Congressman Wants Health Warning Labels For Games

[Greyhawk]

I find myself wondering what people blamed youth aggression on before the advent of video games. TV? Heavy Metal music? Rock n' Roll?

Honestly, every generation misses the point. Young people are aggressive because THEY ARE YOUNG PEOPLE! Look at any male animal in the wild as they hit sexual maturity. They are so full of hormones that they can't help but be aggressive. Its no different for humans.

 

[Jursa]

Gee a warning label... guess I won't play that gory game now... I guess they never realized why cigarette manufacturers put those labels on their packs, it's so that they wouldn't get sued, I'm pretty sure they're intelligent enough to know that nobody gives a crap about a label, it's like a thin paper wall guarding a briefcase full of gold, the moment people realize that the wall can be breached by poking it they won't care anymore...

 

[Andy Chalk]

People Demand Health Warning Labels For Congressmen

"Congressmen have a responsibility to parents, families, and to constituents - to inform them of the potentially damaging content that is often created by their offices," Baca said in a press release. "They have repeatedly failed to live up to this responsibility. Meanwhile research continues to show a proven link between creation of idiotic, unnecessary legislation and increased aggression in people. American people deserve to know the truth about these potentially dangerous laws."

"We must hold Congressmen accountable and do everything in our power to ensure people are aware of the detrimental effects that Congressmen can have before making decisions on which legislation is appropriate for their society," Baca continued, adding that he was "hopeful [his] legislation can break the trend of useless, feel-good tripe purportedly created 'for the children'."

Fixed that for you, Mr. Baca.

Also, I recommend a label of "This Space For Rent" as a tattoo across the forehead, or perhaps "Will Trade Freedoms For Funding".

 

[AuntyEthel]

Introducing Joe Baca, the Jack Thompson for a fresh new year.

 

[Anton P. Nym]

He's a congressman from California. Hmmm... what if they agreed to this proposal, but in order to fairly implement it they slapped that warning sticker on all films and television shows as well? I wonder how his constituants would view that development, hmm?

(Let's stop privilging media based on their medium, dammit.)

-- Steve

 

[MercurySteam]

I'll admit i do get some good quotes from violent games such as Gears 2 e.g. "Eat shit and die."

But ppl don't really think that people like me are gonna strap a chainsaw to a machine-gun and go around butchering people do they? I'm still 14 for COG's sake.

Pardon the.................. Gears thing..........

 

[DarkBlood626]

Im so sick of hearing this s*** O well all these anti game technophobes are over 40 so just let time take care of them just keep pointing out there bull****

 

[ratix2]

I always hate it when people use the argument that playing video games is related to increased aggression in young people. Maybe aggressive young people like to play violent video games and not the other way around.

hate to break it to ya man but its a fact, exposure to violence DOES make people more aggressive. how much more aggressive is based opn a lot of factors but mostly how much exposure and the particular person, but its not just some researcher blowing crap out of their ass like some politicians.

however, this is absurd. the esrb does its job very well, its the parents that dont. a 10 year old starts playing an m rated game, is that the industrys fault or the parents? parents are the ones responsible for what they allow their children to do and if you dont care to look at the ratings then you have no right to ***** about the system not working.

and lastly, the vice president does act as the head of the senate last i checked.

 

[countrysteaksauce]

He's just committing the fallacy of Correlation does not imply causation. Of course violent people are going to be more attracted to violent video games, anyway.

Pretty soon the government will start taxing video games to lower their consumption. If that happens...
Piracy, Ahoy!

 

[DarkBlood626]

And what about all the studies that say video games have no link to violent behaviour O so if u keep ignoring crap u don?t agree with it will go away will it ignorant p***

 

[Brokkr]

I always hate it when people use the argument that playing video games is related to increased aggression in young people. Maybe aggressive young people like to play violent video games and not the other way around.

hate to break it to ya man but its a fact, exposure to violence DOES make people more aggressive. how much more aggressive is based opn a lot of factors but mostly how much exposure and the particular person, but its not just some researcher blowing crap out of their ass like some politicians.

however, this is absurd. the esrb does its job very well, its the parents that dont. a 10 year old starts playing an m rated game, is that the industrys fault or the parents? parents are the ones responsible for what they allow their children to do and if you dont care to look at the ratings then you have no right to ***** about the system not working.

and lastly, the vice president does act as the head of the senate last i checked.

I've seen reports from research studies done that defend both sides of this. Most are just biased. The ones that aren't usually say that no correlation between the two can be found.

 

[DamienHell]

I would like to point out that being a congressman who stands between gamers and their games is dangerous to your health.

 

[AceDiamond]

You know it's funny. A while back somebody told me I should move to California from Massachusetts because California is a "real" state.

In that time, the "real" state has let the morons who live in it ban gay marriage and elect a moron who thinks video games need gigantic warning labels with lies on them.

Meanwhile in my "fake" home state, we've stamped out unconstitutional anti-videogame legislation (and hell, I helped in some way with that) and have legalized gay marriage.

Points to the Massholes, methinks.

[/Jingoism]

Anyway I believe this is unconstitutional because it is slander. There has been overwhelming evidence that the only people affected negatively by violent videogames are the people who are already showing uncontrolled agressive and violent tendencies. Everyone else is perfectly fine, however. So putting a label on a game that makes a blatant falsification of data like this is indeed a violation of the First Amendment.

 

[L.B. Jeffries]

and lastly, the vice president does act as the head of the senate last i checked.

I was waiting for this. Might wanna check again:

Section - 3

"The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided."

Like I said, it's an understandable mistake. But they don't have a vote unless there is a tie which hasn't happened in ages. No vote means they don't have any influence and their own party or constituents govern how their members are going to vote.

They may be called the head of the senate, but they might as well be called King of the Drink Cart while they're at it.

 

[PhoenixFlame]

It's unfortunate but par for the course for this kind of stuff. What Baca proposes to do is to link video gaming to more of a habit akin to smoking, which itself is a tainted industry due to many practices.

The real problem is treating video games as if it is potentially hazardous to health, when it is the exceptions and not the rule that actually falsely portray it in this light. Smoking? That's proven to be potentially hazardous and worth the warning on the box. Video Games? That's another story.

 

[gim73]

Do we really NEED a label on everything? Stupid people should have a label on them saying 'Do not reproduce, will result in disturbed and messed up child'. Some days I wish we could just FORCE abortions. Then again, people are more retarded about abortions than almost anything else. These days you should not have families with five kids. Worked in the old days because three of them kids were sure to die before they reached adulthood and started spawning their own retarded seed all over the place.

Whle we are at it, we should take alot of modern american cartoons and put a label on them, saying to the effect that watching will make you RETARDED. Then we can take anime and put a label on it saying that watching will make your eyes grow extremely large and glossy. How about a warning on all food that says eating too much will make you FAT?

 

[I20I3]

That?s great political logic right there. Rather than saying its maybe the parents fault for getting them the game. I highly doubt a 7 year old works to make enough money to go out and buy him a video game, so you must have either given him the money or bought it for him. Thus the root cause of him getting his hands on an M rated game is that YOU let him. Most places have it that you need a parent get the M rated game for you, and you would think that while getting it for them they might ponder the name or even look at the box. This of course is thrown completely out the window when it comes to renting, because when you rent something (at least where I am from) you get it in the generic looking case with the name printed on the generic label. Oh wait so if you put more labels on the cases, it won?t come up when they rent things, great waste of money that is. How can they possibly be shocked or outraged when they find out that a game which the title of is a criminal offence, (grand theft auto) turned out to be intended for a mature audience. If you are that bad of a parent that you don?t even know the name of the game you are getting for your child, well I feel sorry for the child, and in no way would blame the video game. As for if the video games actually lead to the already poorly raised child being more violent, it MIGHT, it also might help them deal with it rather than take out there aggression in real life. The real question is what drives a normal non violent and aggressive kid to want to play a game like that? Is it pear pressure, the adverts, human nature, and the lack of a good structured relationship with their parents? I highly doubt that a parent with an aggressive child, who they let play violent video games, would not be also contributing to the aggression in other piss pour parenting ways. Like teaching them the proper way to deal with said aggression, not letting them fight, or pick on other kids, and teaching the proper way to treat people. Of course if a congress person were to try and pass a bill that would charge parents for there bratty kids misbehaving, so that maybe they could get off there butts and do some actual parenting, they would be voted out faster than sonic........ 's downfall of game quality.


Sorry kinda went on a rant there but its what i felt had to be said.