Let me be honest, statistics are one of the biggest ways of "lying with authority" when it comes to politics. While annoying, consider that this is an online poll that involved 2200 people and didn't seem to be widely distributed, after all I get the distinct impression that few users of The Escapist, if any of us, knew about this poll when it was happening. Thus anyone here who is an adult (like me) or parents (there seem to be some) were not involved in this poll.
It was doubtlessly put out in a fashion to seem open, but where it would attract specific kinds of respondants. Also we have no idea how many times they have conducted similar polls until they got one with the results they wanted. That's a big deal with private data collection agencies, they are hired to reinforce whatever their client wants in cases like this. There is no overall authority on what is ultimatly a private business that prevents them from collecting data 10x in 10 differant ways until they get what they want.
I'd also point a finger to politics as an example. Back during the last presidential elections most of the media networks were claiming that Obama was going to come in with a clear majority lead with like 70% of the vote. In reality we saw another micro-victory in a polarized nation where he lead with like 7%. The point of providing bad information like that is because it helps sway opinion and encourage people to throw in with a clear winner. Of course come the next election people are going to forget this, and remember only the parts where it was being claimed the race was more accuratly "too close to call".
One can also be critical of that video on a lot of levels. One is of course that all of those games are clearly marked, and it's the fault of parents for not parenting if kids play games like that. Another is that when you look at things like the 50-cent game, it's a situation where your dealing with a person who promotes himself that way IRL, it has nothing to do with video games. If one wants to argue that 50-Cent is a "negative racial stereotype" one has to go after the entire subculture he's part of... and really, good luck with that one. The attacks on video games are a scapegoat so that people don't have to address issues like that which become a lot more touchy more quickly. In his case it's transparently a situation where your dealing with a bigger issue that is overlapping onto this. I personally can only guess this video is made for people with ADHD because when it comes to "San Andreas" I personally can't figure out why in a game about crime it's a "negative racial stereotype" to have the guy being arrested when we already saw the guy embarking on a massive criminal rampage and killing cops in earlier video clips. What's more I will be honest in saying that while I do not care for the subculture or the message, context is entirely missing from some parts of the San Andreas bits in paticular. The cops in that game are corrupt, and while a bad guy, the protaganist is an "anti-hero" in the same kind of way as the protaganist of some of the better mafia dramas that have come out over the years. It tries to put a certain "code" into the things he does, albiet I think in the end it winds up trying to project things onto the whole "Gang Banger" schtick that aren't there IRL (there is no equivilent to things like Omerta in the same way). That bit of fantasy however does put the brutality, and the fighting of the police into a slightly differant context for the purposes of the game.
Should kids be playing any of this stuff? No they should not. On the other hand it's the parents job to raise their kids, not the goverment's.
What's more I am hoping people both on The Supreme Court, and in general, recognize the potential snowball effect here. Give the goverment direct power here, and they are going to use it to control other media as well. What's more people are going to be happy to have the goverment taking responsibility for raising their children out of their hands (looked at from a certain perspective) right up until the goverment starts snowballing what is established here into making other desicians that people aren't going to like.
I cannot comment on Postal 2 incidently, since I have never played it. I do however remember hearing that it wasn't all that good, and (if I'm not remembering things wrong) was also very linear despite having the option to do a lot of things. The violence displayed in the clips of that game also seem to be devoid of context.
