Slashdot Mirror
Ban On Louisiana Video Game Law Now Permanent
Carl Carlson writes "A Louisiana judge has issued a permanent injunction against a Louisiana law banning the sale of violent video games to minors. The law was crafted by video game dilettante Jack Thompson and took a slightly different approach to the issue of regulating video game sales. Rep. Roy Burrell (R) and Jack Thompson had research that purported to show a causative link between playing violent video games and real-world violence entered into the legislative record in an attempt to buttress the legislation's shaky credentials. In addition, the law adapted the Miller obscenity test to the realm of violent video games."
We win!
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
...but isn't there already a system that makes it so that minors can't play some games? I'm not sure how it's in the US but the eruopean PEGI system works just fine here.
So...kids have rights now? How long before they get cell phones in high schools, drink when they go to war (18), etc.?
Zing!
The fact that it became a law in the first place is kind of disturbing. Why should a judge even have to bother stopping this? Well, at least everything turned out good in the end, especially since Jack Thompson is probably pissed off that his attempts at stopping people from accessing anything that is at all violent have failed once again.
Too young to buy a game, but old enough to join the army?
Wow, that's a confusing title, a ban on a law made permanent. At first I read it as the law banning [certain] video games was now perminent. Then, after I cleaned up after the spit-take, I read it as a permanent video game law [as in constitutional amendment] being banned. Took three tries to read it as a video game law being banned permanently.
Did they pull that thing out of a software licence or am I just sleep deprived?
Demented But Determined.
One can never "win" when it comes to situations like these. It takes eternal vigilance to ensure that future legislation is not passed that has many of the same restrictions as this struck-down law has.
The moment you think you've "won", that's the moment you're most vulnerable.
Not only is the Slashdot article misleading, but so is the Ars Technica article!
They make it sound like the ban was legit.
Way to go for Louisiana yet again...why worry about protecting the state from flooding when you can "protect the kids" and pass bad legislation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test
52 52'23" W 47 32'07" N
Is anyone else tired of people attacking our freedom of speech and expression? I for one am glad the courts are still on our side. Separation of powers at work.
my mom posts on slashdot.
Vegitales and Barney do far more damage than violent video games. I've never been disturbed by any video game ever but Barney freaks they hell out of me. Could you imagine the damage Vegitales could do if the viewer happened to have just dropped acid? We just need to ban the right things. Overly religious vegitables and purple blob dinosaurs would be at the top of my list. Drunks used to see pink elephants. What do you have to take to see purple dinosaurs? These are dangerous people producing dangerous and disturbing products. They must be stopped!
Yet another attempt to stop young people from buying violent video games. And why? Because it is making them violent... What a load of garbage, GAMES are for entertainment purposes and granted some take them too seriously... like my Neverwinter Nights addiction. BUT the point is that you can't keep blaming violence in society on games, and if a child buys a game that their parents deem 'too violent' why don't the parents take it away from them?? There are too many violent influences, but in the end it is the responsibility of the individual to decide if they are going to shoot someone in real life or not. So, let's stop passing the buck and take responsibility for our own actions. Next thing we will hear is someone wanting control of games such as 'World Poker Tournament' because it MADE them have a gambling problem.
There looks like there could be a link between what we see on media and our actions, and the mirroring of the behaviour we see may not necessarily even be conscious. Tell me this effect would be lessened during the playing of an actual game. I want to believe it doesn't have an effect, but...
(From edge.org, http://edge.org/q2006/q06_print.html )
MARCO IACOBONI
Neuroscientist; Director, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Lab, UCLA
Media Violence Induces Imitative Violence: The Problem With Super Mirrors
Media violence induces imitative violence. If true, this idea is dangerous for at least two main reasons. First, because its implications are highly relevant to the issue of freedom of speech. Second, because it suggests that our rational autonomy is much more limited than we like to think. This idea is especially dangerous now, because we have discovered a plausible neural mechanism that can explain why observing violence induces imitative violence. Moreover, the properties of this neural mechanism -- the human mirror neuron system -- suggest that imitative violence may not always be a consciously mediated process. The argument for protecting even harmful speech (intended in a broad sense, including movies and videogames) has typically been that the effects of speech are always under the mental intermediation of the listener/viewer. If there is a plausible neurobiological mechanism that suggests that such intermediate step can be by-passed, this argument is no longer valid.
For more than 50 years behavioral data have suggested that media violence induces violent behavior in the observers. Meta-data show that the effect size of media violence is much larger than the effect size of calcium intake on bone mass, or of asbestos exposure to cancer. Still, the behavioral data have been criticized. How is that possible? Two main types of data have been invoked. Controlled laboratory experiments and correlational studies assessing types of media consumed and violent behavior. The lab data have been criticized on the account of not having enough ecological validity, whereas the correlational data have been criticized on the account that they have no explanatory power. Here, as a neuroscientist who is studying the human mirror neuron system and its relations to imitation, I want to focus on a recent neuroscience discovery that may explain why the strong imitative tendencies that humans have may lead them to imitative violence when exposed to media violence.
Mirror neurons are cells located in the premotor cortex, the part of the brain relevant to the planning, selection and execution of actions. In the ventral sector of the premotor cortex there are cells that fire in relation to specific goal-related motor acts, such as grasping, holding, tearing, and bringing to the mouth. Surprisingly, a subset of these cells -- what we call mirror neurons -- also fire when we observe somebody else performing the same action. The behavior of these cells seems to suggest that the observer is looking at her/his own actions reflected by a mirror, while watching somebody else's actions. My group has also shown in several studies that human mirror neuron areas are critical to imitation. There is also evidence that the activation of this neural system is fairly automatic, thus suggesting that it may by-pass conscious mediation. Moreover, mirror neurons also code the intention associated with observed actions, even though there is not a one-to-one mapping between actions and intentions (I can grasp a cup because I want to drink or because I want to put it in the dishwasher). This suggests that this system can indeed code sequences of action (i.e., what happens after I grasp the cup), even though only one action in the sequence has been observed.
Some years ago, when we still were a very small group of neuroscientists studying mirror neurons and we were just starting investigating the role of mirror neurons in intention understanding, we discussed the possi
http://pcblues.com - Digits and Wood
I don't play video games but I'd say a convincing argument can be made that playing violent games doesn't turn people into violent offenders. Namely, that none of these people has mowed down ol' Jack with a bazooka or GTO.
Learn to spell: nickel, missile, lose, solely, amendment, speech, kernel, probably, ridiculous, deity, hierarchy, versus
Ok, I'm one of the many anti-Jack Thompson people around... I can't stand the way in which he is going about his 'crusade' against video games. However, is enforcing game classifications in regards to selling to minors such a bad thing? Seeing as many people (read: parents) don't seem to have much control or responsibility over what their kids are buying / doing, perhaps it's time that the retail sector did enforce these things.
Here in Australia, kids are asked for identification when they are purchasing alcohol or cigarettes, or when they go to an MA15+ or R18+ rated movie... why not carry that over to games? If a parent is happy for a kid to have the game, then they can go and buy it for them.
Causative Link? Bullshit!
People want to find a damn scapegoat for everything. First it was "Violence on TV", then there's "Heavy Metal Music"! Oh my god! Will someone please think of the children! Seriously... you can get more violence in some religious texts than on TV, or Music. Computer Games, TV, or Music don't make people want to commit violence. This was used as an excuse for Columbine.
The fact is that we can owe it to either bad parenting, or maybe a more obvious fact. Homo sapiens is a territorial, aggressive, war-like species. For all our intelligence, we still like to beat the crap out of each other. This is obvious perhaps in more individuals than others.
So stop trying to find things to blame. Making laws are not going to make us less violent.
Vivin Suresh Paliath
http://vivin.net
I like
Or does anyone else here want to stalk Jack Thompson and everytime you see him whip out some violent video game and play it until he leaves? better yet.. bring along my 5 year old and call of duty 2 hehe.
Inane Comments are Generously Disregarded
I'd love to be able to write an opinion to a few papers in the state, reminding everyone to thank our legislature for the unanimous (wasn't it?) approval of this clear violation of the Constitution that will cost the state to spend money when we can least afford frivolous expenditures, and mocking the "Think of the children!" crowd.
Permanent injunction does not mean "forever." It is simply an injunction granted after a complete hearing on the merits, as opposed to a preliminary injunction, which is granted before a trial if you show a "reasonable likelihood of success" and other things, like irreparable harm.
What?
Am I the only one who thinks it odd that children can enjoy all the murder and mayhem that the entertainment industry can dump on them, but god forbid they should see a bare breast!
Is this part of a military conspiracy that wants them for cannon fodder, and fears that a healthy sex drive might make children avoid the latest Republican adventures overseas?
...omphaloskepsis often...
youth crime is at a 30 year low
games have always been violent.
this points to me that there is not a viable corrilation.
"Infecting minds with my own memetic virus, one post at a time." Ultimape
After last year, when the state was smushed by God's finger of Doom, why would this even be on the radar? Why would anyone care? I can't believe that anyone is spending any energy or oxygen on something like this.
why not rename it to 'jack thompson - suck it' just to avoid confusing.
Cnn's Dr. Sanjay Gupta has a blog entry on a new study done by the American Academy of Pediatrics which says there is a correlation between violent video games and violent behavior.
From the article:
Unfortunately the post is pretty short on details and there are no links to the study. Interesting too that Dr. Gupta'a post was referring to 'children' but the tests were done on teenagers. I don't equate teenagers with children.
I'm from Louisiana. After moving here seveal months ago to attend to a family emergency, I've grown used to the state's warped-ness.
I'm sorry. Never move here thiking you'll take a tech job. Never think that anything but either a mall job, an MCSE grunt, or a longshoreman's work awaits you.
This state is hell. And it's the future of the nation if the last two presidential elections are any indication - declining public education, declining corporate interest, and declining intelligence.
It might be the sportsman's paradise, but it sure is a geek's hell.
It's really quite simple. There hasn't been violent video games since the year dot and yet times past were much more violent then now. Or are people going to try to claim that Ghengis Khan and Adolf Hitler played violent video games? Now myself, I play violent video games and yet you'll be hard pressed to find someone less violent then me. I imagine there are many people like myself.
I believe the technical term for such matters is "LOL, PWNED!".
When the posters fear their moderators, there is tyranny; when the moderators fears the posters, there is liberty.
I'd actually go so far as to say that there is a causal link between video games and violence.
Being violent leads one to enjoy violent games.
Really, wasn't that simple?
Absolutely nothing.
Indiana has a state law that states that it's also illegal to sell video games that are mature rated to minors.
Does it stop them being sold?
Nope..
Parents who don't listen to sales people when they say whats in the game are the problem..
Just stop selling things to minors. Problem solved.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I have seen kids go in and have their aunts/uncles/grandparents purchase the game for them for a present. I have seen it happen before me with one of the GTA titles, and I remember when I did the same thing with the Jerky Boys first CD back when I was in junior high.
Since the ban on the sale of alcohol to minors has worked so well over the last 40 years. is there any doubt this will work???? Once again, parents are looking to the government to do the jobs they should be doing.
"In normal times, evil would be fought by good. But in times like these, well, it should be fought by another kind of evil."
Caffeine is my anti-drug!
Duranin - A NWN2 Roleplaying Persistent World
So the idea is that a child at 16 can drive a freakin' motor vehicle but cannot play a violent video game?
Buh?
They could just act out their violent fantasys with the auto...mow down a bunch of Wal*Mart shoppers in the parking lot and you'll get a lesser sentence than if you used a gun or knife!
Lucky for us, that rarely happens.
Blar.
Rep. Roy Burrell (R) and Jack Thompson had research that purported to show a causative link between playing violent video games and real-world violence Causative link, huh? Anyone have a link or know where i can come across this research? I am failing to understand how they could show a causative link.... My limited knowledge would lead me to believe an experiment attempting to make people more violent would be unethical if not military... but otherwise it would be a correlation only, and correlation does not equal causation, no? Point being, how are you going to prove people are more violent scientifically, it is not objective data, you would be showing a trend that could be manipulated by many other factors...
If video games and the military make people violent why am I not violent? [...]
The Army is my job, sometimes we engage and fire on the enemy.. but it isn't like my blood is pulsing and i'm out of control. [...] It is just a job and we are good at it, So you aren't violent, you just kill in a cold, detached state. Devoid of emotion or empathy, because it's the job you have chosen. You only kill for profit, never out of passion...
That does not seem better to me.
You can't take the sky from me...
The world is a big scary place with lots of... reality. Regardless of this law, parents have only minimal control over what sorts of things their children will experience or observe. It is far more effective to spend ones parenting efforts trying to prepare children to face the world, and teaching them how to react to the things they experience and observe, rather than hiding them from it so that they don't know how to react when it does happen.
This is much more in line with the basic premise of parenting, which is that children will eventually grow into adults, and if they are never taught how to deal with things as children, they will still not know once they become adults.