Games Are Porn in Utah

GameDailyBiz reports that there is new anti-videogame legislation brewing in both Iowa and Utah. Utah's law is more poorly thought out than most, essentially classifying violent games as porn. From the article: "Meanwhile in Utah, State Rep. David Hogue (R-Riverton) is taking a different approach. Hogue's HB 0257 would seek to amend an existing Utah statute by adding an 'inappropriate violence' clause--such as violence exhibited in some of today's popular video games. Under the existing Utah statute the distribution or showing of pornography and explicit nudity to minors is a felony. Hogue is certainly not the first politician to compare violent video games to pornography. CA Assemblyman Leland Yee and countless others have put playing violent games in the same category as porn or smoking cigarettes."

Comments

Texas taxes too

[Southpaw018]

There's also a candidate for political office (iirc) in Texas who wants to add a 50% tax on all "violent" games (without really any definition of what is violent and what is not). The bill in question essentially would make almost all video games 1.5x more expensive.
(...He also wants to add a 10% tax to all soft drinks and a $10,000 tax to all abortions. Take that as you will.)

Re:Texas taxes too

[Detritus]

Too late. The federal government has used this tactic for a very long time. Back when the feds at least paid lip service to the Constitution, they imposed a $200 transfer tax (NFA 1934) on the sale of machine guns. $200 was a hell of a lot of money in 1934, almost $3000 in today's dollars, and far greater than the value of the weapon in a free market.

Re:Why not add a "material harmful for minors"?

[monkeydo]

I think he's right. To believe what we're being told, it's wrong to be conservative or Republican. There's a laundry list of politicians supporting this legislation referenced in the article. The Republicans are all branded as such, while the Democrats aren't expressly identified. And of course no one want's to mention that Tipper Gore is the mother of modern music and video game censorship.

Re:tsk, tsk

[PhoenixOne]

Yes, if only there was some sort of standard rating system that video games could use...
http://www.esrb.org/

Maybe somebody at Take2 should just buy their own Congressman.

Re:tsk, tsk

[Osty]

And if only there was some way to enforce [2] those ratings ...

(I'd link something for PS2, but I couldn't find anything appropriate.)

Re:Parents and Politicians are stupid.

[mendaliv]

No, not only in the US. There are actually quite restrictive laws on gaming elsewhere in the world.

Australia, for example, has a history of being quite restrictive.

Here's another article's info on Video Game Legislation Around the World.

Re:tsk, tsk

[Ugly American]

Yes, if only there was some sort of standard rating system that video games could use... http://www.esrb.org/ Maybe somebody at Take2 should just buy their own Congressman.

I'd add that the ESRB ratings do indeed cause developers to exercise some restraint in what kind of content goes into games. At least according to Wikipedia, there's a grand total of 19 AO-rated games in existence (including GTA:SA.) That's 19 titles out of 8,000 or so rated by the ESRB. It seems pretty clear to me that not many publishers want to earn an AO rating and have their game shunned by the major retailers.