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Anti-Gamer South Australian Attorney General Quits
dogbolter writes "South Australian Attorney General, Michael Atkinson, infamous for the banning of R18+ rated games and the censoring of political comment in Australia, has quit. The recent South Australian election provided a massive swing against Atkinson's governing labor party. As a direct result of the South Australian election result, he is standing down. Hopefully someone with half a clue will assume the vacant post and overturn the decision to ban adult oriented computer games."
RAGE QUIT!
Summation 2
A lot of game shops have petitions to sign - Aussies, if you are dropping by one to pick up the latest austrlian-modified (aka heavily-censored) version of whatever, ask to sign the petition. (I found one to sign, right at the front of the store "GAME", in the Brisbane CBD). More info about the craziness of no R18+ games for Australia is Here
Finish him!
how is the SA AG's view on computer games flawed? It should be obvious to anyone that he believes that the views of his constituency...are not supportive of a "wider range" of content in video games.
First of all, he doesn't believe that. In a recent letter he wrote about this, he stated "this issue has little traction with my constituents who are more concerned with real-life issues than home entertainment in imaginary worlds". So it seems that he is not representing the will of his constituents, but he thinks that they don't care about it.
As to why it is flawed, that is because it is so out of step with the rest of the country. Adding an R rating for video games requires the agreement of all Attorneys General of all the states. Michael Atkinson is the only one who will not agree to it, despite the evidence suggesting that the majority of Australians support the introduction.
The main problem is that it doesn't stop kids from seeing adult games. In fact, because there is no R rating, games that would have received that tend to get MA15+ ratings. Those that aren't banned, that is.
Every independent survey run found wide support for an R rating for games amoung the Australian community: Link (reference in there to a survey finding 88% support). Atkinson is considerably more conservative than his base on the issue - this is (or was) a politician's individual crusade, not him representing his electorate.
I don't think this is quite the scalp everyone is looking for..
It is good enough. He was the one person in Australia who was preventing the R18+ rating from being introduced. He wasn't just one politician who was against it, he was someone who had veto power over the entire thing. Now that he is out of that key role, the way is clear for all Attorneys General to allow the change to go through.
Thompson is hardly a pain in the ass, as that would require him to be somewhat effective. If anything, his lunatic raving has worked in favour of game players and -publishers, since he makes the anti-gaming side look bad by association.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
An asshat with a bush hat?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."