Euro Parliament Wants "Red Button" For Shutting Down Games

GamePolitics writes "The European Parliament has actually requested that red, panic-style buttons be set up for use by parents whose children play online games. The buttons would allow the parents to quickly shut the game down should something inappropriate occur. Wouldn't the old-school on-off switch work just as well?" To be fair, the report isn't entirely crazy; it says games "can also be used for educational and medical purposes," and acknowledges that the "presence of violence in video games does not automatically lead to violent behaviour."

Comments

Sounds a bit useless

[TheLink]

Sounds useless, but to answer the question - using the power switch could cause file system corruption.

So if you could rig this up to the equivalent of "Alt-F4" then you can avoid that.

As for why it's useless, if your child is not ready to see "stuff", and they see "stuff", and then you press the panic button, they won't _unsee_ stuff. In fact, they would probably remember it for a very long time.

If your child is not ready, just don't let them play such games, and perhaps you should work harder at getting them ready.

You don't send soldiers to battle untrained and unarmed.

Brainwash/domesticate your kids before the world does it for you (they want your kids to buy/believe their stuff without thinking too much or even at all).

Yes you may think brainwashing is wrong. But it's usually better to train them "fire = bad", and hopefully they survive long enough to figure out the complexities and subtleties.

Re:Sounds a bit useless

[mike2R]

Also, what's the betting that this is mainly a "for the sake of the children, hide the tiny, brief flashes of flesh" idea (which you're less likely to know about) rather than a "for the sake of the children, stop the massed bloodshed" idea (which generally tends to be obvious from the format of the game).

Probably not actually, since this is a proposal for a piece of misguided European legislation, rather than misguided US legislation.

The EU has many many faults, but thankfully over-regulating the human nipple isn't often one of them.

Re:No IR needed to toggle power switch

[h4rm0ny]

I've got a better one. Tell your child to stop playing the game. If a parent can see what their child is doing in order to press a red button, then they can just as easily tell their child what not to do.

Relying on physical means to control your child's behaviour only sends the message that physical means are the only means to control their behaviour and if they can avoid or counter the physical means, they can behave as they wish. Are the people who proposed this bill afraid of their own children? Is physical control what they rely on?