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German Interior Ministers Seek Ban On Violent Games
GamePolitics reports that "Germany's 16 Interior Ministers have banded together to ask the Bundestag (Germany's equivalent of Parliament) to ban the production and distribution of violent video games. Moreover, the ministers hope to see this accomplished before Germany's new elections take place on September 27th." Violent games became a national issue in Germany earlier this year after Far Cry 2 was scapegoated for a shooting. Germany-based game developer Crytek could be forced to move or outsource if the ban goes through. Spiegel Online has the original story (Google translation).
And first to say, the government hatred on freedom of any type has gone too far, and this is a perfect example.
we're supposed to respect for their opinions on Scientology?
But let us be honest. The people ruling that country now, do not even know what you are talking about. The whole world needs to grow up instead of looking for a scape goat.
Yeah, but if they leave Germany, do you really think all the devs are going to follow? They'll end up with an entirely new team making games on the old IP, and it won't be the same.
Hopefully, the politicians behind this get some sort of backlash from their constituents, and back down.
FUD - there is no word in TFA about Crytek being forced to outsource or similar - you know, banning sales != banning development.
(Also, Germany produces lots of real world weapons for export only... )
Just got proven again with the tags. Is 10 min a new record? Anyway, what do they mean by violent? "Violent" could be twisted into a lot of things.
Hey we're really hurting on the economy, let's ban the idiots that dare run a successful business and bring needed tax revenue in! That'l fix the situation! How dare you try and run a business that may offend people in some way!
While I admire everyone's knee jerk reaction to defend video games via free speech I think this method of defense is inherently idiotic.
If someone came up to me and accused me of murder I wouldn't base my case on freedom of privacy. I would hope my lawyer could simply disprove the actual charges against me.
Fighting these sorts of things largely on free speech seems to imply that that video games are actually responsible for some sort of mayhem but should be protected anyway. They aren't dangerous. They don't pose a public threat and they shouldn't even be charged as such let alone 'allowed' to exist in spite of these accusations.
People need to educate the voting public that the 12 year old next to them on the laughing and bragging about how he shot a rifle through someone's head yesterday and made it explode isn't a deraged lunatic.
Video games out of context sound insane and dangerous. This is largely an educational problem which needs a good PR campaign. It's easier to defend something which people understand and like than it is to fight an abstract constitutional battle about the conflict between freedom and public well being.
People don't want to believe in bad people. Lets face it, some people are just rotten. It wasn't video games, it wasn't the comic books, or the rock music. Maybe something caused it other then nature, but if that's the case, I'm sure it was exposure to a lot of lead or a head injury that damaged a specific portion of the head during early childhood.
Until we realize that some people are rotten, and everybody is responsible for themselves, we're going to continue to creating stupid laws that make the word a worse place to live in.
Pretty much any game made now days could be considered violent, any game that you use a gun or weapon to attack something else. Hell even C&C could and games in that area since they have you trin to destroy the enemy.
The whole world needs to grow up instead of looking for a scape goat.
Everytime the world tries to grow up in one area it takes a step back in ways we already had correctly. It really just needs a happy medium on all levels.
Anything can be found funny, from a certain point of view.
Really, this is supposed to be the fabled "democracy" ancient greeks thought up? Oh no, wait. We've transformed that into a PR farce that every four years proves how rotten the people at the top are. Your votes don't matter. They are merely a numeral representation of how much you "don't" have to say. Lies, populism and ignorant phrase flinging wherever you look. None of this will matter AFTER the election that's why everything they tried to introduce lately was meant to be established before voters aren't important again. Look at our ministry of family and health. They neglected their resort for 3 1/2 years and all of a sudden when the election goes into the confrontation phase they start tossing around stuff like "DNS filters" and "address filtering" against alleged child pornography. All of which could be removed through application of existing laws but since they chose to balance the budget by cutting funds to investigators and connecting departments they now have to start flapping their arms REAALLY fast.
Politicians are lying pricks that are always a couple of decades behind when it comes to reality. Unfortunately this generalization stands to be disproven for all of the major parties in my country. They can't stop anyone from selling these games to me and if they do I'll personally book a cheap ticket to one of our less ridiculous neighboring countries. Other than that I or someone else will sue at the surpreme court that no government can tell an adult tax payer what to watch or what to play. Not unless they give up all their ludicrous make-belief jobs. This will all die down when these shit elections are finally over. Remember: Vote Pirate!
The Nazis are back in power except this time round they have the technology to stifle the opposition without the need for bloodshed.
Little by little, more and more is becoming illegal. What was once the realm of interpersonal relationships is slowly being taken over by the state. They will now tell you what you can say and what you cannot say, which game you can play and which you cannot. Soon they will tell you which flag you can wave and what you must think. It will be illegal to not like things which the state supports and to dislike things which the state dislikes - we're part way there already, and not only in Germany. There's not a lot I like about US politics, but one thing I do admire about the US is the freedom of speech enshrined in the constitution. Be glad you have it. It doesn't exist in Europe and I am not aware of any other country where it is protected.