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Australia Could Finally Get R18+ Games
angry tapir writes "Australia may finally get an adults only, R18+ classification for computer games, with the federal government releasing a discussion paper summarizing the key arguments for and against an R18+ classification. Submissions are currently being sought from the community on whether the Australian National Classification Scheme should include an R18+ category for computer and video games. In the past the board responsible for classifying games and movies has banned some titles outright because of the lack of an adults only classification — Aliens Vs. Predator is just the most recent in a long line. The Attorney-General's report on the issue is available online."
Aside from the usual arguments surrounding the average age of game players and my right to choose my entertainment (within reason), and shoehorning games into less restricted categories (GTA-IV, anyone?), I believe outright banning R18+ games probably increasing the availability of these games to minors.
For games that are available in stores, children are the least likely to be able to afford the games. Relative to adults, your average minor is probably going to pirate a game rather than buy it (regardless of legality and classification).
If you ban R18+ games, then adults are going to pirate the game too - if I want to play a game I can't buy in the store, I know I will. In the day of BitTorrent, more people downloading an item in a geographic area, the more accessible that item becomes in that area.
All they're doing by banning R18+ games, is giving minors more seeders when they go ahead and download it anyway.
Its about time the Australian government realized that games are not just for kids anymore. Its no more objectionable to have a game that is made for adults than it is to have a movie made for adults, yet some countries think there is a difference. I doubt Aliens v. Predator has anything I haven't seen before in my games that would otherwise scandalize me as a well-adjusted adult. We have had extreme violence in movies for years, there is nothing significantly different in games other than increased cathartic release.
...is when the people give one state AG the power to frustrate the wishes of all the other state AG's and the people who pay his wages.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Atkinson
This person has been the sole reason why Australia doesn't have a R18+ rating, and I highly doubt a discussion paper will change his mind.
Well I'm in two minds about this:
1. No amount of public support and public consultation is going to change Michael Atkinson's mind over this issue. Even very strong public support (91% of Australian adults support an R18+ rating for games, according to polling). Since Mr. Atkinson holds the power of veto for changing this law, even if the Federal Government STRONGLY URGES the introduction of an R18+ rating, he doesn't actually HAVE to give in to their demands (although there may be political consequences if he doesn't).
On the other hand...
2. It is great that this issue is finally being taken seriously by the general public, and is being given headlines in the major newspapers around the country today. This lends legitimacy to what gamers have been saying for ages - that game classification IS a serious issue and gamers are not kids. It's been pushed from a niche topic, to the mainstream, and that is how laws will get changed. So I'm quite encouraged by this. Michael Atkinson is unlikely to continue vetoing a change to the law if 90% of the public are behind it AND the Federal Government strongly recommends a R18+ rating in an official report ... like any other poltician, there is a point at which Mr. Atkinson will just have to bite the bullet and tow the party line. Woot :)
Mind you, the existing 'ban' (more accurately a lack of a classification preventing the sale of certain games ... you can still purchase them online and legally own and play them), isn't really a huge deal anyway. Ebay/overseas retailers are your friend.
When does this shit stop?
Most human beings reach sexual maturity - that is, the age where their hormones are in full swing - somewhere between the ages of 8 and 14 as measured by earth's orbit around the sun.
At that point they are capable of producing offspring. At that point, their bodies have entered into the physical stages where producing offspring is a *physical imperative* - ie, the hormones that produce the desire to mate are in full swing.
Now this seems to have worked for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of years. After all, we are still around as a species. This is all very well established scientific biological, and realistic, fact.
So... this whole concept of offspring not being able to view other members of their species sans clothing, or in sexual congress, or to engage in said sexual congress themselves, surely must be a societal influence. Am I correct so far?
If so, then if one takes the view of many of those who feel that those members of society younger than a certain age (it differs in various societies, but let's take 18 orbits of the earth about it's star as the number here, because it's what's being bandied about) aren't "ready" to procreate, aren't "ready" to raise those offspring to be productive members of said society, where does the fault lie? Does it lie with the offspring having offspring, or a failure of the society to teach those humans how to raise their own offspring before and during the time when they become physically capable, indeed even when their bodies demand, that they produce offspring?
Put more simply, maybe instead of telling kids they can't have sex, maybe we as a society should be teaching them *before* puberty what it all means, that they will experience it, and when they do, to guide them thru the process, rather than telling them "Sorry, no, you can't do that. Because we say so."
Now, wait a minute. One of the driving beliefs amongst many of those in many societies which restrict the ages at which young human beings can procreate is a belief in a supernatural deity who, in the words of their own creed, once said "be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth". Yet the same holders of that belief also tend to be in the forefront of those who tell young human beings that they cannot procreate, until they have reached some arbitrarily decided "age of reason"; which with some of them seems to be any age younger than they are, regardless of the age they have reached.
Not only that, but many members of that society seem to have reached the conclusion that viewing an unclothed member of their own species seems to fall within some concept called "evil" - which is apparently bad - and which makes one wonder how those members of the species seem to reproduce themselves in such great numbers. Perhaps they do it in the dark. ...
Does anyone else ever wonder whether or not human society is becoming more and more irrational? Nevermind, redundant question ;)
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It doesn't matter if Michael Atkinson wins his seat of Croydon. It has to be a Labor government in South Australia or he will no longer be Attorney General.
It will be a Liberal party member who becomes Attorney General, so I'd be lobbying them.
Oh God , Buddha various Deities etc
you think
no gay marriage , lock up the boat people Liberal party
(Australia's right wing version of the Torys , Republicans )
is going to to be any better?
Liberal party really means no to fun.