California Passes Violent Games Bill

TecnaDigit writes "Today, after sitting on the bill for nearly a month and constant political pressure, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Assembly Bill 1179, the bill that would prohibit the sale and rentals of violent video games to minors. Again, the Entertainment Software Ratings Board and the Video Software Dealers Association (VSDA) are challenging the bill. According the the VSDA, the bill is faulty in that a game is decided whether or not it is 'violent' by juries, and different juries could have different opinions on what is defined as 'violent'." Commentary on GamerGod.

Comments

Like every one else ...

[SuperDuG]

This will get thrown out in court. These laws have been tried in Indiana, Missouri, and are now popping up in Illinois and California.

The problem is, that there is already judicial precedence on the issue.

Kendrick, Teri, et al. v. American Amusement Machine Association (docket no. 00-3643)
Appeal: Cert. denied, Oct. 29, 2001.

Issues: Does an Indianapolis, Ind., law against minors playing violent video games in video parlors violate the First Amendment?

Summary: The ordinance forbids any operator of five or more video-game machines in one place to allow a minor unaccompanied by a parent, guardian, or other custodian to use "an amusement machine that is harmful to minors," requires appropriate warning signs, and requires that such machines be separated by a partition from the other machines in the location and that their viewing areas be concealed from persons who are on the other side of the partition. The U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the ordinance does violate the rights of those under 18 years of age. Judge Posner wrote the decision.

Decision: In denying the appeal, the U.S. Supreme Court makes no ruling on the merits of the law or the challenge to it. It merely means that the case could not get the minimum vote of four justices needed to hear the appeal. It also means that all similar laws in the jurisdiction of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals are void under that court's ruling.

The above is from http://fact.trib.com/1st.01.02supr.html ... which is the denial of appeal when the Indianapolis city government was told their law was UNCONSTITUTIONAL.

Also check here http://www.constitutioncenter.org/education/ForEdu cators/DiscussionStarters/BanningViolentVideoGames .shtml

and here http://culturalpolicy.uchicago.edu/conf2001/papers /walsh.html

So this is nothing new people. Ever since the ID brought us a world where we could literally kill and watch Nazi's die (even before that really). This has been an ongoing debate.

The one thing you MUST realize is that this is not a bill being pushed by the Right-Wing Conservative Nut Jobs (granted they aren't really all against it), this is being pushed by DEMOCRATS. You want to know who hates freedom of speech? Hillary Clinton, after the Columbine murders ordered the surgeon general to find a link between school shooting tragedies and Quake. He found no conclusive link, but that didn't stop her, Lieberman, and the rest of the gang from going hog wild trying to censor video games. I lean left politically, but you can bet your ass I don't agree with censorship.

Do what I did, I joined the EFF http://www.eff.org/ and joined the ACLU http://www.aclu.org/

Re:Why, oh why....

[NoMercy]

In the UK some games are rated by the official censor, notably those with adult content or excessive violence, which get legally binding age marks on them. But yes the ESRB stuff is all voluntary everywhere I believe.

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

[Sycraft-fu]

Are you serious? They HAVE. Long ago.

It's called the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, ESRB, you can find them at www.esrb.org. They are a non-profit ratings group started by the games industry to rate games. Developers submit games for ratings, the ESRB rates them based on known criteria, and then returns a rating. You may then place that rating and ONLY that rating on your game.

It's those little stylized black and white logos. They have a letter, tilted to the left in them. They are located on the lower left or lower right of the front of the game box and are clearly visible. On the back, there's a clarification of why the game got that rating. So, go to a retailer some time, and look at the games. See how many you find that don't have an ESRB rating. My bet? You'll find none. Nearly all games are submitted for ratings (all large publishers submit all their games) and most retailers will not carry unrated games (even retailers that carry unrated movies).

They already have a very effective regulation system in place, that is just like the one the movie industry has. The logos and ratings are trademarked so you cannot use them without the permission of the ESRB, and they only grant permission for the rating your game actually recieved (same way the MPAA does it for movies).

So get off your high horse. The game industry has done a great job of regulating itself. If you can't control your kids and won't take the time to play the games first and see fi they are acceptable, that's not their problem. There are plenty of adult gamers out there and we don't want you telling us what we may and may not play.

This law seems to serve no purpose other than to let bad parents lash out at retailers and distributors when they fail as parents and their kid does something wrong. HAte to break it to you but if your kid does a drive by, GTA did not make him do it, he had much deeper problems.