The Big Picture: Off Target - Don't Censor Me Part 2

[IceForce]

Considering Target and other stores in Australia removed GTA5 because of something some people deemed offensive I'd call that censorship.To remove something because it offends you is pretty much the whole definition of the word.

Then by that same definition, GamerGate is pro-censorship.

 

[IceForce]

Why are private organizations allowed to get away with things we would never allow the government to get away with when many private organizations have almost as much if not more influence and power then the government.

Uhh, because we don't live in a communist society?

Is this a serious question?

 

[Kameburger]

I really want to give this views suffice it to say that I can imagine that while his points may or may not have had validity, it certainly came from that same hypocritical soap box that he uses to bully and dehumanize people who have differing view points.

Fact: Target (who is also own by the same company that owns K-mart) has every right to not stock this game on there shelves and any justification they provide for doing so is superfluous.

Fact: Sexual violence of any kind is banned in Australia and this includes perceived sexual violence as well.

Fact: In Australia games ratings are legally enforceable meaning that selling an 18+ rated game to minors is not a matter of company policy and is a crime.

Points that are frustrating are as follows.

1. Target explained their actions stating based on the premise that GTA V incentivised violence against women and the decision was made based on the view of the "majority" of their customers however I have a suspicion based on the statement that the people who are complaining haven't actually played the game which is one thing when the contents is obvious(i.e. if their argument was that this game rewards you for committing crime, then the discussion might be different).

"We have firsthand experience of this kind of sexual violence," the petition reads. "To see this violence that we lived through turned into a form of entertainments is sickening and causes us great pain and harm."

"This game spreads the idea that certain women exist as scapegoats for male violence. It shows hatred and contempt for women in the sex industry and puts them at greater risk. ... Games like this are grooming yet another generation of boys to tolerate violence against women."

2. They cite the sexual violence as reflecting their personal experience, and making it into entertainment, however playing that game, there is no Sexual Violence, because ironically if there had been the game would have not received a rating as per Australian law which would more or less equate to a full ban based on my understanding of how it works.

So the result of all this is that Target no longer sells a game because a group complained about the game that they didn't play because they objected to contents that wasn't in the game because they wanted to prevent a group of people, who aren't legally allowed to buy the game, from being corrupted by that content and some people are happy about that?

I won't fault Target because well, I'm a little afraid to say why I don't fault them.

 

[Westaway]

but they should do more to acknowledge how abusive a sex worker's life is,

It's a video game. They don't need to put any social or political commentary into their game. They don't need to stand up for marginalized groups. They don't need to spread awareness of social issues. They don't owe anyone anything.

 

[JMac85]

Okay, I've already made this point with another commentator, but I think what MovieBob mostly means to say is that prostitutes don't have to be cut from the games altogether, and shouldn't be granted magic invincibility when a GTA player goes on a rampage, but they should do more to acknowledge how abusive a sex worker's life is, (like with pimps who abuse them to keep them in line, 'customers' who abuse them just to get their rocks off, and so on), rather than just treat them with a "Hey guys! Just pay these happy girls for instant sex!" attitude that was laughably cheesy in the 3D-era, but increasingly out of touch and creepy in the HD-era.

It's not like they can't use the "girlfriend dating" system from GTA IV. It admittedly needs some improvements both mechanically and tonally, but it's still better than acting like prostitutes are happily shameless in performing sex acts for just a bit of money, when in reality they're likely forced and abused into the life by criminal scumbags, and are screwed over even harder by law enforcement and mainstream society blaming the hookers for "bringing it on themselves" instead of the pimps actually forcing them to do those acts.

And if the argument is "oh, EVERYBODY is dehumanized in a GTA game", that can easily be accomplished by dehumanizing the people abusing sex workers, thus getting closer to the root of the problem, while still being a more acceptable message - it's what Watch_Dogs did during the "Human Trafficking" sidequest (namely, hunting down a band of criminals importing sex slaves into the city).

Does that mean the next GTA game should do the same with throngs of taxi drivers, convenience store clerks, paramedics, and of course police officers the typical player mows down indiscriminately?

That's what I don't get about this selective outrage, the GTA series treats everyone equally in a fatalist kind of way, but some people choose to only look at a very specific type of NPC to get in a tizzy about. Why is Rockstar now obligated to be the vanguard of social justice in their open world crime simulator where every walk of life (except children) are subject to a random and violent death?

 

[Krai]

The game itself may not incentivise killing prostitutes to the same degree as previous incarnations of the series do (it sounds like now there is no more reason to kill prostitutes in GTA than there is to kill anyone else), but if I remember right some Rockstar people listed it as a selling point. I could be wrong, they definitely acted like killing prostitutes was a cool feature in the previous games, but I could be misattributing something some game reviewer said. That being said even if Rockstar didn't there are defiantly fans who were excited about it. I don't think that's a good reason to ban a game, but I also don't kid myself and act like nobody ever killed a prostitute in GTA5, and these people killed the prostitute not just cause they wanted to kill an NPC but because it was a prostitute. Killing prostitutes may not be the universal game experience of GTA5, but it is definitely part of the game's image and to some degree I think Rockstar wants it to be part of the game's image.

Another thing the thing that bothered me about Target banning GTA5 is that it comes off a really disingenuous. They do it long after the moment where people who were likely to buy it already have and they banned only that game. Its just so obvious that some executive who has no idea what video games are just banned the game cause he had heard there was a controversy and he decided moralistic people who don't like videogames were a group of people he wanted to please. If they had decided that GTA5 was not in keeping with their image before the game came out and never stocked the game that would have been stupid, but it wouldn't feel so artificial.

There are games, foods, movies, porno, ect. that I don't like and it is my right to then not interact with them if I don't want to. If I owned a store that could mean not stocking the game, food, movie, or porn I disagree with. It's OK for stores not to stock items, it just seems a little off when they stock an item for as long as it is likely to make money then take it off in a transparent attempt to look like they care.

I'm not really sure where I was going with this. I guess I disagree with movie bob, but I disagree for different reasons than everyone else. Shrug

 

[Kingjackl]

On the one hand, I agree with Bob in that this isn't nearly as important as it's being made out to be. The game isn't banned in Australia, and can be purchased anywhere except from Target and Kmart. Also, the fact that it's a re-release of a year old game means the damage is already done anyway. It's fine to stand against the chain's actions in principle (and contrary to what Bob says, this is censorship of a sort), but unless you live in Australia and there isn't a JB Hi-Fi or Big W near where you live, there are perhaps better things to be petitioning.

On the other hand, and I know a lot of people have said this already, but the backlash against the game for endorsing poor treatment of women doesn't hold water, seeing as it's a game where just about everyone is fair game. Also, if you play the story campaign, I'd say about 90% of the people you kill are either criminals or corrupt government and police, most of whom are male. The business with prostitutes is practically an Easter Egg that achieved mainstream attention years ago, and contributed to the series' infamous reputation among ignorant scare-mongerers and moralising mother-hens. These were the arguments being brought up by the people pressuring Target to pull the game, and they hold no more water now than they did during the Jack Thompson days. If you believe GTA's treatment of women is in need of improvement, don't throw your lot in with the pro-censorship crowd just because that's what they're saying as well.

 

[Redd the Sock]

More even handed than anticipated, but still, I disagree.

First off, I'll preface, while GTA V fell flat for me (too much more of the same) I still kind of like the series. Yet, in playing almost every game in the series, I have picked up 2 hookers total: one i 4 to say I did after playing so many, and one in 5 because I thought at the time I'd have the will to 100% it (boy was I wrong). It has never been an efficient way to get health or money, and has ever existed beyond a novelty for cheap laughs (5 being the first one to make it even a low requirement for a complete file). I'm sure I killed several as I drive like a maniac, but that makes them statistics, not beaten women. Moreover, it's GTA, and the main appeal has always been the sandbox you don't have to behave in. We know it's full of things we shouldn't do, and we don't do them in real life.

However the mincing of words over censorship reminds me of this bit:

?Churchill: "Madam, would you sleep with me for five million pounds?" Socialite: "My goodness, Mr. Churchill... Well, I suppose... we would have to discuss terms, of course... "
Churchill: "Would you sleep with me for five pounds?"
Socialite: "Mr. Churchill, what kind of woman do you think I am?!" Churchill: "Madam, we've already established that. Now we are haggling about the price?

In other words: people are trying to find some loophole or minimal level they can apply to this without is being called censorship so they can try and deny that even if all true, the associated connotations are still in place: you are still a thief for a lipstick as a diamond, still prostituting for a million bucks as twenty, and still trying to control and limit expression you don't like if you're at the legislature or the customer service window. If anything, the guy at the legislature is more honest in saying some things can't be said, bought or made, while the other says you can, but puts as many barriers as they legally can in the way.

Now this pisses me and others off on a few levels: there's the basic sense of hypocracy in that if this had been a religious group asking to pull Dragon Age Inquisition everyone making excuses for target because they agree with the issue at hand would be on the other side making the joke petitions and angry tweets and calling censorship.

Still that's minor. But for the rest, well, while slippery slope falicies are laughed at, target didn't just give angry gamers something to yell at. They sent a message to PETA, the religious right, the political right, parental groups, and every parental concern group out there that bitchy internet petitions can work. Even if they won't succeed, expect a lot of attempts by groups we really didn't need to encourage that they might succeed in endlessly campaining that Pokemon is a satanic socialistic promoter of animal abuse.

Yet worst of all is that the larger issue is still out there. Everything said about the sex trade is true, yet what do we do: we act like the game is making it so the laws don't change, rather than hold it up to say why the laws should change. Art exists to highlight social ills more than it does to encourage them, yet there's a strong desire to bury such things because they remind us about how shitty the world really is when we get off twitter and out of the suburbs. We stand a better chance of dealing with society's ills when fiction doesn't sugar coat them and we have to accept them as existing without obvious political slants. Trying to hide them might keep some people from being triggered (and my thoughts on how trying to avoid doing so only promotes a lack of efforts to mentally heal notwithstanding) but it also keeps the problem out of sight, out of mind, except in obviously slanted political editorials out of the likes of Rush Limbaugh.

It's been stupid all around, but I have to side with the stupid on the right side for me, and that's the side that doesn't try to tell others what to do, even by adding inconvenience to the transaction.

Oh, and I'll agree with the joke petitions: if you're going to play moral guardian, be thorough because if you look to oust GTA but leave 50 shade, Game of Thrones, endless R rated movies etc. on the selves, you'll get nothing but laughter out of me and the half assed effort to "preserve family values" or whatever shit you're talking about.

 

[ryukage_sama]

I'll just point out that MovieBob and other's support of Target would completely reverse if they were removing Gone Home for promoting "sodomy" or something-

Support? You really got the impression that he was supporting Target?

He called them cynical and dumb. Boy, those are some supportive words.

Correctly identifying their refusal to sell the game as free market capitalism instead of censorship does not mean he agrees with their actions.

If you follow MovieBob you see a distinct anti-corporation, anti-free market attitude in what he says. So now he goes, "Hey I don't like this either but that's what happens in a free market..." it's like a smug, backhanded jab at people who support something he is against. He's really saying, "This is capitalism's fault." My point is that there would be no strong principled stance about capitalism from him if they were de-listing a game he likes. It would be all condemnation and nothing else.

Bob referred to this event as being an example of "free market capitalism" and not an example of ban or censorship, as many have claimed on this website and elsewhere. Bob even says that capitalism is far from perfect, but its the system at work here. The video wasn't about him not supporting/opposing something. The video was trying to correct those who point to the chain's decision as an example of censorship, because this isn't an example of censorship. He was also redirecting people to direct their ire towards the agencies who DO actively censor and ban games.

 

[JMac85]

The business with prostitutes is practically an Easter Egg that achieved mainstream attention years ago

Seriously, it's an exploit if nothing else. Every NPC is killable, most of the time they drop money, therefore after you lose money from commissioning some sex you can gain it back by taking advantage of another game mechanic. Not exactly an advertised feature. Like pickpocketing your gold back from a skill trainer in the Elder Scrolls games.

 

[Tumedus]

I was willing to forgive it the first time out because I knew what you meant, but this time it just doesn't work. Censorship and what the 1st Amendment protects you against (and similar regulations in other countries) are related but not the exact same thing. Its a rectangle vs square issue.

But for the same reason you can be upset with people for bitching about their 1st amendment rights when a private company censors them, you cannot dismiss every incidence of censorship as a non issue simply because it isn't enacted by the government. You are as guilty of conflating the two ideas as the people you rail against if you do.

Further, while there are certainly over reactions to this, the notion that people shouldn't get upset and/or respond is patently absurd. Target let a single institution dictate whether a game would be on their store shelves and thus available to many people who may or may not agree with the ideas expressed. If people don't fight back against that, then Target, and eventually its competitors, have little reason to question doing that again in the future.

I understand that its really easy to get tired of all the raging and vitriol within the gaming community. But I'll take passionate and misguided over impotent and indifferent. Rather than spending an episode telling people that their concerns are stupid, you should have spent more time showing causes that relate and are more importance. You could have talked in detail about Australia's laws and the problems with them.

 

[elvor0]

Here's where I come from. Don't most of the 'hardcore' crowd that wants GTA usually pirate it through torrents, CD cracks or emulators anyway? If so, why are people fighting this so much when you can just download the game without paying for it.

And like Bob said, it's a year old game you can purchase from other outlets. As for the sex worker thing, I think Rockstar is just appealing to their demographic and what they want. Money speaks the most, devs and publishers give what the audience wants.

What? It's currently the fastest selling entertainment product (yes that includes everything) to have ever been released. Grossing 1 billion in three days. But yes, everyone pirated it even though it's not out on PC yet.

Secondly. It just came out for next gen. Adverts for it are all over the joint.

I played through GTA 5 and cannot actually remember seeing a hooker (unless there's one in a mission I've forgotten about). I honestly thought they'd taken them out of the game.

My two cents.

They're all over the place and the game reminds you quite often that you can pick them up. Additionally, receiving prostitute service counts towards 100% completion.

Gonna have to agree with anonymity88 there. I saw barely any and only 1 that propositioned me, but no option to comply popped up. I certainly didn't have the game ever remind or tell me that I can utilize them. I assumed Michael and Franklin couldn't, like John in Red Dead Redemption, as Michael is married and Franklin is trying to make amends with his girlfriend.

OT:
You could kill ANYONE in GTA. I didn't even know you could pick up hookers in GTA5. Seriously, given the characters, I thought much like in Red Dead Redeption you couldn't.. Michal is married, Franklin was trying to make amends with his girlfriend....and Trevor is a fucking psycho you're not supposed to endear to. He even rapes some poor guy and it's treated as a joke. SEVERAL times. If that was a woman, people would be screaming bloody mary.

And it's all kinds of dodgy that petition. Not ONCE are you told to, need to or even incentivized kill a single woman in the GTA 5 storyline. I've killed platoons of men, cities of them even. I tied one up, broke his kneecaps, pulled his teeth and strapped him up to a car battery But women? None. One woman dies in an accident and Trevor kills one off camera...because he's a fucking pschyo you're not supposed to endear to. But the player neither does or needs to.

Yeah there are NPC women that you can kill if you so choose. There are also dogs. and men. and birds. and deer. and plenty of other things you can CHOOSE to kill. If we wanna pull the sexism card, it doesn't stick to women in GTA5.

Last off Bob: Game just came out on current gen. Adverts for it all over the joint. Kiiiinda relevant.

 

[ACman]

I think Bob is getting it mixed up with the violation of the first amendment, which only the government can violate.

????

No. The American government(s) (+ organisations) ARE the ones cannot censor, or, more correctly, "restrict speech".

Individuals and organisations can do what they want. If CBS wanted to take the FCC to the Supreme Court so that they could show lady-nipples (which they almost did, but the fine they fought was repealed in a lower court) they'd probably win and lady-nipples on primetime TV would be a legal thing.

Whereas if you tried to, for example, take the Escapist to court to insist that you can act like an abusive jackass on their forums (because 1st amendment rights and shit) you'd have no case.

 

[ACman]

Love how pointing out GTA's problematic content instantaneously raises hackles with the reflexively defensive gamers on this site.

GTA is problematic. The defense that "it's satire" doesn't really hold water. GTA is satire in the same way that a Wayans movie is satire. Stupid and completely vacant of anything meaningful to say. Orinally it was passable joke to have a cartoon Scorsese/De Palma homage. Now it's poorly paced actual Scorsese/De Palma with characters that act more like people, rather than outragous charactatures of Tony Montana or Sonny Corleone, and when you put killable prostitues into that world it becomes less palatable than when it was in GTA3/Vice/SA.

If it's satire then what are they trying to say in these games by having killable prostitues?




That's not to say that they shouldn't be allowed to have killable prostitutes in their game.... But being allowed to means that, if you do, people are also allowed to say that it's sorta fucked up.


You kill criminals in the game. Sure. Acceptable in a game about being a criminal it's narratively part of the game and a core system.

You can run people over in a game. Sure. Acceptable in a game where you are a criminal who drives places, plus it's mechanically justified - running over people is fun.

You can go on a killing spree in the game and fight cops..... Bad and kinda fucked up - but systemically fun enough.

You can have sex with prostitues and kill them to get their money back.... because? Because this is GTA and that has been in GTA since GTA3, there is no narative or systemic justification, it's just there.... And it's kinda fucked up.

 

[daxterx2005]

It's like a year old and was being pulled from the shelves anyway they just want their names in the papers....

 

[Monsterfurby]

Are we STILL on the censorship-definition thing? Come on, getting hung up on words like that is not really the most original or insightful point to make.

While I don't think the controversy is as large as people make it look, this video really, really feels like Bob's hipster side going "look at me, I don't care about your petty concerns, dear audience!"

Jim Sterling and John Bain both had far more insightful discussions on the topic. Stick to comic books, movies and other touchstones of ancient American culture, Bob.

 

[Rellik San]

I'm surprised at Bob... no mention of the Porn troubles in the UK with a discussion about censorship.

Porn troubles being that GOD FORBID we show women having fun in sex... I thought that'd be up his alley. D:

You can have sex with prostitues and kill them to get their money back.... because? Because this is GTA and that has been in GTA since GTA3, there is no narative or systemic justification, it's just there.... And it's kinda fucked up.

Or because mechanically protecting that group over others would shatter immersion.

No ones forcing anyone to use the sex workers and even if you do no one's forcing you to kill them, it's an option, but it's one that if you take says more about you as a player (as a note this is the GENERAL YOU not you specifically) than it does the game or it's content.

 

[Gordon_4_v1legacy]

I'm surprised at Bob... no mention of the Porn troubles in the UK with a discussion about censorship.

Porn troubles being that GOD FORBID we show women having fun in sex... I thought that'd be up his alley. D:

I read that list, and even as a non-UK citizen I resent the entries since half of them represent cornerstones of the British boarding school tradition.

 

[XT6Wagon]

Yes you can kill hookers in GTA, but do you know who else you kill? Everyone. You're not incentivized to go out and murder prostitutes anymore than you are to cause other types of general mayhem and destruction. Should Prostitutes be the one character group in GTA whom you can't kill, or is Bob taking the stance that Grand Theft Auto should remove the violence from its games?

Buying sex from prostitutes gives you health back, at the cost of your money. Killing the prostitutes then means you get all the money you spent on getting your health up back.

Don't forget that buying snacks at a convience store is far more useful in GTA5. You can use those any where, any time. Its a little hard to find a hooker as you run from the military in your freshly stolen fighter jet. Your stockpiled snacks are there, ready to be used.

Also you can rob the store after getting your health back for a much better pay out than trying to get your money back from a prostitute.