Australian Attorney General Calls For Violent Videogame Ban

[SenseOfTumour]

I'm gonna go ahead and Godwin's this.

By his rules, Hitler is the same as all politicians and therefore we should ban them all.

In slightly less incendiary terms, the 'offensive games' are the ones who get the media attention, and therefore get noticed for being 'eeevil'.

Yet as people say, we don't judge the whole movie industry by 'The Human Centipede 2', so why does the videogame industry get judged by Manhunt and GTA?


As for Australia, both the UK and US are still clamouring to ban anything fun as soon as the media hear of it, too.

 

[ctuncks]

Could someone explain how requiring a unanimous vote on things like this makes any goddamn sense?

I'm no excerpt on how our politics works but I think it works like this: Each State has an Attorney General, the AG is a member of the current ruling government (state), sometimes when there is Legislation that will affect the Nation as a whole it is required that there be a unanimous vote to be passed by all the state's AG's.

This I believe is so that no states can be forced to adopt any legislation they don't feel is in their State's best interest by manner of being out voted. This system in itself seems fair enough as long as any AG's in question are truly supporting their state.

The problem is that sometimes you feel they're not. Sometimes they might just be pushing their own convictions regardless of what the entire state as a whole wants, or maybe they're just trying to please the voters in their seat (They are an elected MP after all).

In any case the huge problem is that once you get one of these "Blockers" in place they're generally not going to change their mind and may be in office for several years, short of losing their seat or their government losing the election.

Compounding this is the fact that since elections take place every 4 years it's quite possible to have a R18+ Friendly AG getting replaced a non friendly when when a government change happens.

 

[Aeonknight]

I'm all for keeping kids from playing violent games... but I also believe in having limits...

Exactly. But it should be up to the parents to decide what the limits for their children are. Not the government's "one size fits all" censorship.

 

[Fuselage]

Fuck off Smith. Because of you we'll have no rating for at least 2 years you fuck.

 

[Macrobstar]

You know what, I was calm and perfectly fine today
Until I heard about this douchebag politician
Band Anoying politicians they cause anger and violence!

 

[CaptainKoala]

HOLY SHIT! DON'T LOOK NOW BUT THE SUN ROSE THIS MORNING! And now they're saying dogs bark?!? And bears shit in the woods?!? Wow, this is ground-breaking, incredible, unexpected news.

 

[ViciousTide]

So i canz make a killing from exporting illegal underage Games into Australia now?

Sweet!

 

[Trishbot]

Don't worry. You'll get Mortal Kombat eventually, guys, and by then they'll probably do a special Australia bundle with all the DLC.

And you can enjoy both the greatest Aussie game character ever (Kano) and your future queen who takes over Australia (Sheeva).

 

[Creator002]

Maybe I should move sooner than I thought. I'm sure the rating will be passed though. If it's not, as soon as I get enough money, I'm moving countries.

By extension, is the gaming situation in Germany (where I plan to go) OK? I've heard you get your games censored.

 

[Jegsimmons]

sure doesn't seem like it, hell im doubting half the European countries have free speech now adays.

?
*ahem*
Yes they do.
Also, just in case you thought Australia was part of Europe, it isn't.

OP: *sigh*
I don't really have much to say...

i mentioned Europe because i was makeing a statement about the 'westernized' world in general.
and really? i hear things about countries where people get tried for talking negative about islam and stuff like that. yeah maby free speech may vary depending on your version on it and whether hate speech is part of it (personally i think it is, even though we dont like it), but still, they have major censorship compare to the US, UK and Canada.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Does Australia even have Freedom of speech?

It's guaranteed under the United Nation's charter.

I have come to the conclusion that they can refuse to classify any game they want, I will just buy it from an online retailer and import it.

Illegal to sell doesn't forbid you from owning it.

 

[Vaccine]

Ahahahahaha.

Oh wait, he's serious.

When will my government stop being backwater hicks?

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

"I think they should be banned," Smith said in a televised report on Australia's 7 News. "It involves a prostitute giving sexual favors for money to a man in a car, and then when she gets out, he comes out with a semi-automatic rifle and shoots her dead. Now what good does that do anybody?"

The old you can have sex with a prostitute and then kill them kneejerk. Is it five years ago again. Am I trapped in a timewarp.

You and the rest of us. I knew that Halloween Rocky Horror showing would be a bad idea.

Actually, I think it's my fault (or more to the point, a certain DJ's fault.) You see, I went to a dance party on Sunday and, well, one of the dances we did was the Time Warp. Sorry guys, it looks like more than just the people in that room were warped by it.

OT: This is absolutely ridiculous, but at this point I've come to expect it. Australia is right up there with Germany and China on the list of countries that unnecessarily censor things. These attorney generals should think very carefully about whether they want to be included in the ranks of countries like that; personally, I'm embarrassed both for them and for Germany; at least China has the excuse of being an authoritarian regime.

 

[BehattedWanderer]

"I think they should be banned," Smith said in a televised report on Australia's 7 News. "It involves a prostitute giving sexual favors for money to a man in a car, and then when she gets out, he comes out with a semi-automatic rifle and shoots her dead. Now what good does that do anybody?"

Waitwaitwaitwait--he's still hung up on that?? Do people still even do that? He does realize gaming has evolved since then, doesn't he? It's so much different now! Now we use rockets! Semi-automatics...please...

Also, the face presented in that image is my new personal "Derp" face. Ah, how the world should change.

What? Oh, right, this was mostly off topic, non concerned with a system convinced that unilateral support is the only way. Sure, the idea is nice, but there will always be one dissenting voice who's tireless parade of idiocy thinks they are changing the world. It's insipid to restrict someone's personal choices in such a way, especially in the age of the internet, where every choice is validated, supported, and rallied for. Just give in! Let adults have their psychopathic fun, safe in the knowledge that they're doing it in a game, rather than watching your secretary snap one day and use that back wall of fancy legal books as sodomy supplies for the rest of the office.

 

[XSin]

It remains to be seen how Smith's apparent intransigence on violent games will affect Australia's R18+ process.

Why you gotta hit me with words like 'intransigence' 5 minutes after I wake up bro? Had to google that $h1t >_>

 

[6SteW6]

Hey dipshit quit with the whole 'Oh...oh you can kill a prostitute after fornicating with her!' Yeah you can, you know where else you can do that? In real life, and do we?Well...sometimes but seriously most times they just deserve it! And I save a pound fifty! Nothing like a happy meal after a hooker killing that's for true!

 

[ElPatron]

Translation: "even if you are an adult, we still feel you don't quite possess the cognitive discernment to choose what's good for you, so we prohibit it for the greater good. We also ban small tits in porn."

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

"I think they should be banned," Smith said in a televised report on Australia's 7 News. "It involves a prostitute giving sexual favors for money to a man in a car, and then when she gets out, he comes out with a semi-automatic rifle and shoots her dead. Now what good does that do anybody?"

The old you can have sex with a prostitute and then kill them kneejerk. Is it five years ago again. Am I trapped in a timewarp.

You and the rest of us. I knew that Halloween Rocky Horror showing would be a bad idea.

Actually, I think it's my fault (or more to the point, a certain DJ's fault.) You see, I went to a dance party on Sunday and, well, one of the dances we did was the Time Warp. Sorry guys, it looks like more than just the people in that room were warped by it.

OT: This is absolutely ridiculous, but at this point I've come to expect it. Australia is right up there with Germany and China on the list of countries that unnecessarily censor things.

There is quite a large gap between the censorship China does and the ones Australia does. China suppresses all dissent, has massive internet censorship (I know Australia was planning something similar but I don't think they ever did it) and has really stupid rules. For instance you cannot have stories with time travel.

I don't think what Australia is doing is Ok but it's like comparing a mugging to a murder.

Except that Chinese game censorship really isn't all that much stricter than what goes on in Australia. The biggest content thing they censor on a regular basis are depictions of skeletons, which thanks to some cultural thing involving reverence for ancestors, is banned in China. I mean, yes, overall they're much worse than Australia, but the fact that Australia censors games at all, when the rest of the world really doesn't give a crap, puts them in the company of authoritarian regimes like China and North Korea just because nobody else is stupid enough to try that kind of censorship.