Thoughts Blowing in the Dust

[woodchip]

Well once again the powers that be, who'd love to do a George Orwellian, find they are sadly mistaken:

"WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Monday refused to let California clamp down on the sale or rental of violent video games to children, saying governments lack authority to "restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed" despite complaints that the popular and fast-changing technology allows the young to simulate acts of brutality."

I guess there weren't enough cases showing violent game using children running amok to warrant a law preventing our dissolute youth from performing violent acts upon pixel dust persons.

[Heretic]

Can you provide links to where video Games lead the youth to Violence? Did you know a case could be made that the drop in crime rates are due to video games.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/vi ... Videogames

http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolu ... myths.html

[Duper]

Here's an article at Gamasutra that goes into it.

On the technical side of things, the language of the law was too broad/vague.

The Actual Ruling.

[Will Robinson]

Wouldn't you also need to ban stuff like ESPN's 'He just got Jacked Up..' highlight reels and football in general if you use violence content as the reason for restricting it?

[CUDA]

heck if that's the case then according to the local news broadcast at noon today we'd need to ban them also.

1 suicide, guy jumped under the light rail train and got himself decapitated 100 yards from where I work
2 hit and runs one which resulted in a death.
4 murders

seems like Violent content to me.

[Top Gun]

The Court did good on this one.

[Heretic]

heck if that's the case then according to the local news broadcast at noon today we'd need to ban them also.

1 suicide, guy jumped under the light rail train and got himself decapitated 100 yards from where I work
2 hit and runs one which resulted in a death.
4 murders

seems like Violent content to me.

Comics and rap also

Let's not forget story about Billy Joe and Bobbie Sue

[ Post made via Android ]

[Duper]

"Some amici who support respondents foresee the day when 'virtual-reality shoot-em-ups' will allow children to 'actually feel the splatting blood from the blown-off head' of a victim."

"...In some of these games, the violence is astounding. Victims by the dozens are killed with every imaginable implement, including machine guns, shotguns, clubs, hammers, axes, swords, and chainsaws. Victims are dismembered, decapitated, disemboweled, set on fire, and chopped into little pieces. They cry out in agony and beg for mercy. Blood gushes, splatters, and pools. Severed body parts and gobs of human remains are graphically shown. In some games, points are awarded based, not only on the number of victims killed, but on the killing technique employed."

"It also appears that there is no antisocial theme too base for some in the video game industry to exploit. There are games in which a player can take on the identity and reenact the killings carried out by the perpetrators of the murders at Columbine High School and Virginia Tech. The objective of one game is to rape a mother and her daughters; in another, the goal is to rape Native American women. There is a game in which players engage in 'ethnic cleansing' and can choose to gun down African-Americans, Latinos, or Jews. In still another game, players attempt to fire a rifle shot into the head of President Kennedy as his motorcade passes by the Texas School Book Depository."

"If the technological characteristics of the sophisticated games that are likely to be available in the near future are combined with the characteristics of the most violent games already marketed, the result will be games that allow troubled teens to experience in an extraordinarily personal and vivid way what it would be like to carry out unspeakable acts of violence."

THAT is what is meant by violent.

[Top Gun]

...did they seriously reference Custer's Last Stand for the Atari 2600? Woooooow.

[Foil]

Just to point this out, because I think it's being a bit lost in the conversation:

"...sale or rental of violent video games to children..."

If the decision had been about blanket censorship of violent games, I'd have said the court did the right thing.

Considering the fact that the decision was about access restrictions specifically for children, I'm not so sure.

[Lothar]

"...sale or rental of violent video games to children..."

If the decision had been about blanket censorship of violent games, I'd have said the court did the right thing.

Considering the fact that the decision was about access restrictions specifically for children, I'm not so sure.

Yeah, but:

Even where the protection of children is the object, the constitutional limits on governmental action apply.

Minors are entitled to a significant measure of First Amendment protection, and only in relatively narrow and well-defined circumstances may government bar public dissemination of protected materials to them.

Speech that is neither obscene as to youths nor subject to some other legitimate proscription cannot be suppressed solely to protect the young from ideas or images that a legislative body thinks unsuitable for them.

Broadly speaking, just because it's kids doesn't mean the government can restrict speech that is not otherwise restricted.

Furthermore:

California’s argument would fare better if there were along standing tradition in this country of specially restricting children’s access to depictions of violence, but there is none. Certainly the books we give children to read—or read to them when they are younger—contain no shortage of gore. Grimm’s Fairy Tales, for example, are grim indeed.

He follows this with more examples, and then a great section on the history of people wanting to ban violence in kids' media in the US and failing due to that pesky Constitution. On the same subject:

when Miller was decided, depictions of “hard core” sexual conduct were not a common feature of mainstream entertainment. But nothing similar can be said about much of the conduct covered by the California law. It provides that a video game cannot qualify as “violent” unless “the range of options available to a player includes killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being.” §1746(d)(1).
For better or worse, our society has long regarded many depictions of killing and maiming as suitable features of popular entertainment, including entertainment that is widely available to minors.
....
A “deviant or morbid interest” in violence, therefore, appears to be an interest that deviates from what is regarded—presumably in accordance with some generally accepted standard—as normal and healthy. Thus, the application of the California law is heavily dependent on the identification of generally accepted standards regarding the suitability of violent entertainment for minors.

So the law appeals to community standards for what is acceptable in video games -- and those community standards allow children to be exposed to exactly the sort of content the law seeks to restrict, both in video games and in other media. Alito points us back to Scalia's argument about violence in children's stories, here. So the California law contradicts itself.

While some of the legislation’s effect may indeed be in support of what some parents of the restricted children actually want, its entire effect is only in support of what the State thinks parents ought to want.

So this law is both underinclusive, in the sense that it targets only violent video games and not violent books, movies, comics, cartoons, etc., and overinclusive, in that it "abridges the First Amendment rights of young people whose parents (and aunts and uncles) think violent video games are a harmless pastime".

There is no question that the court did the right thing. Government speech restrictions must pass a very strict test, and the California law banning sale of violent video games to minors came nowhere close to passing that test. It attempted to create an entirely new class of speech restriction (depictions of violence; Alito p6), limit that speech restriction to "disfavoring a particular speaker or viewpoint" (video games; see Scalia p14), even though there is no "compelling interest" for government involvement because the industry already voluntarily requires parental consent (Scalia p15).

If you don't want your kid exposed to violence, pay attention to game ratings (and movie ratings and book reviews...)

[Foil]

Lothar, you're reading too much into what I said.

I certainly see the rationale behind the decision, and I never said I disagreed with the final result (in fact, in this particular case, I generally agree with it). My statement was intended to point out a fundamental difference between this thread and the typical "do video game cause real violence?" threads (which we've already seen a bazillion times), namely:

This is not simply a case of free speech / restriction, this is a case of free speech / restriction involving sales to minors, who are already a population treated differently under the law.

In various ways, the law already applies restrictions to transactions when only minors are involved (e.g. alcohol and tobacco products, adult material, movies, etc.) . Yes, the California law was too broad, but IMO there is legal and ethical precedent for restrictive law when it comes to what minors are allowed to purchase by themselves.

[Again, for anyone skimming: I am not suggesting in any way that violent games cause violence, or that violence should be removed from stores/media/games. I am suggesting that protective/restrictive laws specific to minors can be reasonable.]

-------------

If you don't want your kid exposed to violence, pay attention to game ratings (and movie ratings and book reviews...)

Absolutely.

And, in a similar vein, if your kid wants a restricted-sale product, and you as a parent feel it's okay, then go get it for them.

I'm being a bit tongue-in-cheek here, of course. I'd just like to see the dialogue move away from re-hashing the "video games create serial killers" claim (which I think we all know is bogus), and into the more interesting area of the rights of minors under our law.

[Lothar]

this is a case of free speech / restriction involving sales to minors, who are already a population treated differently under the law.
....
there is legal and ethical precedent for restrictive law when it comes to what minors are allowed to purchase by themselves.

Minors are not treated much differently in free speech law. That's what my first three quotes are about -- speech restrictions for the protection of minors still have to meet very specific criteria in order to not run afoul of the Constitution. The only content-related legal distinction I'm aware of for minors is for sexually explicit material.

As my next few quotes note, restrictions on depictions of violence to minors simply do not exist in US legal tradition. In fact, we have a cultural tradition of exposing our children to violence and gore -- from Grimm's Fairy Tales to Lord of the Flies, from Bugs Bunny to Braveheart, from 6 year olds to 17-and-a-half year olds (which, as Alito notes in his concurring opinion, the California law fails to distinguish between). This is in marked contrast to sexually explicit material, which (as Alito again notes) was not common in entertainment for minors prior to the Miller case where it was outlawed. It's not the place of the legislature to override cultural norms in order to protect children from harmful content; the Miller case didn't establish a new cultural norm, it just reinforced it.

There is legal precedent for restricting what minors are able to purchase, but those restrictions don't apply to depictions of violence, and never have in American law. The closest analog, the MPAA rating system, is voluntary and not legally binding. Alcohol, tobacco, and firearms are not "speech"; they pose direct physical danger. I seriously doubt a "no violent video games" law could be narrowly enough tailored to withstand a legal challenge while still being effective; the majority ruling on this case is pretty clear that depictions of violence are not and have never been restricted speech.

[Foil]

...restrictions on depictions of violence to minors simply do not exist in US legal tradition. ... This is in marked contrast to sexually explicit material, which (as Alito again notes) was not common in entertainment for minors prior to the Miller case where it was outlawed.

Yep. Don't you find that strange?!

Most of the ruling is firmly based on written law and precedent. So I find it extremely baffling that the argument for making a distinction between purchasing violent material (minors allowed) and purchasing sexually-explicit material (minors not allowed) is based on something as ill-defined and variable as common culture.

It's not the place of the legislature to override cultural norms in order to protect children from harmful content; the Miller case didn't establish a new cultural norm, it just reinforced it.

Again, why is cultural norm such a prevailing factor? If for some reason our common culture said that for minors, "bondage porn is bad but the rest is okay" and "gunfights are bad but swordfights are okay", is that what the law should reflect?

-------------------------

IMO, basing a legal decision on the whimsy of current culture is simply inconsistent. Either:

1. Restrict both violent and sexually-explicit material. (Purchases done by parents).

-or-

2. Restrict neither one. (Promote parental-awareness organizations.)

[flip]

IMO, every piece of legislation like this should rest firmly on the parents discretion. I let my 2 boys play Call Of Duty. To me it is no different than what me and all the neighborhood kids used to do. We would get all camoed up, and stage battles with rubberband guns. More fun in my opinion and healthier than just playing a video game, but these are the times we live in. It seems almost like human nature to have these battles when faced with opposition. A fact of life.
On the other hand, my youngest came home with a game, Prototype I think was the name. In this game he could run through town killing and maiming just passer-by's and people hanging out at the bus stop. Total different scenario in my mind. It was immediately destroyed. That is how it should be in my mind. I should have the final say on what my children are exposed to, and any legislation should strongly reflect that.

[Tunnelcat]

Here's a question. If violent video games are deemed a bad influence for children by most parents and many scholars, yet called free speech by SCOTUS, why is that no different than having laws restricting children from having access to pornography? Why is viewing violence OK and viewing sex NOT OK for children?

[Top Gun]

Here's a question. If violent video games are deemed a bad influence for children by most parents and many scholars, yet called free speech by SCOTUS, why is that no different than having laws restricting children from having access to pornography? Why is viewing violence OK and viewing sex NOT OK for children?

I think US culture in general seems to have a much more permissive view on violent content than it does on sexual content, which is the opposite of many other first-world countries. One could probably come up with any number of reasons as to why, though it does seem a bit strange to me. I mean, most of the country was in an uproar over a singer accidentally exposing a normal body part during the Superbowl, yet most of us are fine with our kids seeing Random Violence Summer Blockbuster #23.

[flip]

I think Duper made a good point earlier, because first violence should be defined. Would Descent be considered a violent game, hell yeah if anyone has had the opportunity to hear me while playing, yet it lacks any of the gore and realism of a real death and I get great pleasure from watching your ship blown to smithereens. I think violence should be defined in the context it is portrayed. There are varying degrees to violence, some that are understood, such as self-defense and then others where the individual is obviously sick and perverse. I feel the same way about porn. For a young man who knows nothing of sex, it can give a very bad image of sexual relations and women in general. Maybe it's a fine line, but to portray violence in war is worlds different to me than to portray yourself snatching a woman out of a car and raping her. It's all about the context. If rape is obscene and wrong, then to imagine one self doing it is also wrong. War is a fact of life, rape is perverse.

[Top Gun]

Well yeah, I don't think anyone would argue that giving kids access to material involving people being raped is a particularly good idea, but I think there's a huge difference between rape porn and happening to see a woman topless, for instance.

[callmeslick]

Here's a question. If violent video games are deemed a bad influence for children by most parents and many scholars, yet called free speech by SCOTUS, why is that no different than having laws restricting children from having access to pornography? Why is viewing violence OK and viewing sex NOT OK for children?

I wondered the exact same thing, when I first heard the ruling........but, then again, I came to and realized I live in America.

[Foil]

...US culture in general seems to have a much more permissive view on violent content than it does on sexual content...

Yep.

Look back over the quotes Lothar posted - the court opinions are quite clear that a major reason for the distinction between restriction of violent content and restriction of sexual content is based on common cultural practice.

Personally, I find that wildly inconsistent.

If the government is restricting access to minors, it should restrict access to both.

If the government is not involved, it should stay out of either one.

[Top Gun]

I do agree that there is a fundamental inconsistency there, but if the best we can do is have at least one aspect be non-restrictive, then I'd gladly take that over both being restricted.

[Tunnelcat]

I think violence should be defined as the physical depiction of one person causing injury, torture, rape, mutilation or murder to another human being or realistic animal. I don't think kids have the frontal lobe development to discern between doing those things to either actual beings or virtual cyber beings, especially if that cyber being is someone else's avatar. You've all heard of the connections between children who torture animals when they're young and then grow up to be serial murderers? Well, can that same idea be applied to children using depictions of cyber violence, in a virtual world where there are usually no limits to what one can do? How many times has anyone here done maximum overkill to another player or NPC in a game because you got really riled up, pissed off and immersed in the game? I've gotten carried away myself sometimes. Would children be able to separate actions in the virtual world from the real one?

I remember in GTA San Andreas, where you could go all over beating up and murdering without regard, in fact it was required to complete the game, very little was done other than some yelling and screaming from a few people. Then when someone found a graphic sex scene buried within the game, all hell broke loose and a patch was issued to block THAT! Something is seriously wrong with our priorities in this country.

[Heretic]

The Horror

[Tunnelcat]

Mythical creatures are fair game.

[woodchip]

TC must of forgotten all the terrible things the Roadrunner did to Wily Coyote....speak about violence.

[Lothar]

...US culture in general seems to have a much more permissive view on violent content than it does on sexual content...

Yep.

Look back over the quotes Lothar posted - the court opinions are quite clear that a major reason for the distinction between restriction of violent content and restriction of sexual content is based on common cultural practice.

Personally, I find that wildly inconsistent.

If the government is restricting access to minors, it should restrict access to both.

If the government is not involved, it should stay out of either one.

Why not restrict access to minors for all three: violence, sexual content, and religious content?

The statute in Ginsberg restricted the sale of certain depictions of “nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sado-masochistic abuse,”that were “‘[h]armful to minors.’” A depiction was harmful to minors if it:
“(i) predominantly appeals to the prurient, shameful or morbid interests of minors, and
“(ii) is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable material for minors, and
“(iii) is utterly without redeeming social importance for minors.” 390
U. S., at 646 (Appendix A to opinion of the Court) (quoting N. Y. Penal Law §484–h(1)(f)).

According to Alito, this "defined “harmful to minors” simply by adding the words “for minors” to each element of the definition of obscenity set out in what were then the Court’s leading obscenity decisions".

Under Miller, an obscenity statute must contain a threshold limitation that restricts the statute’s scope to specifically described “hard core” materials. See 413 U. S., at 23–25, 27. Materials that fall within this “hard core” category may be deemed to be obscene if three additional requirements are met:
(1)
an “average person, applying contemporary com-munity standards [must] find . . . the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest”;
(2)
“the work [must] depic[t] or describ[e], in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and”
(3)
“the work, taken as a whole, [must] lac[k] serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.” Id., at 24

Time and time again, we find the law comes back to things being "patently offensive" (as well as meeting other criteria such as not having serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value.) The California law attempted to parallel this, and this is where Alito finds the most fault with it -- because depictions of violence are not considered "patently offensive" in American culture.

[null0010]

I don't think kids have the frontal lobe development to discern between doing those things to either actual beings or virtual cyber beings, especially if that cyber being is someone else's avatar. You've all heard of the connections between children who torture animals when they're young and then grow up to be serial murderers? Well, can that same idea be applied to children using depictions of cyber violence, in a virtual world where there are usually no limits to what one can do?

Speak for yourself; I was playing Doom at age 7 and I've never brutally murdered anyone.

[Lothar]

Yeah, I was playing DooM at 10 or 11, and my baby brother watched when he was 5 or 6. We seem to be doing OK.

[Top Gun]

Oh man, don't even get me started on the Miller Test. Such an awful set of standards.

[Spidey]

Yeah, I was playing DooM at 10 or 11, and my baby brother watched when he was 5 or 6. We seem to be doing OK.

Now apply that logic to porno.

[CUDA]

people are a product of their environment. if your thinking that these things have no effect on you. then your being naive. playing these games or watching these things on TV especially at a young age is like a virus inoculation. you start to build up an immunity to it without every knowing it. when your dealing with Kids that already have a warped sense of thinking and reality. This "can" and sometimes does affect them. to say it doesn't is pure stupidity

[Heretic]

Wow when did we turn into our parents and start saying things like this? Rock and roll causes violence TV causes violence Rap causes violence. I am sorry to tell you it's human nature to be violent. How about the third world countries where they don't have all this. What causes them to be violent? Do you think all those Somali pirates have all these things that make people so violent? It must be the radio then that causes all the violence or was it theaters. Wait how about all the murders and wars before the advent of all those violent creating sounds and images.

17 • RECREATION

Most entertainment among rural Somalis occurs in ceremonies associated with major life transitions. It includes storytelling and recounting the exploits of one's kinfolk and ancestors.

Television is nonexistent in Somalia, although before the civil war the government did provide a radio service. Many urban and rural Somalis listen regularly to BBC radio broadcasts. Before the civil war of the 1990s, movie theaters also operated in all major cities and towns, before the outbreak of widespread fighting

HTTP://www.everyculture.com/wc/Rwanda-t ... z1Qg5hHWOl

If you believe vegetarians it's eating meat that causes all anger and violence in the world.

[Drakona]

I think it is inappropriate to group porngraphy and violence together simply because both are offensive. Pornography is addictive by nature, and has a dramatic and obvious effect on one's present and future relationships. It is appropriate to restrict its access to those who understand the consequences of its use.

By contrast, violent entertainment is not addictive, and what effect it may have on people is not completely clear.

(Incidentally, posting from Android is doing wonders for my brevity.)

[ Post made via Android ]

[woodchip]

people are a product of their environment. if your thinking that these things have no effect on you. then your being naive. playing these games or watching these things on TV especially at a young age is like a virus inoculation. you start to build up an immunity to it without every knowing it. when your dealing with Kids that already have a warped sense of thinking and reality. This "can" and sometimes does affect them. to say it doesn't is pure stupidity

guess what Cuda, you can't avoid it. The news is filled with violence and over time makes everyone inured to the affects of watching violence. While you may try to protect your kids from seeing it, your kids friend are talking about it and it is almost impossible to avoid coming in contact with violent images once they leave your house.

[Foil]

I think it is inappropriate to group porngraphy and violence together simply because both are offensive.

Agreed. That said, I also think it's inappropriate to draw a legal distinction betweeen them simply because one is more culturally accepted than the other (the Supreme Court used this rationale).

[Note: there are other reasons I think the court was correct to reject this particular law.]

Pornography is addictive by nature...

Absolutely. That's been well-established.

By contrast, violent entertainment is not addictive...

You're certain of that? Seems to me it can be addictive to some extent. I'd be curious to see if any reputable studies have been done about this.

[CUDA]

people are a product of their environment. if your thinking that these things have no effect on you. then your being naive. playing these games or watching these things on TV especially at a young age is like a virus inoculation. you start to build up an immunity to it without every knowing it. when your dealing with Kids that already have a warped sense of thinking and reality. This "can" and sometimes does affect them. to say it doesn't is pure stupidity

guess what Cuda, you can't avoid it. The news is filled with violence and over time makes everyone inured to the affects of watching violence. While you may try to protect your kids from seeing it, your kids friend are talking about it and it is almost impossible to avoid coming in contact with violent images once they leave your house.

I never said you could avoid it. but that does not address my point.

[woodchip]

people are a product of their environment. if your thinking that these things have no effect on you. then your being naive. playing these games or watching these things on TV especially at a young age is like a virus inoculation. you start to build up an immunity to it without every knowing it. when your dealing with Kids that already have a warped sense of thinking and reality. This "can" and sometimes does affect them. to say it doesn't is pure stupidity

guess what Cuda, you can't avoid it. The news is filled with violence and over time makes everyone inured to the affects of watching violence. While you may try to protect your kids from seeing it, your kids friend are talking about it and it is almost impossible to avoid coming in contact with violent images once they leave your house.

I never said you could avoid it. but that does not address my point.

While you may build up a "immunity" it hasn't been shown to drive you to committing violence. Nor does having a "immunity" to violence equate to being all bad. In combat, those who grew up hunting or working on a farm where animals were slaughtered, fared better when faced with the aftermath of a battle than those who grew up in a protected environment.

[null0010]

Yeah, I was playing DooM at 10 or 11, and my baby brother watched when he was 5 or 6. We seem to be doing OK.

Now apply that logic to porno.

Okay. I was first exposed to pornography at age 10; I do not run around raping people.

[flip]

How old are you now Null, and do you have a meaningful relationship at this time?