As with any election cycle, the topic of censorship and first amendment rights are going to creep up. Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear an argument out of California concerning violent video games as perhaps pornographic, and the call for laws to ensure minors can not get a hold of them. This is important for a number of reasons:
1) This is the first case of its kind regarding video games to reach the Supreme Court, and
2) As always, all facets of media and entertainment would be considerably affected by the outcome, if it goes against the games industry.
While video game developers make violent games, of this there is no doubt, but arguably do have a clear rating system, it is safe to say that parents and retailers alike have not exactly been policing perhaps as they should ( or should they have at all?). This case makes me think back to the comics obscenity cases of the black list era in America, when horror comics publisher EC was put under the microscope for selling questionable content ( I suggest reading David Hajdu's book The Ten-Cent Plague for some really good historical insight ) and thus corrupting innocent America.
Video games are now a fixture of American pop culture life. As a tool for media, game consoles and games have the power to reach and connect anywhere and anyone in the world. What are some of your thoughts about this case and its impending impact? Here is a link to another article for some more information on the case http://kotaku.com/5678354/all-you-need-to-know-about-this-weeks-violent-video-game-case-in-the-us-supreme-court
All violence is pornographic if it is viewed or experienced in a sense of pleasure, as most of the time it is, in either form: cinematic, video games, comics...and I'm using "pleasure" here as a broad term, because, even if it is used as a means of sobering one to the drastic & tragic nature of violence, then it is being used for/as to produce a pleasurable effect (as in producing a desired non-violent response from viewing violence and violent acts). An artist can obviously make violence more sensational in interp, more sensual (pleasure again), through techniques of a given medium-- that being said, I am against forms of censorship in most cases involving the arts. The ESRB exists for a reason and if anything, parents need to be more educated about the system itself; I don't mean to place the onus on all parents, but ultimately, it does rely on an educated parental populus to monitor exposure.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the onus cannot be put solely on parents, as vendors need to be held accountable for actions such as sales to minors. You raise an interesting point about that "violence is pornographic if it is viewed or experienced in a sense of pleasure". That seems to be the real sticking point for most, where did that idea originate?
ReplyDelete