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Clinton Introduces Invasive Game Legislation
An anonymous reader writes "Senator Clinton has introduced a doozy of a game bill. It mandates an investigation of the gaming industry to determine how pervasive hidden mature content like the 'Hot Coffee' mod is." GamePolitics is reporting on the bill itself, as well as the ESA's response. From the latter article: "While we are gratified that the Senator holds the ESRB in such high regard that her bill would give these ratings the force of law, the courts have made clear that giving a private party governmental powers is unconstitutional. Beyond that, the bill clearly infringes the constitutionally protected creative rights of the video game industry. Thus, if enacted, the bill will be struck down as have similar bills passed in several states...." More commentary at Gamasutra.
Can you please make Politics the primary category for this article so that people will actually see it and comment on it?
Arguing about vi versus Emacs is like arguing whether it's better to make fire by rubbing sticks or banging rocks.
why something like this only applies to games and not other forms of media. Why does 'Family Entertainment Protection Act' specifically target games when movies, books, and magazines can be just as 'harmful' to children.
Personally, I have a problem with the bill even existing, but I find the double standard to be particularly disturbing. I guess we're looking at FOTM politics.
Young people WILL get what they want, be it porn or violence. Let's spend money on education and community programs instead so they won't be corrupted by said porn and violence.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Back in the day when her "husband" was president, her supposed top priority was reforming health care to ensure that every American had some sort of reasonable coverage for if they were sick or injured. Now she's more worried about protecting our youth from potential images of sex or violence.
It seems to me that government in general lately has been more concerned with legislation that protects "morality" (e.g. media content, gay marriages, etc.) than with doing anything that tangibly affects people such as health care. It's like going back to the days of the Puritans and all of their 'blue laws' (many of which still exist in New England).
The video game industry needs to start making campaign contributions to politicians at a level on par with the film and music industries.
English is easier said than done.
If parents would stop leaving it up to the ESRB or the government to decide whats best for their children, these kinds of things wouldn't even be an issue. What the hell is a 13-year-old doing with GTA: San Andreas in the first place? I doubt he has a job, SOMEONE gave him that money, or SOMEONE took him to the store to buy that game. If it wasn't Mom or Dad, consider it a probably-not-illegal version of contributing to the deliquency of a minor. If it was Mom or Dad, shame on you, its YOUR fault.
Stop blaming the game companies and start being a parent. If you don't have the time to spend to screen games and movies for your children, and if you're just letting them have whatever they want, then your parenting skills need some work. Obviously Dora the Explorer is probably going to be okay. Any game that has a masked gunman on the front, more than likely will not be okay.
My wife and I recently went to go see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Our daughter (4.5 years old) has seen movies 1-3. We thought the dementors in part 3 would be a problem for her, but we told her ahead of time "This movie has some dark ghost-looking things in it, do you think you'll be okay with that." Of course she's going to say yes, (as she did) but it at least gave her a heads up when she did see them. We told her that we were seeing #4 before we did, and we told her why. Even at 4.5 years, she understood (or seemed to) that maybe that movie was too much for a little girl and that if we didn't think it was okay for her to watch it, then she wouldn't get to see it. It wasn't, and she didn't. She (luckily) understood that and didn't even give it a second thought. She just said "Will I get to watch it when I'm older?" and we of course said yes.
Before you ask, was I going to see the movie anyway? Probably. The difference being that we went through the trouble of getting a family member to watch her while we went, instead of just taking her in the first place.
A neighbor's kid watched The Ring because he wasn't being supervised (at all) and he had horrific nightmares for about 3 months because of it. The parents got upset and started blaming the studio. Finally another neighbor (who wasn't afraid to speak her mind) said that it was basically their fault that they weren't involved in what their child was watching. It happened in their own house, on the family TV, while they were home.
Any fool can have a child, but it takes a lot of effort to be able to call yourself a parent. Senator Clinton thinks she knows whats best for your children. While I might not always make the best decision with respect to my kids, I do try to, but the bottom line is that they are MY kids, and its MY decision.
And they said zombies weren't real!
My only problem with your letter (other than that it's a little confrontational) is your quickness to blame this on conservatives. Although there are certainly too many Jack Thompsons in the world, there are also plenty of Hillary Clintons and Tipper Gores. This is not a liberal-vs-conservative issue - it's a government-vs-individual issue.
People who tend to be pro-big-government also tend to be pro-censorship, and there are at least as many big government liberals as conservatives. The real lesson is that all of us, regardless of the direction of our leanings, need to watch out for those would would claim to represent our wants as they strip us of our liberties. Republican, Democrat, or whatever else you might happen to be, don't think it can't happen in your party.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
I'm sorry, but Hillary is definitely *not* a moderate. She is a closet socialist--in the closet because she realizes that most of Americans disagree with her agenda. Remember her universal medical coverage, her bus tour across the U.S. to push it? More importantly, I don't think liberals have rejected her. She is very popular among the NOW, which is not the bastion of Moderateness.
If she were a Moderate, or a Conservative, then she would have run for Senator in Arkansas, her last state of residence. She might have won, even though she is a Yankee. She ran in NY because it is *not* a Conservative state. She went to where her base was.
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.