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Utah Senate, House Pass Jack Thompson's Game Sales Bill
Ars Technica reports that the Utah State Senate and House have both passed Jack Thompson's proposed legislation that would stiffen penalties for the sale of M-rated games to minors. Oddly, on its trip through the state legislature, amendments rendered it largely ineffective; retailers are in the clear if the employee who sold the game goes through a training program, or if the minor misrepresents his age. It's also possible that the bill could cause some retailers to simply take down their ESRB-related advertising. Thompson's statements about the bill put the focus on advertising, but discussion on the Utah Senate floor had a familiar ring, touching on the story of a Grand Theft Auto player who killed two policemen in 2003. The ESRB wrote an open letter in opposition of the bill, saying it could undo the efforts they've made to popularize their rating system. The bill's sponsors fired back, questioning the industry's overall commitment to ratings, and now it awaits only the governor's signature before becoming law.
Only three GTA players have killed cops? GTA must make people less likely to kill cops. After all, think of all the killing of cops not associated with GTA players.
Hmm, perhaps an occasional game of fake-blow-shit-up would make disaffected youths less likely to really-blow-shit-up? It is all about the kids, right?
You couldn't pay me to live there. The funny thing is that I know some Mormons who feel the same way. I guess Utah Mormon is a bit of a different breed than Mormons from almost everywhere else. It must be the effect of any one group having a majority. They get to be assholes.
Picture the sales clerk saying OK kid! You must first misrepresent your age before I am allowed to sell you this game!
Just keep in mind that crap sometimes spreads.. There was a time when you could smoke on the Greyhound bus.. that is until you entered the state of Utah.. look where we are at today.
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While I do not agree with the bill, no game publisher's free speech is being restricted, no game company is being prosecuted by the government for the content of the games. The games are still able to be sold, and while not as damaging as cigarettes, alcohol, guns (yes, in most states you have to be 18 to jump through the hoops solo to get a gun), or porn, an average, voting citizen's access to the games are not restricted and the game company has not been silenced.
First Amendment law requires strict scrutiny. That means the government must, when regulating sales or distribution of material covered by the First Amendment, demonstrate that its proposed law has the minimum necessary effects required to accomplish its goals. Since the goal (regulating commercial press activity) is unconstitutional to begin with, there's no way the law can meet strict scrutiny.
Seriously. Why do you think that, out of dozens of attempts to pass laws like this in various states, absolutely none of them have survived court challenges?
A further question. The First Amendment puts a free press on an equal footing with the free exercise of religion. What do you think might happen if the Utah legislature attempted to dictate the terms under which Mormon literature and religious items could be sold?
They latched on to something of an urban myth surrounding James Dallas Egbert III.
Egbert was pretty messed up long before fantasy roleplaying came along.
Like many gamers, he was a very smart kid (he graduated high school at 14 or 15), and he really just wasn't ready for the real world. He was two years older than me, but 3-4 grades in front of me, so I didn't know him personally, but my parents knew his parents moderately well.
The stories in the papers were pretty sensationalistic, because at the time, D&D was just really catching on, and (like you said) a lot of people wanted some ammo against it. Anybody who did any research would have known that he had been on thin ice for a long time, but nobody dug deeper and the lie the investigator told stood for years. Despite his book, nobody remembers the real story.
I'm having a hard time connecting the age-limit restriction and the death of two police officers. Is this to say that if a 35 year-old person were to shoot a police officer, we should restrict violent game sales to only those who are 36 or older? These phony imposed age-limits need to go and let parents decide what is best for our kids instead of the government. My kids (13 and 9) will have a harder time drumming up $50 for the game than they would buying it underage anyways.