Slashdot Mirror
Germany Wants EU to Ban Violent Games
FredDC writes "Germany is seeking support among other European countries to ban violent videogames during its EU Presidency, according to Infoworld. In an initiative led by Franco Frattini, the European Justice commissioner, Germany is pushing for restrictions on the sale of games with violent content of any kind, from Half-Life to Star Trek . In the eyes of the EU, gaming and real-world violence is 'linked', and steps should be taken to prevent the purchase of these games by younger people. From the article: 'The German government said it will conduct a study of all the different national rules concerning video games, with a view to setting Union-wide norms. Its initiative makes the prospect of a ban much more likely. Video game violence became a hot political issue in Germany at the end of last year when 18-year-old Sebastian Bosse shot up a high school in Emsdetten, Germany, injuring 37 before fatally turning the gun on himself. Police said Bosse spent most of his waking hours playing Counter-Strike.'" This, just days after two Final Fantasy VII fans were arrested in connection with a series of killings.
They just aim to create EU-wide unified criteria for judging violence in games. Nothing more. It has nothing to do with banning games!
Slashdot summaries are often misleading interpretations of articles. That is not the case here. From TFA, "The Commission wants to see a combination of outright bans on the most violent games, together with minimum age rules on other titles." If you're asserting the summary is wrong because you read the article, your comment would be fine as the reference is already there. As it is you're making an assertion that contradicts the article. For that you need to provide a real reference if you want anyone to believe you.
I think we're all pretty sick of the constant political campaigns against violent games. In every case it's someone who goes nuts and commits some heinous crime and the fact that they played violent video games often is trotted out as either the sole cause or the trigger for the event. But there's thousands (maybe tens of thousands I don't have figures for EU) of other EU gamers playing HL and CS and somehow, beyond all odds, they manage to not go psycho and kill a bunch of people, how do they manage? [/sarcasm]
Why in this modern age must popliticians treat entire continental populations like a kindergarten class? A statistically insignificant number of people are in the ven diagram overlap of violent videogame players and violent criminals so such games are banned for everyone? Talk about lazy legislation, so sorry it's easier to try and ruin it for everyone else instead of actually investigating the other motivations and causes that lead to these tragedies and maybe learning to diagnose and treat or prevent such violent behavior. This has all been said before, it will all be said again, just ranting to get it out of my system.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
Every time I see kids treated like adults, they act like adults. Every time I see kids treated like kids, they act like kids. Oddly enough the maturity of their behavior tends to be pretty proportional to the trust you place in them ...
Agreed, 100%.
The phrase monkey see, monkey do, cuts both ways. While growing up in a violent environment (not video games - that's fake; I mean real violent environments like warzones and gang violence prone urban zones) tends to produce violent kids, kids with good, strong role models tend to be more intelligent and responsible. Humans emulate. It's what we've evolved to do.
Where it gets complicated, though, is determining: what is a good role model?
Personally, I think the anti-game, anti-fun, anti-alcohol, anti-drug, anti-sex, anti-everything protect-you-at-any-cost soccer moms are terrible role models, because they perpetuate the "do as I say, because I'm better than you" creed. More often than not, it is rooted in hypocrisy. And that is more damaging than any video game could ever be.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
"As the country that was host to probably the greatest villain in the twentieth century there is going to be a lot of pressure to condemn things that could ever be even remotely like the horrible things that happened there during WWII."
n _POWs#American_food_policy_in_Germany_shortly_afte r_the_war
The pressure has less to do with hosting the supposed "greatest villain in the twentieth century" and more to do with the fact that Germany was invaded and has since been occupied by foreign troops until the present day. And contrary to what is shown on the "History" Channel about the postwar events - with commentary about the Marshall Plan, Hershey bars and grainy footage of airplanes dropping off bales of cargo - the reality was much more harsh. Over 4 million Germans were used as slave labour by the Allies after the war. This went on for a period longer than the war's duration!
Meanwhile in Germany after the war in 1945 and 1946, international aid organizations were prevented from sending relief to German civilians. In 1945, the average German civilian received a starvation diet of 1200 calories - in the US and UK occupation zones. In 1946, the average German civilian received 1500 calories, still well below what is considered to be healthy.
Their press and government were also under strict Allied control.
THAT is where the pressure to self-flagellate comes from. Germans knew that if they didn't kowtow to their occupiers, their lives would be forfeit. These attitudes got passed down to the next generation.
Stalin was at least as bad as Hitler ever was. The difference between Russian and German attitudes about their past leaders is that one was occupied by enemies of the prior regime, the other wasn't.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgenthau_Plan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenhower_and_Germa
If I have seen further it is by stealing the Intellectual Property of giants.
[T]he United States has the highest rates of childhood homicide, suicide, and firearm-related death among industrialized countries. ... The firearm-related homicide rate in the United States was nearly 16 times higher than that in all of the other countries combined (0.94 compared with 0.06); the firearm-related suicide rate was nearly 11 times higher (0.32 compared with 0.03); and the unintentional firearm-related death rate was nine times higher (0.36 compared with 0.04) Rates of Homicide, Suicide, and Firearm-Related Death Among Children -- 26 Industrialized Countries (1990-1995)
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Where firearms are tightly regulated, firearms are insignificant as a cause of death among children.