Wasting time with these matters...

Remove all ads!

Looks like politicians around the world are all the same: they turn silly things into a worlwide matter.
I grow up watching action movies, reading comics and in most of them there were violence and all those 'bad' things. Every now and them I read things like this and I wonder: is there nothing REALLY important to do???!!!??? There are people starving, dying, killing, and a long etc., but this woman tells me that is very important that pornography can't be in a game. The game is for 18+ years old people, so what's the problem?

So that is the manufacter's fault?

So, still is the manufacter's fault???
Day after day I see kids within worst enviroment, I see kids that don't play games but they are smoking cannabis at my window, there are kids killing another kids just because they are form a rival band and they can't afford a game where to learn that, I see little girls doing what I didn't until I was 19, and they haven't played San Andreas...
Instead of making so much noise about a game or about a breast why don't they try to 'fix' education? Why don't they waste their time in some constructive work?

(I didn't knew where to put this, so sorry if is in the wrong place)

[ September 19, 2005, 16:40: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

 

I think the issues of porn and violence in gaming are just as important to other governments as well. It's hardly a "US" thing.

UK gov't concerns

 

Yes, it is here too, there is the 'worried mothers association' around here that is complaining since GTA: San Andreas came out, they tried to ban it from shops.
Politics are babling all day long about the changes that have to be on tv shows, ads, etc, in favor of the kids but the laws that they made are triky: is cheaper to brake the law than lose some advertisers. So still there are politics babling and 'worried mothers' after this kind of games.

EDIT:
(yeah, remember Janet Jackson breast)

 

I know that most of the gaming companies are in the US. I don't believe, however, that the "puritanism" as you term it, exists only in the US. The 1950's existed for everyone...I'm sure there are parochial attitudes worldwide.

As far as government concern -- I also saw some links about EU concern for porn in any format, whether in games or not. Politicians parrot what their constinuents are resonating, you're right about that. But neither is it an easy position for them to take, with the gaming industry positioned as it is, commanding the generation of significant dollars in our economy.

 

Yes, I know what the facts of the news brief are. I was responding to the additional information that was shared on your view of "puritanism" and the containment of this very human universal attitude to only those humans that live within the US borders, simply because the word was coined there. But we're off topic and I think debating it further would clearly be pointless.

 

It's true politician these day claimed all video games are the source of evil. No seriously it's just plain dumb. Video game is just as rock 'n roll was in the 60s (or so I'm being told by older people).

Let's look at the fact

The majority of gamers are between 18 and 30, and the average is 29.

It's an industry worth sereval millions dollar (if not more) and AFAIK government doesn't really control them, and don't make money out of them.

The governements can't (thus far...) use it as a mean of propaganda (Like TV and some movies)

Some game are really well thought out and very well written, (there's still some bad one though). Hell when I first play BG2 4-5 years ago, I recall my english written skills has improved due to the fact that I played this game. Some game have good historical value too. So some game, can be educational. I don't recall seeing a real educational tv show in the past year.

So basicly it's better to let kids watch about all war danger and anti-terrorism on CNN and South Park on tv, than learning about romans in Rome: Total War.

 

Christian puritanism may have a strong hold on the US (and to a much lesser degree Canada) but excessive moral rigour is hardly a purely Western failing or a Christian one by a long shot -- IIRC, most Muslim countries ban all sorts of things that Western countries allow in regular retail shops. In addition, for all it's many foul-ups, the principle in the U.S. of a free press is not present in MANY other countries, where government censorship of newspapers and television is common practice.

All that said, when it comes to this particular game, I'm with Tal in that it's a lot easier to blame the "media" bugaboo than to admit that you have failed utterly to bring your kids up with a scrap of morality or decency. Granny should be buying her grandkids material that she at least knows something about, or talking to a salesperson who can tell her exactly what sort of material is in the game she's buying for Junior.

 

Not having lived in other countries, only visited a few, I can't make judgements except what I see in the news.

I do think that we in the USA have a split-personality (so-to-speak). On the one hand we push Freedom but on the other we want the government to protect us from all sorts of things.

I also agree with Tal. Parents are responsible for their children. If they can't be bothered to take an interest in what their children are doing they shouldn't be suprised at improper behaviour.

 

Yeah, kids won't ever be brought up right if the parents don't give a damn. Unless kids are taken from parents, which we don't want on a massive scale.

I believe that censoring sucks, but I also believe that there's no need to allow businesses to fatten up on people's low urges and play with fire in order to fill their wallets.

Content ratings should be strictly observed and strictly enforced. It should be illegal to sell something with a high rating to a person below that age. But the rating should be on the box, first of all.

As for USA, that's where both the greatest puritanism and the greatest libertinism dwell. I suppose this is because of the clash between the hardcore Protestant ethics (the historical puritans) and the strong belief in freedom.

As for the sex scene in GTA San Andreas, if I were in the position to ban the game from being sold to minors under 18, I would do so. I'm fed up with all the lousiness around and I'm starting to feel more and more like cleaning up a bit.

This doesn't mean kids shouldn't know how biology works or how a man or a woman looks, but biology classes and art museums are for that. Not some lousy banging in a game. Not like many of those kids wouldn't make GTA characters blush, with what they do at parties with a sufficient load of booze and weed, anyway. But for decency's sake...

 

I'm with you on this one. I think the stores ought to respectn the rating on the label, and that custommer be fully aware of what exactly they buy. Such product can exist, thinking it we can make it disapear is an utopia, however selling mature game only to people who has the right age to can make a huge difference, or so I think.

 

People tend to regard pretended violence as nothing really serious and a way of unloading tension, taking it off without yelling at live people etc. With sexual content... well, it's already sexual. There isn't really much of pretending in that sphere. Normal people should be able to watch a sex scene in a movie without getting off on it and treating it as the main attraction, but just how many normal people do we have? Violent content is some form of make-believe violence, game, play. Sexual content is already get off material.

If we go further into a religious or conservative mind, sexual misconduct doesn't have to be targeted at anyone specific - it's seeking and getting the specific sensations which is the factor. With violence, the chief problem is harming your neighbour -- obviously unachievable on a fictional character.

I don't fully agree, although I do see sense in that. If you ask me, "gangsta" games can be fun but there's always the question why people want to play such games at all and if children should. It would be a tad bit restrictive to block all illegal activities from games as potential player choices. It's just... well, there's a difference between having fun watching movies or playing games and regretting you can't be a mafia goon in real life. Fun is fun but it's a different matter when the escapism goes too far and people use virtual reality to get rid of moral restraints, benefit/harm calculation etc etc. It can affect susceptible people and children's minds aren't fully formed, nor is their willpower at its peek. Again, parents' job to draw some limits and watch carefully.

Back to the sex scene, though, if I came across something like that in a game, I would take it as a joke. Or put it down realism (mimesis, you know ). Heck, I played both Fallouts. But there's still some difference between realism, even somewhat jestful realism, and flashing kids with lewd content in order to make the game more popular or whatever else. And we all know that 18+ games are practically being tailored for 18- people.

In short, I guess, I'll have to reiterate the thought that devs, publishers and retailers should stick to the rating norms by the book. No monkey business. And yeah, crack down on dumb violence in teen games along with the gratuitous sex in one swoop.

Another example of hypocrisy is sticking too closely to arbitrary and unimaginative definitions of what makes nudity, what makes sexual content etc etc. By some definitions, it would be improper to show a sweater-clad girl with perky nipples because of the cold, but coin-sized bikini cups and hair-thin thongs are okay. Come on, that's just plain dumb.

Next, not all nudity is sexual content and not all sexual content is nude. My father was an artist and I had a great interest in art history back in the day (I can almost see a nude Venus statue from where I'm writing ), not to mention my little pen drawing hobby, so I can tell you that a whole gallery of simply nude silhouttes won't get anywhere as lewd as a single person you can find walking down the street if you look around, given what people wear nowadays. You just know the difference between art and porn, same as everyone knows (or should know) the difference between undressing in a doctor's office and having shanky photos taken. Getting mad at all forms and kinds of nudity is not quite wise and doesn't solve anything. You know, perhaps if young guys went to museums and saw what a woman looks like, they wouldn't download so much porn.

[ September 18, 2005, 15:29: Message edited by: chevalier ]

 

I wish someone could explain to me what the whole *issue* is. I've been playing violent computer games since early childhood and I don't consider myself a violent person.
I played Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards while I was so young I didn't even get any of the sexual jokes (or anything else off it, for that matter ) and I played many fantasy games as I grew up.

Still, I have never tried to cast a spell, nor (intended to) commit a violent or sexual crime.

I think the entire impressionability of kids is overinflated. Even when I refused to go to sleep with the lights off, I perfectly well knew the differences between games and real life, and that the things I did in games I should and/or could not do in rl.

To stick to the original topic, I agree whole-heartedly. Violence and pornography in video games shouldn't be an issue, and definitely not a major one. Let people have their fun, it's not *real*. Let politicians and such concern themselves with problems that *are* real, please.

Can anyone give me some sort of statistic that shows that there is a credible relation between computer games and violent/sexual crimes?

... Hmm. I had a point somewhere too, but never mind that

 

Well it seems that violence does indeed matter as much as the sex issue to some people. And it appears BOTH issues matter to Hillary

And more violent concerns in California

and in Illinois

As if the legislation will stop kids from playing them -- never has and never will. You can't legislate family or personal values.

[ September 18, 2005, 20:06: Message edited by: Spellbound ]

 

US Department of Justice - Bureau of Justice Statistics

Now, I'm noone to proclaim the truth of the gospel that is PCGamer, but in a recent editorial, Game-Revoultion.com's Duke Ferris stated that "There is no epidemic of youth violence in America."

Indeed, the exact opposite is true - violent crime is actually at its lowest rates ever in American History - now, I don't want to make sweeping overgeneralizations, but it could possibly be true that this could be an international truth as well. (But i've no data to back this up.) If you look at the charts provided in the link above, it's pretty obvious that our media and politicians are picking on pretty much a very select few horrible instances and blowing them up to be much more widespread than they really are.

The truth is (apparently), that "kids who play videogames" are arguably "the most non-violent kids in the history of American justice statistics."

But hey, who needs facts, anyways?

 

I agree with that -- but I don't think the gaming sex issue is any more of an important trigger to these politicians than the violence issue. For those folks who want to spend their time lobbying for this, I think they see it as a package.

 

Yes I remember reading Duke's editorial here is the link Now this might not be the absolute true, but still it has it's value I think.