Congressman Wants Health Warning Labels on Games, Again

[PrinceofPersia]

Well only one thing to do now:

 

[joebthegreat]

I think the burden of proof here is on the people who are making the claims that video games cause violence. One cannot simply make a claim and state that it's true unless opponents disprove it.

But that's just what I said. You can't PROVE anything. So long as our statement is physically capable of being disproved, the burden is always to disprove it.

You never can and never will prove anything true. You merely make a statement, and then try to disprove it.

That's all we EVER do in Science.

So assuming "video games cause violent tendencies in children" is both a testable prediction, and capable of being disproved.

Then it is up to us to test and disprove the statement. Until we do, the statement stands. So long as we can disprove it with one (and only one) legitimate experiment we can throw it out and never look at it again.

Show me ANY experiment which disproves the statement "video games cause violent tendencies in children". I'm sure they're out there, especially if you're so sure your argument is a correct one. I'm actually shocked nobody has even tried showing me a single experiment.

 

[Gudrests]

"WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent videogames and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior."

Really? Would you like to prove that?

The only people who become violent because of video games are people that have pre-existing mental disorders. Give a normal teenager Modern Warfare, he's not going to become the next Jeffrey Dahmer.

I think this is all true....i want to be violent to this person and I play violent video games all day...or maybe it could be for my lack of patience on dumb people.....im not soo sure at this point. Still....this guy is dumb

 

[Fern Williams]

Putting a warring label like that on a game is like putting a warring label on all wardrobes because they might lead to Narnia. Also the I wonder if the people that criticize games have ever even sat down to play one.

 

[TheGreatCoolEnergy]

Y'know, when studies show that there is no conclusive evidence showing a cause-effect relationship between violent videogames and aggressive behavior, you kind of have to wonder why this guy is even bothering. As in, what's the goddamn point? Does he have an agenda, or is he just a gullible asshole that heard "vidya makes people bad" and decided to propose legislation because of it?

He needs to stay in office if he wants to keep his pay check rolling.

When are all the old, stupid people going to die off? It'd sure be nice to get some congressmen and politicians who actually know what they're talking about when it comes to video games (Or anything else, for that matter).

That would be the day, wouldn't it?

Would you also like this on alcohol? Which has PROVABLE evidence rather than your made up variety?

Or Catcher in the Rye?

Or Huckleberry Finn?

...families deserve to know the truth...

That you're desperately trying to add false warnings to the best policed products instead of, say, fixing the unemployment rate of 12.4%, given California is the fifth worse state in the U.S. for that.

Yes, I think they do.

What he said.

California, stop trying to legislate games and start worrying about trying to get California out of the really shitty state its in right now.

Legislating games won't help the situation.

They need something for a distraction, because the real problems are really deep and hard to fix, and actually solving them would piss off a lot of their voters, which would get them taken out of office

I don't see the problem. It already says the games aren't for pre-teens, a label saying that again isn't going to change anything.

The implication that we are all crazy, aggressive, killers is demeaning

You know who needs a lesson in responisbility? The government.

Stop wasting our money.

Well said

*sigh* some people just seem to ave some sort of unexplained, stupid and unreasonable grudge against video games...

This guy is full of crap, when will people realise the truth, and stop blaming video games for their problems...

People need something quick and easy to blame deeper problems on, duh. If you grew up on books and movies, blaming them would make an ass of yourself...Well, more of an ass

If it failed before what makes you think it'll work again?

It's the fact that this is even being passed. I mean image this, but applied to the Bible, or Koran, etc. Image the uproar it would create

 

[SilentVirus]

I think it should say "Warning. Bad government decisions led to 13 Trillion Dollar debt that YOU are going to have to pick up"

 

[Vault101]

You know what? Fuck the children WONT SOMEBODY THINK OF THE GAMERS???

 

[5mj7R7yf4Dwr3gdZyyu9PeGNwYjlNrjzuh3iTXQG]

Seriously, what the hell is wrong with California?

This is a matter of reactionary legislation, which is commonplace in California, but also in plenty of other states. It's difficult to control all to which your child is exposed (which is ultimately a good thing, since kids are better informed with a broad range of perspectives, as they grow up). But many parents are afraid of any subversive influences that might cause their kids to develop their own attitudes and personalities, even though this is ultimately inevitable.

But Califonia (my hometown of San Francisco, in fact) is the source of the no-toys-in-happy-meals bill, for which I hang my head in shame.

But when voters turn to the legislators to do something about fact-of-life issues (such as children getting losing innocence while they lose ignorance), our reps often don't even have a clue as to what is wrong, let alone how they fix it. This kind of legislation is a common result.

The problem is, that just as invasive DRM works in that it keeps shareholders happy (evil-as-fuck anti-piracy looks excellent to non-gamer shareholders on a publisher's portfollio), blanket regulations such as this look good to the constituency that doesn't know any better. Less publicity is made when it gets blasted in the courts, and the rep gets his votes.

The NRA's been relying on the same kind of tactic for years.

I don't see the problem. It already says the games aren't for pre-teens, a label saying that again isn't going to change anything.

The problem is, people don't recognize that games, like comic books, appeal to a wide range of age and sophistication demographics, and Arkham Asylum [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ptitlerax1116nu5ji], and then wonder how in Hell such a comic got written for Batman.

As a regular player of Left4Dead 2, I noticed after the Christmas Steam Sale the new rush of players with squeaky kid voices who still haven't figured out how to relate to gamers who identify as a different gender (hint: the same way you relate to those who identify as your own). Left4Dead 2 features not only wholesale slaughter of (infected) human beings, and all the gore that would entail, but also features indications and story elements of themes inappropriate for kids not in high school, (e.g. the indescriminate culling of healthy civilian Americans by the US Military, as could easily happen in an apocalypse scenario.)

You're right, the second lable isn't going to change things where the first lable didn't, but just as sex curious kids aren't barred from adult literature in the libraries (and can find porn on the internet) game-curous kids will often be able to gain access to these games somehow. But this hasn't changed from times immemorial when rap, comics, rock-and-roll or television was the corrupting factor. No-one is making them play these games, and we need to allow them to police themselves, so long as they keep to all their other duties, of course.

So why don't we have our own damn lobbyists in Washington?...

You can start by writing your representatives (contact information of which can be Googled easily). There! You're lobbying your reps.

If you create a website with a forum, you can coordinate with like minded folks to simultaneously contact their reps as well.

And if you find you're not doing it, the answer lies before you: it's too much effort.

In the meantime...

No, first ammendment infringements are not specific to Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives. Indeed, one of my favorite collectors' items is a NO FREE SPEECH FOR FASCISTS flyer from UC Berkeley, where they were completely up in arms about neo-Nazis who wanted to (peacefully) demonstrate and speak on the campus.

To many folks, maybe to most, free speech is a fine thing until someone else is saying something they find offensive.


The thing is, they'll carry it to far. They always have, to the point the Supreme Court is already too wary, noting we've freaked out about new media before [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NewMediaAreEvil]. The radical left usually wants to sanitize anything that might offend an oppressed minority (even if taken out of context), and the radical right usually wants to censor anything that might raise questions about the veracity of their methods, their ideology or authority, or that of their religion.

I think that the courts will continue to uphold gaming freedoms for violence, so long as we keep the sex to a minimum. I'm sure they're afraid that if the game industry was forced to go underground, quality would plummet while offensiveness would skyrocket [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custer's_Revenge].

 

[Cuddlydemon]

I'm now convinced that California is where politicians go to die.

 

[inFAMOUSCowZ]

And theres studies showing no links. It all depends on whose playing the game. So until there is a definitive link between the two, no label should be on the box.

 

[Tim Mazzola]

Joe Baka

 

[redisforever]

They may have to put warnings on games like WoW later, saying "WARNING: This game will make you throw your life and friends away."
I have friends who literally have not emerged from WoW for days, except to eat, and go to school. And well, bathroom.

 

[Worgen]

they can put warnings on videogames, but only if they also put a warning on the bible that it might cause homophobia, warnings on coke that it might make you a fatass, warnings on guns they they might make you dead, and warnings on fox news that it might make you a retard

 

[soulsabr]

Not that I read the whole thing but I wonder if they might consider that there is a link between violent people wanting violent games? Just a question.

 

[JWAN]

There you go, the Politically Correct left is trying to save the children again just like the ones on the right.

Stupidity is not cut along party lines.

 

[samsonguy920]

Sounds like someone missed the bus of the whole California v Videogames thing. The current case in the Supreme Court hasn't been decided upon and already this guy wants to add something else?

Why is California all about equality on many things except for this?

 

[K_Dub]

Ah ignorance, it's good to see ya again. Welp, let's see what kind of trouble you're trying to start up this time.

 

[5mj7R7yf4Dwr3gdZyyu9PeGNwYjlNrjzuh3iTXQG]

Let me just say something about this Science...

In Science, one must make a hypothesis (testable prediction), and then rigorously test it through experimentation.

In Science, one (and only one) legitimate experiment that disproves your prediction is all that is needed. If you are proved incorrect, we throw it out. There is no such thing as proving something correct.

For the sake of being a devils advocate, allow me to ask one question. Where is your proof that violence in video games does not promote violent tendencies in children? All you need is one legitimate experiment. The results must stand on their own merit, not on interpretation.

A few things:

~ Science is not based on experimentation but observation. Experiments are artificed circumstances in which to produce clean observations, but some experiments are impossible (creating a gravitational field strong enough to produce lensing) and others are unethical (giving human beings cancer so that we see if a treatment works).

Secondly, Science never proves anything any more than can, say, a court of law, with the sole exception of the pure-thought sciences such as logic and mathematics, in which proof beyond doubt can occur. Gravity, despite its flawless observed consistency, will only ever be a theory, just a very, very strong one.

Sociology is a soft science, which, unlike physics or chemistry, can only map out tendencies and approximations, usually based on behavioural statistics within human society and not within the closed environment of a laboratory. The reason is simple: we cannot (and should not) clone one hundred children and raise them in an exact environment so that we can see the changes in behavior of those we expose to Manhunter 2 compared to the control group. With any less stringent conditions, we cannot be sure all the extraneous conditions are insignficant, hence we have to go by the laws of averages.

Nothing in Sociology is exact. One could easily correlate, for example, the descent of violent sex crimes with the rise in availability of the internet (and along with an increase in reporting vectors and victim sensitivity training among responding agencies). Does this indicate that the availability of porn (via the internet) reduces sex crimes? Possibly, but the internet also increased connection to support groups, common interest groups and education resources about how to relate to other people, and any of these may be part, all or none of the causation factor.

But more importantly, burden of proof, or rather sufficient evidence of harm is on those who would regulate the industry in order for a law be made that creates a restriction, otherwise there would be nothing to stop the orange growers of the US from pushing a law banning manderins because they cause cancer. So it's not up to the game industry to prove that their product is harmless, but the lobbiests for the regulation to prove that harm exists.

It gets worse. During the new millenium, a lot of companies invested in the status quo invoked a lot of pseudoscience in order to obgfuscate the details about global climate change, and this tactic has, thanks to its success, continued to propagate in any controversy in which the actual science backs one side and not the other (evolution & cosmology vs. biblical creationism, fetal personhood vs. women's rights, flood geology vs. academic geology, and so on). So there are a lot of scientific inqueries that are implemented with a specific outcome in mind, and a lot of other so-called studies that are fabricated out of whole cloth, and pass off as scientific inquery. This is why, as Dr. Richard Dawkins noted, we need to return to the practice of having scientific results backed by multiple sources of review that confirm each other.

So, given this, it is not only necessary for Baca and his crew to provide studies that show violent videogames consistently are a cause of harm to children, but also must then provide parallel review studies, preferably that use different methods, as well as different test groups.

Incidentally, I think if this method were applied to intolerant religious communities, and the propensity of kids to bully fringe groups within them, some very interesting results would emerge.

 

[Gaderael]

"WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent videogames and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior."

Excuse me, Congressman Baca?

 

[carletonman]

Sorry, bloodstains are a real pain to get out of carpet. But I digress

The sad fact is that congresspeople don't give a damn about things like facts and research when it doesn't suit their needs. Having consumed my fair share of violent media over the years, I'm no less likely to shoot someone than a person that hasn't. You know what the States needs to invest in? Labels on guns warning owners not to shoot people.