Videogames Now As Bad As Porn in Oklahoma

[Intruder]

A new bill signed into law says that certain video games are just as bad as porn.

The bill signed by Oklahoma Governor Brad Henry goes into effect on Nov. 1st.

Read the article here. (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=9681)

[ZephidsEmbrace]

Good lord, this is just pathetic.

[phantomhitman]

you know those video gamers can get porn from out of thin air.

[Norse]

wait...porn is bad??? I haven't noticed...

[51|RandoM]

Some of them are worse than porn.

[MSUStud911]

This law will never make it past the inevitable lawsuit by the ESA. It's almost like the lawmakers don't want to succeed. Seriously, it's like they read all of the laws that have already been stricken and decided to attempt an even more outlandishly strict/oppressive law than any other tried before.

[Deathbane27]

There should be a law... If a State or National congressman votes to pass a law that is later overturned because it is unconstitutional, then they get punished by whatever the penalty would have been for violating the law.

As it is, they just put the Partisan Blindfold on whenever an election issue bill comes along and blame activist judges.

Fuck them all. In the ass. With a rusty cattle prod.

[mkelehan]

I don't want my kids watching porn OR playing GTA. That being said, keeping their inoffensive boxes hidden from kids isn't going to help anything. If the box depicted a cop getting shot in the head, sure, but I don't really think any retailer would carry that anyway.

[Heretic Machine]

It's almost like the lawmakers don't want to succeed.

It isn't that they are sabotaging the law or anything like that... they just don't give a shit. It's success as a law has nothing to do with it's role in their agenda, which is to fool dumbasses into voting for them.

It'll work too.

[Carnisaur]

As if obscenity laws aren't ridicuous enough. The government needs to recognize that it is not a judge of how art is defined, and obscenity laws are a political tool more than anything. I'd like to say this would never pass, but it could happen if videogames become a bona-fide mass media.

[Intruder]

It isn't that they don't want it to succeed... They just don't give a shit. It's success as a law has nothing to do with it's role in their agenda, which is to fool dumbasses into voting for them.

It'll work too.

Agreed, more than likely this is just another thing that a potential candidate can point to come election time, then tout to his constituants "Look what I tried to do to protect your kids! I care, i really do care!" Thus is the nature of politics.

[bKangy]

Blood... flowing... out of ears... I can't help it! My brain is leaking!

[Cha-Ka]

Perigon got it in one. This is just lip service for 'family values'

[OSX]

This definition considers inappropriate any game which “lacks serious literary, scientific, medical, artistic or political value” and which features glamorized or gratuitous violence; uses that violence to shock or stimulate; features violence that is not contextually relevant to the material; has violence so pervasive that it serves as the thread holding the plot of the material together; trivializes the serious nature of realistic violence; does not demonstrate the consequences or effects of realistic violence; uses brutal weapons designed to inflict the maximum amount of pain and damage; endorses or glorifies torture or excessive weaponry, or depicts lead characters who resort to violence freely.

...

What? Thats got to be the worst definition of game porn ever. I dont even know where to start...

[absolut taco]

A new bill signed into law says that certain video games are just as bad as porn.

The bill signed by the Gov. goes into effect on nov. 1st.

Read the article here. (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=9681)
If Oklahoma says porn and games are bad, it makes them good in my book!

[Wyrm]

It's fucking Oklahoma. It's in the bible belt. Is anyone really shocked by this? I live there, and I'll tell you something. The beer sucks, there are tons of gay people, and I'm constantly having to go back inside and change because the weather sucks my balls. I fucking hate it.

*Note, I do not hate gay people. Many are actually my friends. I just think it's funny that there are lots of gay people since it's in the Bible belt.

[Deathbane27]

...

What? Thats got to be the worst definition of game porn ever. I dont even know where to start...

There's two parts to the bill, which is actually an amendment to the existing porn law. (This same piece of shit, or something so similar I'm not going to bother checking, was in Utah; it passed the Senate but not the House (or vice versa?) because there's some political crapfest going between them.)

Change 1: Adds videogames to the list of media that are covered in the porn law.

Change 2: Adds violence to the list of inappropriate content.

So, basically, Before:
Sexually explicit movies
Sexually explicit magazines

After:
Sexually explicit movies
Sexually explicit magazines
Sexually explicit videogames
Excessively violent movies
Excessively violent magazines
Excessively violent videogames

[MSUStud911]

Legal obscenity has only ever included stuff with sexual themes, and even then it has to be pretty extreme. Violence is not legal obscenity and this bill is just a bunch of windbags doing what they do best: ignorantly blowing hot air.

[Cha-Ka]

These sorts of bills cannot legally be passed and pushing them through should be a crime that carries a heavy fine. Someone should figure out exactly how much money this bill cost tax payers so far and bill the governor of Oklahoma for the full amount.

[dimsumx]

If games are porn, then I'm a pervert.

[Heretic Machine]

These sorts of bills cannot legally be passed and pushing them through should be a crime that carries a heavy fine. Someone should figure out exactly how much money this bill cost tax payers so far and bill the governor of Oklahoma for the full amount.

Personally, I've always thought that making such BS bills should be met with at least ten years of jail time. Hell, if I were in charge it'd be a capital offence.

[GrinR]

Well, shit, there goes all my fine plans for moving to FUCKING OKLAHOMA!?

I guess I'll just toss this into that vortex I call, "Things going on in Oklahoma that I care about."

[inmostlight]

Wow. My first interpretation of the headline was that video games were as bad as "porn in Oklahoma". And that's gotta be pretty bad, because just thinking about Oklahoma porn is giving me the jeeblies.

[Cool AN]

Anything to get a few votes I guess.

[Zurik]

Take that free speech! They shouldn't stop there though, let's setup bon fires and start burning these abbomination games. Then let's go after the people that make these games, they're evil too! How can you tell who designs these games? Will make them wear special armbands to show what they are.

[RandomViolence]

This'll get overturned, just like every other bill that has tried to introduce violence as obscenity.

[AversionFX]

Wow, another reason to never go to Oklahoma. Not like I had ever planned on it in the first place...

[Wonka]

This law is just more evidence of the ENORMOUS age gap that exists between those who make the laws and those of us who play games.

Give it ten or twenty years so that todays 30 somethings start taking up seats in our government, and this will change.

[grunter]

As a non US person and as a blanket comment to these types of stories, how does putting into law the stopping the sale of excessively violent and/or sexually explicit games to minors, make it an act against free speech or even necessarily a bad thing?

I understand that if a kid wants to get a “mature rated” game they will, but if they are not readily available off the shelf then chances are the majority of Joe Kid Average wont get them.

[Samo Umer]

I like porn.

I + porn = happy

[AniAko]

Some of them are worse than porn.

TELL ME ABOUT IT! Remember BMXXXX? Or the Guy game, or whatever it was called? Way worse than the worst porn I've ever scene.

[Goronmon]

As a non US person and as a blanket comment to these types of stories, how does putting into law the stopping the sale of excessively violent and/or sexually explicit games to minors, make it an act against free speech or even necessarily a bad thing?For one thing, many retailers would prolly stop selling said games (unless there are edited versions, ala edited CDs at Wal-Mart). It gives the impression that "violently obscene" games are "bad" and should be hidden from the general public the same way porn is. Those two things alone will hurt sales, thus reducing (or maybe even eliminating) the chance of developers even attempting to create games that might fit into the "defined" category.

[Oxonian]

What's interesting is that everyone (on both sides of the debate) ignores the first part of the definition: the game must "lack[] serious literary, scientific, medical, artistic or political value." The legislators did not pick this language out of thin air: it's taken from Supreme Court decisions describing threshold questions in the regulation of speech. Anything which possesses any serious value as an expressive work is not affected by the statute.

This is a common trick of drafting statutes in realms with constitutional pitfalls. Basically, the legislature tries to draft the statute so that it exactly follows the contours of the Constitution. If something is protected by the First Amendment, then definitionally, the statute doesn't affect it. If something isn't protected (because it lacks this "serious value"), then the statute can't be violating the Constitution.

Think, though: how many games lack any serious value as a literary or artistic work? The question isn't whether the story or art are aesthetically good, but whether there is serious effort at expression in the game. I'd suggest that very, very few games -- even brutally violent games -- would meet such a definition. The question is, how badly do you want to protect the games that make the first Doom game look like "Crime and Punishment"?