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Switzerland Pursues Violent Games Ban
BanjoTed writes "We hear lots about the issues facing violent games in Australia, but the anti-games bandwagon is gathering pace closer to home — in Switzerland, to be precise. The Swiss government is gearing up to consider a total ban on mature games in the country."
"We hear lots about the issues facing violent games in Australia, but the anti-games bandwagon is gathering pace closer to home — in Switzerland, to be precise."
Are you sure you don't live in Austria?
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
This isn't closer to home for me:P~~~~
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Some games are really bad, whether it be egregious content or age-inappropriate content.
But there's no need to get violent about it. A normal rational games ban would work just as well as a violent games ban.
If as an adult you let the government treat you like a child, remember what happened to you as a child when you "said something mommy and daddy didn't like".
With this focus by Swiss leadership on the dubious social dangers of simulated violence, we can at least take heart knowing they've found solutions to all other social issues with demonstrated negative impacts.
I'm so happy to live in a world with such pragmatic leaders. We can always count on politicians for intellectually honest debate of issues and good faith efforts to fix the problems they can.
So nice to sleep easy knowing that representatives the world over don't let themselves get bogged down in baseless populist hysteria or abuse the power they're given to manipulate economies such that wealth is redistributed to their buddies.
I don't know what we'd do without our honest, hard working politicians. May your silver spoons never tarnish, you captains of hypocrisy.
Switzerland has very little regard for free speech. Very little regard for things that are unpopular or disliked and has an aging, reactionary voter base. Frankly, I got far more worked up over the ban on minarets that they enacted last year. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/30/world/europe/30swiss.html That was a much more serious violation of basic rights. This? This is small potatoes.
If we look at the youth crime rates in the US, they dropped of precipitously when the PS1 came out and have stayed low compared to previous decades ever since.
If the trend was the same in Switzerland, what happens when you take away that outlet?
Most of the drop in crime likely comes from resolution of boredom, but it probably serves as a panacea for some of the whackjobs out there too.
Switzerland has more direct democracy than most countries. Even if the legislation passes parliament, if someone gathers 50k signatures against some law (in 100 days), he can cause national vote on this matter. In this vote all citizens decide whether the law should stay or be rejected. So to get rid of it they just need to convince normal people (and not politicians) that this is a bad idea.
It's shorthand for "for mature audiences". But you knew that.
He does have a point though - most of what is classified as "mature" in games really only appeals to teenagers. Take the sex scenes in Bioware's DragonAge; speaking as someone in my thirties they are cringe-makingly awful, but I suspect my eighteen year old self would have enjoyed them.
It isn't just games. I recently reread what I remembered as some excellent Sci-Fi books, Peter F Hamilton's Night's Dawn series. I still like the books, but I found the constant gratuitous sex scenes really got a bit wearing after a while. When I first read them, I found those sections titillating.
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