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Oklahoma Senate OKs Violent-Games Bill
CNet is reporting that the Oklahoma Senate unanimously approved a new violent-games bill on Monday that makes it a crime to sell violent video games to children under 18. From the article: "The bill passed 47-0 in the state Senate, but is being held on a motion to reconsider the vote within three legislative days before being sent back to the House to vote on Senate amendments."
This type of thing really pisses me off. Are they going to ban violent sports games like football, boxing and hockey? There is a lot of hitting in those games. Are they going to ban sales of violent rated "T" games? This is just another example of legislators usurping parents' roles. It will be struck down, they're doing it all for show.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
I recommend that people interested in the effects of violents in the media should this book/site. The guy makes some very interesting points, one of them being that the effects of being desensitized don't surface until someone is actually confronted with a violent situation.
Making it a crime to sell such games is pointless if one can simply supply a child with them. Say, for example, on the 25th of December after weeks of begging.
The problem isn't some immoral shopkeep hawking his wares to unsuspecting kiddies whilst twirling his moustache, but the permissive parents at home who mostly don't give a damn if their child is virtually running around with a virtual gun shooting virtual people with virtually aroused sexual organs.
Correct me if I am wrong, but this law simply restricts minors from purchasing/renting "violent" games without their parents' knowledge. This simply forces the parents to get involved. If a parent doesn't think that the game is too violent, then that parent can simply authorize the purchase (ie: purchase it for the child). This law seems to really be made for parents who don't care to get involved with their child; it simply governs the child when the parents fail to.
And others would say the exact opposite -- that no video game holds *any* artistic value. Then your loophole would work in the other direction.... banning the sale of all video games to anyone under 18.
Honestly, I think this may not be a bad idea. I'm a life-long gamer, but I'm also a parent, and I firmly believe that parents should rigidly control what games their children play. Banning the sale of of all video games to minors would help parents in that regard, and may just force the issue with lazy parents, making them go to the store to buy a game for their kid. Maybe even getting them to go together, actually talk to each other for five minutes... yeah, a bill like that might even eventually bring about world peace!
Heh, who am I kidding?
"Times have not become more violent. They have just become more televised."
-Marilyn Manson
Hmm.. I'm a bit confused, but what does any of the above examples have to do with violence?
If noone rtfa, then what's the slashdot effect?
Perhaps if you had included the ENTIRE text of definition 5, it would make a bit more sense and seem a bit less biased.
I don't think they are trying to single out homosexuals. I think they are just trying to completely spell everything out for the corporations that act like children and try to find all the loopholes in the law. However, I'd like to echo somebody elses sentiment: What does all of this have to do with violence?GreyPoopon
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Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
No, they are indeed singling out homosexuals, because all of the other standards for sexual conduct described apply equally to homosexuals and heterosexuals alike. It would be entirely possible to read this law to say that two men or two women holding hands is illegal, but a man and a woman is not.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Violent games fund terrorism and child pornography, don't they.
Bzzt. Wrong. There is no law against a 10 year old going to see an R-Rated movie. There is no law against a 10 year old buying said movie on DVD - unrated version even. There is no law against a 10 year old buying an Emimen album.
If this law is accepted, it will also be accepted that video games are for some reason a less protected form of speech than other media. I that OK with you? It's not OK with me.
"HB2122 passed and was signed by the Governor. This new law allows Permit/License holders to carry onto private parking lots their concealed firearm and store it in their locked vehicle. The Bill States, "No person, property owner, tenant, employer, or business entity shall be permitted to establish any policy or rule that has the effect of prohibiting any person, except a convicted felon, from transporting and storing firearms in a locked vehicle on any property set aside for any vehicle." The law becomes effective 11/1/04." - in fairness, it must be mentioned that this law was set aside (forgive the nonlegalese, IANAL) by a Federal judge, and also the minimum age for possessing a firearm is 21.
But you have to wonder at the logic of a legislature that needs to "protect" kids from videogame violence up until 18, and then at 21 lets them buy REAL guns, carry them around concealed, leave them in their cars (oooh! The car has to be LOCKED - that'll stop a car thief), and so forth. Note this is not an anti-gun post - it is only an anti-hypocrasy post. Don't promote the carrage and use of weapons of deadly force on one hand and then act holier-then-thou and say we're "protecting the children" by not letting them see video-game violence on their own (on the TV it's fine, evidently).
Homosexuality isn't a form of sexual conduct. It's a sexual preference. Anal sex is sexual conduct. Oral sex is sexual conduct. A Dirty Sanchez is sexual (mis)conduct.
Homosexuality is no more a form of sexual conduct than heterosexuality is, the latter of which appears to be missing.
That's purely prejudicial to include one and not the other. A homosexual character in a game makes it illegal to sell to minors? Please.
How in the world is homosexuality immoral?
Unfortunately, you have no clue about what a democracy is. Here's a hint: Democracy does not mean dictatorship of the majority.
Accepting homosexuality as something normal is not the minority dictating the majority, it's simply the majority showing a bit of respect for the minorty.
We have relations in Oklahoma. Decent folks, live and work on their family farm... and as susceptible to idiocy like this demagogue's "anti-violence" bill as anyone could be.
This is the state that elected Tom Coburn "Lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they'll only let one girl go to the bathroom" as a senator. It's a fricking demonstration case for Dick Nixon's "Southern Strategy" social issues being used to scare and dupe people.
In these folks' minds, promoting "anti-violence" legislation that addresses sexuality as if it's "violent" and preventing churches from controlling who brings concealed weapons to Sunday service are not fundamentally incompatible actions. We're talking my relatives -- whose response to my idea of putting numbers (10 cents, 25 cents) on our coinage was that it smacked of world government.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.