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Officer's Group Calls for Ban On 25 To Life
Kotaku reports that the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund is calling for a boycott of 25 to Life. From the post: "It is absolutely unconscionable that game makers are enabling young people--or anyone--to dramatize shooting and killing as a form of entertainment while officers and innocent people are dying in real-life on our streets every day. We're encouraging parents, caregivers and everyone who is concerned about both law enforcement officers and children to ensure this game never makes it into the homes or hands of impressionable young people."
When you've got the real thing available online?
- islami-baghdad-sniper/al-jaishul-islami-baghdad-sn iper-70mb.rmvb
http://ia300831.eu.archive.org/3/items/al-jaishul
Seriously, isn't this sort of thing how Arnie got rich...and into office?
Yes! These games are an outrage. In my youth we had good, clean, wholesome fun. We kids ran around outside and played, uh, Cops and Robbers.
My fellow ghosts and I have been protesting Pac-Man for over 25 years, and we're still not safe from being eaten by some random gamer kid on the street.
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
The FA correctly notes that the call is for a boycott, but the headline there refers to a "ban" instead. Bizarrely, the submitter decided to use the body's correct wording in his body and the headline's error in his header.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Both the summary and TFA seem to confuse a boycott with a ban. But they're not the same. The NLEOMF only seems to be calling for a boycott, or for what might be called "discretionary purchasing." I didn't see anywhere in their statement where they called for it to be illegal or impossible to buy the game. So TFA's complaint that "they shouldn't be able to dictate what I play. What's next, a ban on all movies depicting violence against police?" and the summary are pretty unfair to the organization, and are probably just flamebait.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Postal really started this genre many years ago and created a stir. This is just the next target from crazy parent groups and surely not the last. If they would spend as much time with their kids, maybe they wouldn't be so messed up!
http://religiousfreaks.com/It looks like the original wire service report included various bits of unpleasant information from the Brandon Vedas incident. That's some astoundingly sloppy reporting.
Move 'sig'. For great justice!
Meaning its for older individuals? Not impressionable children? I'm not going to buy the game because it looks like a drole rehash, but keeping it out of the hands of children? The industry already did their duty with its rating. Now Parents need to do theirs and not buy the damn game for their kids. YOu don't give porn to 12 year olds, why would a game be any different. People need to wake up and realize just because its a game doesn't mean its suitable for children. I'm always astounded at what I see parents buying for their children in the games section.
It may be my opinion, but a parent that buys their kids this type of game probably wouldn't blink about giving said child a copy of Mien Komf(sp?: Hitler AutoBio) or a terrorist's manifesto because THEY NEVER READ WHAT IT IS! How damn difficult is it to LOOK at the content you are giving your children. Hell if you want to buy this game and you think your child can handle the adult subject matter and you want to take the time to discuss it with your child, fine by all means that is your right as a parent. It just drives me nuts to see all the irresponsible parents who think its everyone elses job to police their children.
Oh I understand you'll never be able to controll all that they see, but in my mind you should make a damn good effort to make sure they understand what they see and the consequences.
"If I were bound by all laws everywhere I'm sure I would have committed a capital crime somewhere."
Instead of boycotting the game (though reasonable) and seeking to remove it from stores (something of a free speech issue?), why don't they spend more effort on supporting the ESRB rating system and its enforcement? They should do that if they're really focused on keeping it out of the 'hands of impressionable young people'.
It is absolutely unconscionable that game makers are enabling young people--or anyone--to dramatize shooting and killing as a form of entertainment while officers and innocent people are dying in real-life on our streets every day
So, I assume you'll get right onto boycotting the show COPS, right? Because it dramatizes pursuit and police brutality as a form of entertainment while civilians and innocent people are being arrested in real-life on our streets every day.
It would be impossible to even consider trying to quantify the number of media titles (games, movies, etc.) where killing has taken place. Of course I don't condone any type of real life murder, including the killing of peace/police officers. I do, however, wish to retain my right to play whatever the hell I want to play.
One thing that groups like this don't know or don't consider, is that the people who commit these heinous crimes are not the normal average everyday kids. If they have any type of mental instability that allows the line between reality and fantasy to blur enough to think that committing the crimes they see in these games is okay, then there is a word for that. Its called predisposition. Its not the games that is causing these violent crimes. I was playing GTA: San Andreas last night, where one of the missions I had to do was to rob a bank and a betting store. I successfully completed both missions, and guess what? This morning I woke up, ate my breakfast, took my kids to their babysitter, came to work, and so far have had a very productive day. Not once did the idea of robbing a bank or a betting store enter my mind, because I know the difference between real and fantasy. Those people who commit these crimes then blame video games or movies for them are either mentally ill, or they are just trying to find a scapegoat. Personally I feel that anyone that has the "mental" capability to actually take another person's life in cold blood has a mental defect, regardless of what the courts say. I'm not saying that these people should not go to prison, but I'm saying that thats not normal behavior.
I respect police officers and the dangerous job they do. I have several in my family, and have gone along on ridealongs with quite a few. I know all about the training they have, and the day-to-day dangers they can endure. However I do not feel that anyone has the right to tell me what I should and should not be able to play. One might say "Where can the line be drawn"... However given the history of 'cops and robbers', 'cowboys and indians', etc that I was bombarded with growing up, I don't think this is really any different, AS LONG AS the person playing these games is mentally fit to differentiate reality from fantasy. Do I feel that people should undergo mental testing to purchase a game? No. However I do feel that people need to stop blaming the games and movies and start putting the blame where it probably lies the most: On the parents. Parents need to teach their kids right and wrong, they need to teach their kids whats real and "make-believe". If they can see that their kid can't tell the difference between tv and real life, they need to seek professional help. I'm sick and tired of people blaming the game companies when its usually the parent's fault.
Children aren't born with an inherent understanding of good, evil, right,or wrong. They need to be taught these ideas. This is way before school, and rests entirely on the shoulders of the parents.
And they said zombies weren't real!
The images are wrong. The messages are wrong. And stocking it in U.S. stores is wrong.
And perhaps banning it is also wrong.
What's so different about violence in video games as opposed to violence in books, movies, TV, etc.? And what about all those shootout games kids play with toy guns? Why not ban those?
Millions of kids watch/participate in entertainment that contains violent content and millions grow up to be law abiding citizens. These guys don't have any evidence of a connection with games and real life. They just don't like the content and want to enforce their preferences on everyone else. Shameful.
No, I won't let my kids play it - at 3 and 5 yo, they're still working through the "Clifford the Big Red Dog" games. When they're closer to 18, I'm sure we'll discuss the VR headsets to augment the latest round of violent video games, but for now, nope.
I used to play Lazer Tag with my friends at night around our high school. It was fun and sometimes a huge adrenaline rush. It made it very clear to me that I never want to be in a firefight - I lost way too often, which in RL is defined as "more than once".
Never never never smoke crack before geometry class!
Nice missleading headline though.
No one in the article mentions banning the game, other than the author who apprently postulates that the next logical step is banning all movies that depict violence against police, showing that he profoundly missed the difference between ban and boycott.
I'm going to be boycotting this game as well, not because I think virtual depictions of killing cops and the innocent are wrong, but because I think that like most games relying soley on offensive and gruesome content, this game will be terrible to play.
If you want to not buy the game based on 'moral' grounds, good for you. Don't take the Jack Thompson road to raving lunacy and I really can't take issue with this kind of protest; other than to say I think it defeats its own purpose. Controversy, and complaint is a substitute for the marketing budget in these kinds of games. This is a fairly small, niche (Adults only rating if I'm not mistaken), low quality, no class game; and leaving to flounder in obscurity would do more harm than a nationally publicized boycott.
I was thinking the same thing. In the old kids game, you ran around saying, "Bang!" and "missing" a lot. The good guys were the only ones allowed to shoot and win, and the bad guys played out losing with child-like melodrama. Only the cops would win, and then you'd switch sides so that you could be the good guys and win.
This game's a little nastier with no clear morality, actual graphic death, and a glorification of the "thug life." I'm not sure that I'd support a ban on it, but no one can really sanely offer that this is good, clean, kid-friendly fun.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Yeah, I apparently was also one who got confused between the headline and the actual wording in the article. I blame the writer of the article for apparently not knowing that there is a clear distinction between ban and boycott. I also blame myself for just quickly scanning the article since I was at work.
The Get Rich Or Die Tryin jab was my subtle attempt at trying to add some humor. Either way, my point still stands that the MA rated game should be treated no differently in the stores than an R rated movie. I realize that some parents will still buy it for their kids, but I blame the parents for their lack of parenting than I would blame the makers of the game or anybody else. I'm a firm believer in the games rating system. It's just too bad that more parents don't pay attention to it.
Really, 2 things need to happen in the gaming industry. 1) We, the mature adult gamers out there need to let more parents know that we do exist and that games like GTA are made for us. 2) It's abundantly clear that many parents still do not know about or pay attention to the games rating system. The more attentive parents are aware of it, sure. But what the industry could really use is a massive PR campaign regarding the ratings system with commercials taken our during popular adult programs such as one of the multitude of CSI's, and with ads placed in popular adult magazines, such as (no I'm not immediately thinking of Playboy!) Time and those leagues of women's magazines that litter the grocery store checkout lanes. And they need to be good adverts -- ads that will actually draw the consumers' attention to them. So far, all I've ever seen done to explain a games rating might be a short explanation at the end of an ad for GTA or something.
I don't know. Maybe I may have missed some ads like these, but I'm also not the typical American consumer (I.E. I despise CSI and Law & Order). I'm not the kind of person to whom these advertisements should be targetted.
If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.