I want to *wheer* in *heavy space*. I *strawberry* wish there will be no *dancing*. But unless you are a *happy camper*, it is *frumple* and we must *dancing* and *squeezing the juice*. We only want *to play*, but if you not a *happy camper*, then it is all too sad and we will *dance* until there is no more *many bubbles*.
Well, the Russian bureaucrats seem to think of them as the same character, at least. If it wasn't so, the Russian licence plates probably would also use other letters than only A, B, C, E, H, K, M, O, P, T, X;) BTW, those letters transcribe to latin as A, V, S, YE, N, K, M, O, R, T, H.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the licence plates only use letters that can be recognized both in Russia and in west. It is impossible saying whether they are using cyrillic or latin letters in the licence plates, because they are only considered characters by the bureaucracy. And now, somebody will probably dig up an old soviet plate and tell that for example the Leningradskij Oblast plates have letter in them. That is true. However, Soviet Union != Russia. Hopefully it's not a surprise that interoperability with west wasn't top-priority in CCCP/SSSR.
Not everything done in different cultures is acceptable. It is okay opposing things even if you are not part of the culture yourself (which, actually, is what I am doing at the precise moment by writing this text). There are certain universal standards that should be imposed on all cultures. If The Aztechs lived now, I would be the first to tell them stop slaughtering their people in some ceremonies, no matter how many thousands of years old a tradition it would be. Your point makes it clear that you're quite a strong relativist. And relativism is not a very good thing. And to make it hyper clear: the "humans being humans" was meant from a child's point of view.
I could spend hours telling you why relativism is bad.. Or why people should not have sex with children, but the information should already be out there, if you are really interested in reading it anyway. I think the best would be if someone checked your IP and brought your computer to the police station right away...
Yeah, but do all of those happen in red lights? That's the important thing here. If GTA means all kinds of car thefts, then I have understood that wrong (because of how it goes in that game). In any case, I was talking about the "run after the car, open its door, kick the driver out, drive away - preferably running over the original driver, first" type of car theft. Which I still do hope does not happen all that often.
Well, the most violent movies ARE shown in midnight, while the kids are asleep, precisely because that way the kids won't see them (unless the parents are completely reckless). And even if the children couldn't buy the games theirselves, their parents of course could (unless they are under 18 theirselves, which is luckily relatively rare for children old enough to play video games). The thing is precisely that the parents can't follow their kids everywhere and the kid can buy whatever he wants during the time he's alone in some shop. And it's in that situation good that the shop has to think twice before selling some violent game to a kid. And sex has always been bad for children. That's why you aren't allowed to have it with them. Seeing naked bodies is different, though. That alone is not sex. That is only humans being humans. Which is normal to a kid.
Well.. In this case I used that yo avoid saying "19th century", which would have been weirdish. And I don't think saying 1800s meaning the 19th century will ever end, because in so so many languages it would directy translate about this way: "the 1800-time" or "18-hundred-time". That system, BTW, has the funny effect that it's practically impossible speaking of the first ten years of that century. This happens for example with Finnish, in which it's currently impossible even talking of the first/century/ without using some weird bypasses in your speak, such as "during the first decade of the 2000-time". Take any subject, you can find languages that handle such subject very stupidly. For example the Russian language almost never uses their word for "be", which causes some funny situations while talking in Russian. Can't remember an example from English, but I can remember I've ran into some of them during my life.
Well.. The kids seem to be able to buy video games in Finland, although they get only a fraction of the monthly money compared to what the US kids get, they still manage to buy video games.
Your claim that all parents have played NES and thus understand computers and games perfectly doesn't quite hold water. If it did, there would be no coffee cup holder problems.
Believe me, Joe Average is not a computer expert. And Joe Average is the father of the kids we're talking about. And Joe Average doesn't know of the parental settings or if he does, he finds them too complicated to use. After all, setting the timer for your video recorder is a lot easier than setting up the parental settings...
Talking to video game store clerks doesn't really help, because games are anyway mostly bought from some hypermarkets where they are cheaper. And even the video game store clerks probably have just played NES games in their childhood and might not really take into account that games are now quite different from the cruelty of Zero Wing. That's actually precisely what you said, too. And walking to the video game store and asking doesn't quite work for this point anymore, because we've had it illegal selling very violent games to children since it became possible making such realistic graphics that they might cause problems.
The idea of it costing something for the shop or causing bureaucracy to check the children's age is quite weird. Please explain the mechanism that would cause that to happen in USA.
Then about that censorship thought.
You seem to be thinking that it is okay shaping children's minds into accepting violence as a part of everyday life, but not okay shaping them into keeping to think severe violence is something sick that should be avoided. If you knew somebody was going to be sliced into two parts IRL, would you bring your kid to see that? If not, then why do you let him see the precisely same thing from some screen, while he will interpret that just as if happened in reality? Would it be "mind-control" not letting the kid come with you no matter how much he insists on it? Children are not stupid, but they DO lack many tools of mature thinking. That's a completely different thing from intelligence. And thats why they need adults' protection. And those adults have to be everybody he meets in his everyday life, not just his parents. If a kid sees bloody violence, then that's the same bloody violence for him, no matter whether he sees it in TV or IRL.
How many times has a kid come asking you "Why do these have to exist?" when they see a beer bottle? How about liquor? Or boner pills? For child those are unknown things. They don't have any values attached to those things. Just like seeing a weapon being visible doesn't cause a child to go all sad. If the alcohol is advertised with people being drunk, shouting loud and being all that stuff at the same time underlining that this is somehow preferable behaviour, then the child could indeed get quite shocked. He would find it scary that adults - whom a kid should be able to trust 100% (the rare special cases especially taught by mother are not seen as adults, but more as creatures when all the warnings get attached) - are doing something like that. Also, seeing naked bodies causes no harm at all. They are just humans. Harm is caused, if the people do something weird with their very normal human bodies. What makes you think a kid would get any mental problems from seeing a naked tit? For the kid a woman body is nothing but a body belonging to a woman. It has no sexual values attached to it, so the child won't get traumatized of something like that. How would the children take a shower with their parents if they couldn't see a naked adult without growing theirselves a trauma?
But seeing people physically torn apart in a very painful and cruel manner will for sure cause mental problems for the child. Many children will go ask: "Mommy what is this? Why are they doing that to him?". The mommy will then explain that it's just stupid pointless fiction that doesn't resemble reality and that what the kid's seen is just a stunt. But some kids won't ask. However even they have the thought in their heads. They just happen to be the type that doesn't ask that from anyone. And those kids are the ones who might never handle the situation with an adult and who might get real problems from it.
I know from my experience that children beating each other up for money in schools does not happen often at all. Most schools have no problem whatsoever with something like that. Or, that is anyways the case over here. I believe and wish that you've been in a school that is a special case in your region. Usually if children beat each other up, it's more in order to uphold some kind of ranking order instead of in order to do actual robberies. I think it would make quite big news, if children actually began violently robbing each other like that. And I myself was bullied very strongly in school, so it's also not that I would just have miraculously avoided seeing that happen. And I am fairly sure that Grand Theft Autos happen no more often that once every three months per state. Or, maybe the situation is different in some slummier areas. Not much idea of them, really. But anyway, most people never visit such dangerous slums (or, at least I would avoid such things if I lived in a place that has them), so I don't think they really see GTA's happening all that often. And even then, I'm not saying the children will begin committing GTA's when they grow adult because of having played a game. However, it is quite clear that their attitudes will be such that I would consider it quite sad seeing people think that way. They are people who have taken violence as a part of everyday life in their heads. And that is bad in a society, because that does help violence exist.
Well.. I have seen many families where the parents don't understand - and often even don't want to understand - anything about computers. That goes to the extent that they don't care a frog of what their kids do with their computers. Whatever the kid is doing with the computer, the parents just decide that's beyond their comprehension and ignore it all. That has to do with the "why's my coffee cup holder broken" phenomenon.
And I am talking about the effects of violent games for a CHILD's mind. Just like you, I don't think either, that violent movies cause any violent behaviour in adults. Even those adults that get funny ideas from them, would get the funny ideas from somewhere anyway. Since most parents forbid their children from watching very violent or mentally disturbing movies anyway, I don't think their existence as for itself should be visible in the statistics. And I believe that also in USA there's at least/some/ level of control to what kind of movies and games kids can buy from the stores, albeit the level is, according to these posts here, dramatically lower than I had ever thought could be possible in west. Since there must be some control, it probably works somewhat well enough to prevent kids from seeing the most violent movies that they really do manage to avoid having to see that stuff. However, should that protection system somehow fail - as is beginning to happen right now - we will be seeing results within ten to twenty years time. Not before the children grow adult and move away from their parents. Maybe when they're 18, maybe when they're 25. I don't really know how it goes over there. Why the system is failing is that since the last few years it has been possible making video games with a level of realism that is comparable or higher than that of movies. As I wrote a few lines above, many parents are unable to understand that nowadays also games can be violent. I don't think something like Quake is violent, because its world doesn't resemble reality and even a six-year-old can figure out the difference between it and reality. But then.. Stuff like GTA3 really does look quite a bit more realistic. And games with detached arms and legs flying around the screen really do manage to picture the arms and legs so that they really look like human arms and legs instead of just a lump built of huge flat polygons.
The important difference to television is that while TV was brought to public by adults, things related to computers arrive through children. Children are actually teaching their parents how to use computers. I have seen it and since you're a slashdot reader, I know that you have, too. Parents don't understand the depth of feeling a computer game can produce. They are too amazed of someone managing to control the "movie" by using a keyboard and also of a small kid being so skilled with controlling the "movie" with his keyboard, that they forget to pay attention to what they see on the screen. They pay attention to the kid pressing a key to sit inside a car. They don't notice that someone gets thrown out of the car and run over as well. Or, at least too often they don't. When visiting your relatives that have small kids this christmas, observe their habits.
The adults' inability to protect the children from extreme video game violence also has its effect on how the stores work. The store clerks often know nothing at all about computer games and the idea that some of them might be dangerous to a very young mind might never cross their mind. While they might refuse to sell a similar movie, they will sell a computer game. As long as the age limits are nothing but stickers on a box, that situation will see a change only in decades' time when the old workers retire and younger ones replace them. The only way this can be changed is by making it compulsory obeying the limits. In other words, a shop selling a K-18 game to a child should get fined. With the current system that is apparently not possible. I don't care if it's federal or state legislation that
Might look like that, but while writing the post I didn't know that you actually do have it legal selling horror films to kids.
And I find it very unlikely that the industry would be able to enforce that the content rating system is cared of at all in the shops. I believe the rating will only mean a label in the game box and that that label will never be noticed by anyone. We used to have a similar system over here just some five years ago. Does the industry even have legal rights to enforce such rating system? If it doesn't, then how on earth would it ever gonna work? Money itself is greedy. If nobody forbids a shop from selling a massacre film for a kid, then the kid WILL buy it when his parents look elsewhere. The parents simply can't follow their children's all moves. If they did, the parents would have to bring the eight-year-olds to the candy kiosk two blocks away and all that stuff, which would just teach the kids to be completely separated from the life outside their houses and cars. Since the kids will have to be let wander in the world, we must make sure the parts of the world the kid is let to wander in are truly safe for him. Traffic lights on the pedestrian crossings, not selling porn and violence to young minds, all that stuff.
It's quite ridiculous trusting that the big enterprises would show any more than cosmetic effort in order to protect the children if they get money for not protecting them.
WTF? Does real life include beating up people just in order to get 5$ from their pockets? Or does it include randomly robbing people's cars? The whole idea of GTA is that it takes place in a very morbid world where things are mainly handled by killing someone. I do like GTA 3 and 4, but don't think they make quite the best role model for a kid. I wouldn't let a kid less than.. say 9-year-old play those games.
Or about SoF.. Should the kids be prepared to seeing people with their arms ripped off by violence and accept that "such is life"? Yeah, those things do happen, but 99,9% of the people will luckily never see them. Those who do, usually need some mental help after that. A child has to be of certain age to be able to comprehend some things. Since there are better ways to prepare the kid for such situations (for example the parents telling that such situation might be possible, hurts like hell and should be avoided at all costs) I wouldn't advice any parent to teach their kids to face the real world by giving them SoF.. I HAVE seen children try kicking each other with flying kicks because they have seen it happen in a game and nothing has happened to the character there, either.
Real life is the real life we live. The stuff you see in GTA IV or SoF does NOT happen in that life. Of course YMMV and if it does, then my condolences.
So, are the kids actually allowed to buy a zombie splatter movie that will give them nightmares for the next week or so and will get them used to seeing six cubical meters of blood bursted around before they grow enough to make the difference between reality and fiction? I find this piece of news rather shocking. Especially in a country where parents bring their children to school by cars because it's "too dangerous" for a kid to walk alone..
Why on earth should all kids be allowed to go and buy GTA IV, Soldier of Fortune or any similar game? The good thing in games is that they let you in their world a lot tighter than movies. (of course this depends on the skill of the director just like in movies) Since games have this thing, their violence or sexualism is even worse for children than those of movies. And since children aren't allowed to buy even adult movies (or K-16, for that matter), then why should they be allowed to buy adult games?
Yes, the monopolistic newspaper of Finland, Helsingin Sanomat, seems to agree with you. They call it "the home video by Pekka-Eric Auvinen that was removed from Youtube 2". There's also "the home video by Pekka-Eric Auvinen that was removed from Youtube 1", linking here: http://www.hs.fi/videot/1135231628338?kategoria=Uutiset&sivu=1 .
Quite a typical bring everyone to a suicide -type. The last time something similar happened it was a boy/young man in 2002, exploding himself and some 7 other people in a shopping centre in Vantaa, near Helsinki. Both this school murderer and the bomb dude were very quiet people who didn't talk very much with others and who just hid all their bad feelings inside. There's something odd about the culture here that makes it a honour not talking about your feelings. And then stuff like this happens. Okay, this killer apparently had some sort of revolution as his motive, asking others to cause chaos in the classroom by throwing around shelves and that kinda stuff before starting the shooting, but behind everything there's of course a mental problem.
The button for creating a top-level reply is currently located in a hideous cave, under a heap of links crumbled atop it. It might be that the people just can't find the link and click the first "reply to this" button they find. And that is the reply to this button of the phirst post.
(and why I am now replying to you instead of your parent, is that the new comment system apparently didn't want to give me a Reply to this link for the other post this time)
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Why does this make me think of telescopes and skirts?
Do not being *put bad spice* Star Control 2, *silly cow*.
You are making me *frumple*. It is *dancing*.
I want to *wheer* in *heavy space*. I *strawberry* wish there will be no *dancing*. But unless you are a *happy camper*, it is *frumple* and we must *dancing* and *squeezing the juice*.
We only want *to play*, but if you not a *happy camper*, then it is all too sad and we will *dance* until there is no more *many bubbles*.
Well, the Russian bureaucrats seem to think of them as the same character, at least. If it wasn't so, the Russian licence plates probably would also use other letters than only A, B, C, E, H, K, M, O, P, T, X ;)
BTW, those letters transcribe to latin as A, V, S, YE, N, K, M, O, R, T, H.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the licence plates only use letters that can be recognized both in Russia and in west. It is impossible saying whether they are using cyrillic or latin letters in the licence plates, because they are only considered characters by the bureaucracy. And now, somebody will probably dig up an old soviet plate and tell that for example the Leningradskij Oblast plates have letter in them. That is true. However, Soviet Union != Russia. Hopefully it's not a surprise that interoperability with west wasn't top-priority in CCCP/SSSR.
Woaw! Thatäs some freaky stuff going on over there!
Not everything done in different cultures is acceptable. It is okay opposing things even if you are not part of the culture yourself (which, actually, is what I am doing at the precise moment by writing this text). There are certain universal standards that should be imposed on all cultures. If The Aztechs lived now, I would be the first to tell them stop slaughtering their people in some ceremonies, no matter how many thousands of years old a tradition it would be. Your point makes it clear that you're quite a strong relativist. And relativism is not a very good thing.
And to make it hyper clear: the "humans being humans" was meant from a child's point of view.
I could spend hours telling you why relativism is bad.. Or why people should not have sex with children, but the information should already be out there, if you are really interested in reading it anyway.
I think the best would be if someone checked your IP and brought your computer to the police station right away...
Yeah, but do all of those happen in red lights? That's the important thing here. If GTA means all kinds of car thefts, then I have understood that wrong (because of how it goes in that game). In any case, I was talking about the "run after the car, open its door, kick the driver out, drive away - preferably running over the original driver, first" type of car theft. Which I still do hope does not happen all that often.
Well, the most violent movies ARE shown in midnight, while the kids are asleep, precisely because that way the kids won't see them (unless the parents are completely reckless).
And even if the children couldn't buy the games theirselves, their parents of course could (unless they are under 18 theirselves, which is luckily relatively rare for children old enough to play video games). The thing is precisely that the parents can't follow their kids everywhere and the kid can buy whatever he wants during the time he's alone in some shop. And it's in that situation good that the shop has to think twice before selling some violent game to a kid.
And sex has always been bad for children. That's why you aren't allowed to have it with them. Seeing naked bodies is different, though. That alone is not sex. That is only humans being humans. Which is normal to a kid.
Well.. In this case I used that yo avoid saying "19th century", which would have been weirdish. And I don't think saying 1800s meaning the 19th century will ever end, because in so so many languages it would directy translate about this way: "the 1800-time" or "18-hundred-time". That system, BTW, has the funny effect that it's practically impossible speaking of the first ten years of that century. This happens for example with Finnish, in which it's currently impossible even talking of the first /century/ without using some weird bypasses in your speak, such as "during the first decade of the 2000-time". Take any subject, you can find languages that handle such subject very stupidly. For example the Russian language almost never uses their word for "be", which causes some funny situations while talking in Russian. Can't remember an example from English, but I can remember I've ran into some of them during my life.
Well.. The kids seem to be able to buy video games in Finland, although they get only a fraction of the monthly money compared to what the US kids get, they still manage to buy video games. Your claim that all parents have played NES and thus understand computers and games perfectly doesn't quite hold water. If it did, there would be no coffee cup holder problems. Believe me, Joe Average is not a computer expert. And Joe Average is the father of the kids we're talking about. And Joe Average doesn't know of the parental settings or if he does, he finds them too complicated to use. After all, setting the timer for your video recorder is a lot easier than setting up the parental settings... Talking to video game store clerks doesn't really help, because games are anyway mostly bought from some hypermarkets where they are cheaper. And even the video game store clerks probably have just played NES games in their childhood and might not really take into account that games are now quite different from the cruelty of Zero Wing. That's actually precisely what you said, too. And walking to the video game store and asking doesn't quite work for this point anymore, because we've had it illegal selling very violent games to children since it became possible making such realistic graphics that they might cause problems. The idea of it costing something for the shop or causing bureaucracy to check the children's age is quite weird. Please explain the mechanism that would cause that to happen in USA. Then about that censorship thought. You seem to be thinking that it is okay shaping children's minds into accepting violence as a part of everyday life, but not okay shaping them into keeping to think severe violence is something sick that should be avoided. If you knew somebody was going to be sliced into two parts IRL, would you bring your kid to see that? If not, then why do you let him see the precisely same thing from some screen, while he will interpret that just as if happened in reality? Would it be "mind-control" not letting the kid come with you no matter how much he insists on it? Children are not stupid, but they DO lack many tools of mature thinking. That's a completely different thing from intelligence. And thats why they need adults' protection. And those adults have to be everybody he meets in his everyday life, not just his parents. If a kid sees bloody violence, then that's the same bloody violence for him, no matter whether he sees it in TV or IRL.
They could call the 1800s "century 18". Or perhaps "culture 18", whatever each one finds the best version.
How many times has a kid come asking you "Why do these have to exist?" when they see a beer bottle? How about liquor? Or boner pills? For child those are unknown things. They don't have any values attached to those things. Just like seeing a weapon being visible doesn't cause a child to go all sad.
If the alcohol is advertised with people being drunk, shouting loud and being all that stuff at the same time underlining that this is somehow preferable behaviour, then the child could indeed get quite shocked. He would find it scary that adults - whom a kid should be able to trust 100% (the rare special cases especially taught by mother are not seen as adults, but more as creatures when all the warnings get attached) - are doing something like that. Also, seeing naked bodies causes no harm at all. They are just humans. Harm is caused, if the people do something weird with their very normal human bodies.
What makes you think a kid would get any mental problems from seeing a naked tit? For the kid a woman body is nothing but a body belonging to a woman. It has no sexual values attached to it, so the child won't get traumatized of something like that. How would the children take a shower with their parents if they couldn't see a naked adult without growing theirselves a trauma?
But seeing people physically torn apart in a very painful and cruel manner will for sure cause mental problems for the child. Many children will go ask: "Mommy what is this? Why are they doing that to him?". The mommy will then explain that it's just stupid pointless fiction that doesn't resemble reality and that what the kid's seen is just a stunt. But some kids won't ask. However even they have the thought in their heads. They just happen to be the type that doesn't ask that from anyone. And those kids are the ones who might never handle the situation with an adult and who might get real problems from it.
I know from my experience that children beating each other up for money in schools does not happen often at all. Most schools have no problem whatsoever with something like that. Or, that is anyways the case over here. I believe and wish that you've been in a school that is a special case in your region. Usually if children beat each other up, it's more in order to uphold some kind of ranking order instead of in order to do actual robberies. I think it would make quite big news, if children actually began violently robbing each other like that.
And I myself was bullied very strongly in school, so it's also not that I would just have miraculously avoided seeing that happen.
And I am fairly sure that Grand Theft Autos happen no more often that once every three months per state. Or, maybe the situation is different in some slummier areas. Not much idea of them, really. But anyway, most people never visit such dangerous slums (or, at least I would avoid such things if I lived in a place that has them), so I don't think they really see GTA's happening all that often.
And even then, I'm not saying the children will begin committing GTA's when they grow adult because of having played a game. However, it is quite clear that their attitudes will be such that I would consider it quite sad seeing people think that way. They are people who have taken violence as a part of everyday life in their heads. And that is bad in a society, because that does help violence exist.
Well.. I have seen many families where the parents don't understand - and often even don't want to understand - anything about computers. That goes to the extent that they don't care a frog of what their kids do with their computers. Whatever the kid is doing with the computer, the parents just decide that's beyond their comprehension and ignore it all. That has to do with the "why's my coffee cup holder broken" phenomenon.
/some/ level of control to what kind of movies and games kids can buy from the stores, albeit the level is, according to these posts here, dramatically lower than I had ever thought could be possible in west. Since there must be some control, it probably works somewhat well enough to prevent kids from seeing the most violent movies that they really do manage to avoid having to see that stuff.
And I am talking about the effects of violent games for a CHILD's mind. Just like you, I don't think either, that violent movies cause any violent behaviour in adults. Even those adults that get funny ideas from them, would get the funny ideas from somewhere anyway.
Since most parents forbid their children from watching very violent or mentally disturbing movies anyway, I don't think their existence as for itself should be visible in the statistics. And I believe that also in USA there's at least
However, should that protection system somehow fail - as is beginning to happen right now - we will be seeing results within ten to twenty years time. Not before the children grow adult and move away from their parents. Maybe when they're 18, maybe when they're 25. I don't really know how it goes over there.
Why the system is failing is that since the last few years it has been possible making video games with a level of realism that is comparable or higher than that of movies. As I wrote a few lines above, many parents are unable to understand that nowadays also games can be violent. I don't think something like Quake is violent, because its world doesn't resemble reality and even a six-year-old can figure out the difference between it and reality. But then.. Stuff like GTA3 really does look quite a bit more realistic. And games with detached arms and legs flying around the screen really do manage to picture the arms and legs so that they really look like human arms and legs instead of just a lump built of huge flat polygons.
The important difference to television is that while TV was brought to public by adults, things related to computers arrive through children. Children are actually teaching their parents how to use computers. I have seen it and since you're a slashdot reader, I know that you have, too. Parents don't understand the depth of feeling a computer game can produce. They are too amazed of someone managing to control the "movie" by using a keyboard and also of a small kid being so skilled with controlling the "movie" with his keyboard, that they forget to pay attention to what they see on the screen. They pay attention to the kid pressing a key to sit inside a car. They don't notice that someone gets thrown out of the car and run over as well. Or, at least too often they don't.
When visiting your relatives that have small kids this christmas, observe their habits.
The adults' inability to protect the children from extreme video game violence also has its effect on how the stores work. The store clerks often know nothing at all about computer games and the idea that some of them might be dangerous to a very young mind might never cross their mind. While they might refuse to sell a similar movie, they will sell a computer game. As long as the age limits are nothing but stickers on a box, that situation will see a change only in decades' time when the old workers retire and younger ones replace them. The only way this can be changed is by making it compulsory obeying the limits. In other words, a shop selling a K-18 game to a child should get fined. With the current system that is apparently not possible. I don't care if it's federal or state legislation that
Might look like that, but while writing the post I didn't know that you actually do have it legal selling horror films to kids. And I find it very unlikely that the industry would be able to enforce that the content rating system is cared of at all in the shops. I believe the rating will only mean a label in the game box and that that label will never be noticed by anyone. We used to have a similar system over here just some five years ago. Does the industry even have legal rights to enforce such rating system? If it doesn't, then how on earth would it ever gonna work? Money itself is greedy. If nobody forbids a shop from selling a massacre film for a kid, then the kid WILL buy it when his parents look elsewhere. The parents simply can't follow their children's all moves. If they did, the parents would have to bring the eight-year-olds to the candy kiosk two blocks away and all that stuff, which would just teach the kids to be completely separated from the life outside their houses and cars. Since the kids will have to be let wander in the world, we must make sure the parts of the world the kid is let to wander in are truly safe for him. Traffic lights on the pedestrian crossings, not selling porn and violence to young minds, all that stuff. It's quite ridiculous trusting that the big enterprises would show any more than cosmetic effort in order to protect the children if they get money for not protecting them.
WTF? Does real life include beating up people just in order to get 5$ from their pockets? Or does it include randomly robbing people's cars? The whole idea of GTA is that it takes place in a very morbid world where things are mainly handled by killing someone. I do like GTA 3 and 4, but don't think they make quite the best role model for a kid. I wouldn't let a kid less than.. say 9-year-old play those games.
Or about SoF.. Should the kids be prepared to seeing people with their arms ripped off by violence and accept that "such is life"?
Yeah, those things do happen, but 99,9% of the people will luckily never see them. Those who do, usually need some mental help after that. A child has to be of certain age to be able to comprehend some things. Since there are better ways to prepare the kid for such situations (for example the parents telling that such situation might be possible, hurts like hell and should be avoided at all costs) I wouldn't advice any parent to teach their kids to face the real world by giving them SoF..
I HAVE seen children try kicking each other with flying kicks because they have seen it happen in a game and nothing has happened to the character there, either.
Real life is the real life we live. The stuff you see in GTA IV or SoF does NOT happen in that life. Of course YMMV and if it does, then my condolences.
So, are the kids actually allowed to buy a zombie splatter movie that will give them nightmares for the next week or so and will get them used to seeing six cubical meters of blood bursted around before they grow enough to make the difference between reality and fiction? I find this piece of news rather shocking. Especially in a country where parents bring their children to school by cars because it's "too dangerous" for a kid to walk alone..
:(
If yes, then.. Well, it would explain a lot
Isn't it quite ignorant NOT preventing kids from seeing game content they wouldn't be allowed to see in movies?
Why on earth should all kids be allowed to go and buy GTA IV, Soldier of Fortune or any similar game? The good thing in games is that they let you in their world a lot tighter than movies. (of course this depends on the skill of the director just like in movies) Since games have this thing, their violence or sexualism is even worse for children than those of movies. And since children aren't allowed to buy even adult movies (or K-16, for that matter), then why should they be allowed to buy adult games?
I'm sure also preventing children from buying porn films is socialism (eäääärgh! That horrible word! We are geeks, not some social creatures!), right?
Here's an even better version of the same: http://vwisb7.vkw.tu-dresden.de/~treiber/MicroApplet/
Some do, some don't. I didn't.
Yes, the monopolistic newspaper of Finland, Helsingin Sanomat, seems to agree with you. They call it "the home video by Pekka-Eric Auvinen that was removed from Youtube 2". There's also "the home video by Pekka-Eric Auvinen that was removed from Youtube 1", linking here: http://www.hs.fi/videot/1135231628338?kategoria=Uutiset&sivu=1 . Quite a typical bring everyone to a suicide -type. The last time something similar happened it was a boy/young man in 2002, exploding himself and some 7 other people in a shopping centre in Vantaa, near Helsinki. Both this school murderer and the bomb dude were very quiet people who didn't talk very much with others and who just hid all their bad feelings inside. There's something odd about the culture here that makes it a honour not talking about your feelings. And then stuff like this happens. Okay, this killer apparently had some sort of revolution as his motive, asking others to cause chaos in the classroom by throwing around shelves and that kinda stuff before starting the shooting, but behind everything there's of course a mental problem.
The pirate map for locating the cave be here.
The button for creating a top-level reply is currently located in a hideous cave, under a heap of links crumbled atop it. It might be that the people just can't find the link and click the first "reply to this" button they find. And that is the reply to this button of the phirst post.
(and why I am now replying to you instead of your parent, is that the new comment system apparently didn't want to give me a Reply to this link for the other post this time)