR job - not anyone else's.
If you don't want your 9 year old to buy product X, explain to them why not and then explain to them what will happen when they disobey mommy and daddy. Then, and this is crucial, actually discipline them for disobeying. You know - spare the rod, spoil the child. But under no circumstances should it be MY responsibility to raise your child for you. I wasn't there at conception so your child is not my responsibility. Teaching your child YOUR values is not my responsibility. Making sure your child doesn't buy videogames they want because little Johnny down the street has it is NOT my responsibility.
The responsibility for raising your child lies squarely with you.
Dream as if you'll live forever.
Live as if you'll die tomorrow.
~Anonymous~
A reality that does not change much, no matter what party is in the White House, really. One group tries to make a level playing field for everyone, to a fault, and the other tells you how to behave in the privacy of your own home. But staying on topic--I'm tired of this "do it for the children" crap that solely blames external factors for adolescent misbehavior.
Preventing my hypothetical 16 year-old son from playing DooM 3, and having him walk over to the TV and watch a slasher film on some pay cable channel, just shows that standards only apply to those who don't have the power to decide their own freedoms, and that these legislators have been practically programmed by moralist lobbyists to believe that playing out violence creates violence. If that was a case, there would have been a national carjacking epidemic directly following the release of GTA3. But there wasn't, because children actually do understand the difference between a TV and the fucking driveway in front of their house. I'm far more concerned about gangster rap's glorification of the coldly violent and mysogynistic thug.
I don't understand the attitude displayed on this topic. If you have an R18 film containing sex and or violence, you expect that selling it to a 13 year old will get you fined (if anyone finds out).
Given that video games have ratings as well (or should be rated) what's suprising about people wanting to enforce those ratings? It seems an exactly analagous situation to me.
Once again, when a Democrat dones something stupid, they are spared the indignity of having their political affiliation mentioned in the slashdot article. ALL politicians do stupid stuff - can we just have a policy, like a newspaper, where if a politician is named it lists their state and political affiliation? It's easy....
Sen. Joe Smith - Maine (R)
see?
Thanks.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur