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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."
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.
Yes. Here in the United States, parents have say over their children's disposable income, and are able to veto what they spend it on. Furthermore, they can limit their children's access to the television and to the gaming system, and have to power to check to see what games their kids are playing and to take it away, or even punish the child in other ways if they're playing a game that the parent doesn't approve of.
Heehee. I'm kidding, of course. No, there's no system.
If the masses can keep you down, you're not the Ubermensch.
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.
And by "we", you of course mean the organization whose lawyers got the bill struck down, namely the Entertainment Software Association, whose members include Vivendi/Universal (hello RIAA), Microsoft (Who do you want to screw today?), Sony (this rootkit might sting a little), and Electronic Arts (nuff sed).
Mmmmmm, ironyburger.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Its the parents responsibility, first and foremost. The idea of using the government as a crutch will only encourage people not to think on their own.
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
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?
Why is it always assumed that adults are somehow immune to the effects of violent games/TV/movies while kids will be horribly warped by it?
Personally, I feel that there is some truth to the nasty media -> bad effects meme, but it effects adults too, and the type of content is far more important than rough metrics like violent scenes per hour.
My gut feeling is that verbal violence (which usually does not involve curse words) and displays of disrespect have a far greater impact on people. It's both far more prevalent and much easier to imitate/believe than physical violence. "Saved by the Bell" is quite likely to bend many teenagers' beliefs towards conformity (more rigid gender roles, more focus on social rank, etc.). "Pokemon" has bent many kids towards materialist/consumerist views. "Star Trek: The Next Generation", despite showing people die and other forms of violence, is unlikely to engender either pro-violence/pro-militarist or antisocial behavior. Even "Power Rangers" probably has fairly muted effects since it's pretty devoid of any real substance.
What do you mean 'we win'? Who wins? I don't understand why so many people are hell-bent on violence in this (American) culture. What makes a violent video game incomparable to an 'R' rated movie or sexually explicit material (which both cannot be sold to minors)? The only entities winning here are the corporations making money by selling to a larger audience. Meanwhile another generation of violence-exposed-to kids will turn into violence-loving adults. But anyway, the whole 'violent video games make people violent' argument aside, I fail to see why video games are placed in an untouchable category regarding law when other media and substances like alcohol have strict age limits. I fail to see how anyone 'wins' either.R rated movies can be sold to children. There is no law preventing this. There are conventions preventing this, adopted voluntarily by the stores.
Other media are not in a different category. Substances are. And I think most people can observe a difference between chemical ingestion and media exposure. If the law went into place or stood in place the games could still be sold to parents who can choose what to expose their children to. That seems like a winning situation to me. Giving kids rights to buy all kinds of explicitly violent games before they may be old enough to understand the implications (whatever you think they may or may not be) seems like a losing situation to me.Those of us on the other side just prefer not to have free speech rights eroded. Parents still have plenty of control over what media their children are exposed to. If their ability to purchase the games is the gating factor on their exposure, you have a serious problem with how you're raising your children.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
I don't think simply telling the kids they aren't allowed to play those games is the right approach. Banning something only increases their desire to get it (remember, kids ALWAYS try to rebell against their parents). The kids need to understand WHY you don't want them playing those games*. And better yet, they should be able to tell right from wrong and real from virtual by the time they actually encounter videogames.
*=Randomly reminds me of when my parents told me not to play a game called Zaxxon because I pronounced that like Sexxon and they thought that's what the game is about as they've never seen the game itself. It's a simple isometric shmup, actually.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
well I never used to have too much trouble getting ahold of them when I was 14. Is it any different today?
When I hear some politician whining about "our kids are being corrupted!", I want to ask them "how old were you when you had your first beer?".
I worry more about how deeply embedded hypocrisy is in our society.
need a free COBOL editor for Windows?
The thing is. It IS true. Parents need to start taking responsibility for the children they have. And the government needs to not be passing laws designed to "make up" for parents who don't take responsibility, instead perhaps they should be holding parents responsible along with the children for their actions.
Say what you will about parents being too busy, but I was raised by my Mom, who worked >40 hours a week (IT staff) my entire childhood. She also was always aware of what I was up to and took her role as parent very seriously. She knew what I was watching, she knew who I was spending time with, she knew what games I'd bought and was playing (because she made sure she was the one that bought them). She also did something that I see lacking from most parents these days, including families where one parent IS home with the children... she COMMUNICATED with me. She made sure to keep the dialog open at all times and to listen to what I was saying too.
Meanwhile the friends I had with the most screwed up childhoods? One parent was always home, parents still married, parents completely self absorbed and ignoring their kids. Go figure.