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Parents Need To Be Informed
GamerDad writes "Dave Long looks at the recent gaming controversy and lays the blame squarely on the parents. 'If you didn't talk to them about this game before buying it for your child, then you chose to be uninformed and there's nothing myself, the game maker, the retailer or the government can do to help you. The information is out there. In fact, it's right here on GamerDad. Be smarter next time and take a couple minutes to check it out.'"
Where's the fantastic lawsuit opportunities in THAT? It'll never fly.
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
Abso-fucking-lutely! I love GTA:SA but would have to be brain damaged to let little kids play it. Whatever happened to parental responsibility?
"Physics is to math what sex is to masturbation." - Richard Feynman
If you bought this game for your son or daughter under the age of seventeen, then you should have known this.
Yes, but the original rating was M for Mature, meaning anyone under 17 had to have a parent or guardian's permission to have the game. This means it was legal for Rockstar Games to sell the game to minors with permission. However, for explicit sexual content you must be 18 or older. By the description (I haven't seen it myself) it would probably be classified as pornography, making it illegal to sell to minors (it would no longer be up to a permissive guardian). Originally selling the game with an M rating when in fact it could be classified as pornography could actually be a rather serious issue for Rockstar Games.
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
Classifying this as pornography is like saying that Pocahontas should be classified as pornography, because some clever video editing can remove that leather dress. The modded game is not the same as the game as sold, it is a different game.
The whole charade is ridiculous.
So parents should assume responsibility for the entertainment their kids consume? Duh.
Really, worrying about videogames should be the bottom of your list. Your kids will encounter far worse influences and situations and threats just going to school every day. Kids aren't stupid. I remember being a kid and tits never warped me or turned me into a sadistic sex fiend (something else is to blame for that). Violent games and television didn't turn me into Manson or a highway sniper. Have some common sense and realize that your kids understand media far better than you ever will and your fears are baseless and stupid.
Seriously, what videogame out there has or could turn any normal kid into a sadistic killer or something, unless he's a fucking deranged ass from a totally dysfunctional and useless family in the first place? Getting a divorce or smacking your spouse around does a million times the damage to a kid that every ounce of television and videogame violence and sex combined could ever do.
Maybe the game developers can make thier games a little less, oh I don't know, in-your-face about the violence and stuff? I mean, GTA was okay with that, but Manhunt? Manhunt, rockstar? Do we really need a game who's basis is to sneak up behind people and kill them in hideously ghastly ways?
The government could get involved in helping to make sure that the little-uns can't get their hands on Mature rated games, through the classic system of fines.
The stores could get involved, when a 60 year old woman comes in to buy GTA:SA, by asking if its for thier underage kid and asking if they think its really appropriate?
Oh, and the most important culprit: The kids themselves! Are we totally forgetting that the way that a lot of these kids are getting these games is by convincing their parents that "oh, don't worry mommy, GTA really isn't THAT violent a game!"
Show of hands: How many people here have convinced mommy and daddy to pick up an M rated game for them when they were under 17?
*raises hand*
The parents have to do a lot of things. Maybe the other people involved could, *gasp*, make their jobs a bit easier! Some fault does lie with them, but not all of it...
Beyond the Polygons : Because 50,000 polygo
There is no way any parent has anyone to blame but themselves if they purchase questionable content for their kids. I mean, the game is freaking called Grand Theft Auto! You know? As in, the crime of grand theft auto?!? What the hell did you think it was going to be about? Puppies and sunshine?! And then these people have the gall to bring the publishers to court over their stupid purchase?
I don't know what's worse: that parents expect someone else to do their job for them in this day and age, or that judges reward this behavior.
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
The statement was: have each parent go to Gamer Dad and check things out. Why would the average non-techie know of the existence of Gamer Dad? Not exactly as well known as the Consumer Product Safety Commission, or Consumer Reports. No, if there was porno on the disk, no matter that it had to be unlocked with a publicly available key, it was mislabled and parents wouldn't know. There should be consequences since parents should have the ability to guide their children and that wasn't possible in this case.
I had a sitdown with GamerDad a little while back, covering parents, gamers and ESRB:
w ith-gamerdad.html
http://cathodetan.blogspot.com/2005/07/interview-
I think we have found the first sign of intelligence on the Internet! How long before it takes over?
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
from http://ncnewsonline.com/story.asp?id=11722 (reg. required):
Editor, The News:
Recently, a modification known as "Hot Coffee" was released on the Internet that allowed a user to access illicit material in the video game "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas."
The developer, Rockstar Games, had left this material in the game but had made it totally inaccessible to the player in any way through the game. The modification permits the player to access a brief sex scene (using in-game player models, not a movie) that would otherwise never appear in the game.
Pushed by Sen. Hillary Clinton, the Entertainment Software Ratings Board announced July 21 its plans to change San Andreas' rating to AO, or Adults Only (18 plus). Rockstar promised to ship a version of the game without the illicit content and cease sales of the version with the content. Retailers such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy have ceased sales and even Gamestop has stopped selling it.
The largest outcry from parents was, "Why are video game companies selling games with such graphic violence and sex to my children?"
My question, then, as well as the millions of other gamers, to the parents is this: Why are you letting your children buy a game that has such content?
Most of the children who have the game more than likely received it as a gift from a parent, so I should then rephrase my question.
Why are they buying games for their children that deal with such themes as drug use, graphic violence, murder and sex?
The massive parental push to get this game off the shelves simply proves that parents of today's children are not willing to monitor their children's use of television, computers and video games. Instead, they rely on such wonderful technology to baby-sit their children.
Colin Dean Go a year without DRM
There is plenty of blame to go around, and you can't just throw it at one group. Yes, the parents are to blame for letting their kids get the game. But so what, the store still sold it to the kids. And the company is to blame for marketing the games to the kids.
This isn't as clear cut as you people want it to be.
Remember during the 80's when consumer education was the big thing and resource such as Consumer Reports was heavily advertised?
Now we have even easier access to this information. Why the hell can't parents educate themselves on purchases anymore?
The main difference is that the content was already there straight from the publisher.* Some individual coming in later and adding a modification is something entirely different.
*Plus as the OP pointed out. Basically a "bait and switch" was done by rockstar.
If this were the great firewall of china everyone would be up in arms, this smacks of one rule for the rest of the world and one for the children. I remember being a child, I used to go out shooting with friends (and no adults), I saw my fair share of porn and violent and horrific movies. Has it turned me into a violent oppressive adult, or and adult who can see the oppression of the freedom of out youth. If you can't take it, then go to Church, but don't force you discriminatory opinions on everyone else.
Parents ARE informed, there was a uk study to that ponit a few weeks ago. They know the ratings and what they mean, but they largely do not care.
I agree that parents should be the custodians of their own children. The fact is that "concerned" men of influence in times past have noted that, due to the effects of corporate massified America, parents are no longer suitable guardians for their children. Hence the rise of parens patriae in the United States; the government now owns and is responsible for children (this is why kids can be forced to go to school, can be taken from incompentent parents and placed with others, and also why children will shortly be medicated on the state's sole oversight). Parents are allowed to care for children only under the government's watchful (or negligent) eye.
Parents, who have now been programmed to be just as much consumers of gaming and entertainment as their children, are still very useful: they provide an excellent scapegoat for public outrage - it was the parents' fault.
It's a wonderful standard. First eviscerate parenthood with state and business agendas, then act indignant when parents fail to protect their own kids from corporate-sponsored sleaze.
Parents just don't understand.
Game makers, don't say on the boxes or on the commericals what the content is.
To say it's all the parents or the makers fault isn't the complete story, both sides are at fault here. Why can't a game maker say what is in the frickin' game? Saying it's on a review at a website isn't good enough, they need to publish on the game whats in the game. Parents need to have access to the content so they can say yea or nay.
In otherwords, this is a way of telling the soccer moms of the world to fsck off and die.
This sig no verb.
Information on these games should be more readily available than it is. They should understand what they are buying before they do so. Many times I have seen parents buying games for the children when in reality they have no ideas what it is that they are purchasing. These people should be shot. By not using a little intelligence and looking at what they are buying they are causing a large amount of pain for those of us that are old enough/mature enough to play these games. On the other hand, some things get a little out of hand. Speaking exclusively in the case of GTA:SA, the scene made accessable by the "Hot Coffee Mod" isn't quite as bad as many of the other things in this game. First off, everything in the game is animated, it is NOT REAL PEOPLE. Second, which is worse to you? shooting/blowing up cops? or a man having sex with his girlfriend?
An acquaintance of mine wrote a more colorful version of Long's article. I heartily agree with both.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I always tell parents that the game they're buying for their kid is rated M for Mature due to [blood, gore, violence, sexual themes, drug use, etc]. Nine times out of ten, they tell me they don't like it, but their kid already played it. What the hell kind of excuse is that? I've told parents flat-out that GTA: SA is quite possibly the worst game that they could be buying for their kids, yet they still use that excuse. I blame the parents as well, because they are ultimately the ones who can control what their kids play. Retailers can only do so much to inform the parents, and no government-mandated rating system is going to change anything (the current rating system works just fine, but the parents don't care). If parents get in an uproar about how terrible a game is, odds are they ignored the information they were given.
To many parents are relying on Video Nanny (TV, Video Games, etc.) to keep there children occupied and out of there hair. This is a problem that needs to be addressed at the parents and not at the TV, Movie, and Video Game companines. Not everything can be Barny and Sememe Street friendly. Just becase its sold at Wal-Mart does not mean its safe for kids.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. -Albert Einstein