regarding GTA IV and the morality patrol

With GTA IV coming out tomorrow, the usual gang of idiots are up in arms about how this game will lead to the end of civilization as we know it, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria, etc. As I said in my PAX keynote, this sort of moralistic chest-thumping makes me a little stabby:

Whenever I hear [Hillary Clinton, Jack Thompson, etc.] pontificate about how dangerous and antisocial and devoid of redeeming qualities video games are, I get a little stabby, because these games we love to play are much, much more than the simplistic bloodbaths Mass Media likes to portray them as during May sweeps.

Just as the multiplayer games are social activities, so are the single-player games narrative works of art, and they should be treated that way.

The hysteria surrounding the release of GTA IV has officially crossed into the realm of the absurd as moralizing groups of busybodies lead (shockingly) by Fox News successfully forced the transit authorities in Chicago to pull GTA IV ads from their buses. In Miami, professional attention whore Jack Thompson forced the Miami-Dade transit authority to yank GTA IV ads from bus shelters.

Can I just take a moment and point out how insane this is? This type of hysterical overreaction to a video game is completely out of proportion to any alleged harm it could inflict on anyone, but is accepted because it is done, as it always is, in the name of protecting The Children.

Yeah, it's always about protecting The Children, which leads me to wonder where The Parents are, and if these people are so serious about making the world better for The Children, why they don't invest the same amount of energy and resources into securing quality healthcare and world-class education for them as they spend wringing their hands over video games that aren't even supposed to be played by The Children in the first place.

As numerous others have pointed out, there was nothing offensive or suggestive in the ads that were pulled, but the spineless cowards responsible for running them instantly caved to the slightest pressure from the self-appointed morality patrol. I wonder how much revenue these cities lost because of this? GTA IV is rated M, the equivalent of R, so does that mean that all these cities will start removing advertising for movies that aren't appropriate for children? What about advertising for fast food and junk food and alcohol? Surely those are all things which could cause harm to children, right? If they don't instantly remove all the advertising from city buses that may offend anyone, what will we tell The Children?!

Surely, I'm not the only guy in the room who sees how absurd this whole thing is, right? Please tell me that I'm not, and I'll stop calling you Shirley.

I've said that this behavior can be equated to the Satanic Panic of the 80s. Leslie Benzies, the president of Rockstar North, took it even further back and said that all this hysteria is just like the Elvis Panic of the 50s:

[GTA IV critics are] the same kind of people who complained about Elvis… There is a big fear factor here. It’s [like] the coming of the railways, it’s Elvis shaking his hips. It’s cars going over 25 miles per hour and making people explode.

We’ve had such a beating over the past three years, by the US government, the British government, the Daily Mail. ‘You kill prostitutes’ – that’s usually the objection. I ask if they’ve ever played the game. Invariably they haven’t.

In my PAX Keynote, I said:

Speaking of parents and children and video games and opportunistic, pandering politicians: it’s none of their fucking business what I choose to play with my kids, and I wish they’d stop trying to tell me – and everyone else by extension – what my kids can and can’t play. I didn’t let my kids play violent or graphic games when they were too young to understand what the game was about because I’m a good parent who is involved in his kids’ lives, not because some idiot politician tried to score easy political points with the authoritarian 20 percenters who think censorship is totally awesome.

Let me point you to a great bit of satire, Celebrating 30 years of video games killing children. It starts with Space Invaders ("This will clearly make children think they can get another life after they die, thereby causing kids to start killing themselves in droves thinking that they can instantly come back to life!") and ends with GTA IV:

Studies now show that the average video game player is not a child at all and that their average age is actually 34. Considering this alarming data -- along with our history of pandering for votes by portraying gamers as evil, psychopathic, nut jobs for more than a quarter of a century now -- we have determined the obvious course of action: To protect our political careers, it is imperative that we raise the voting age to 35!

That's what this usually comes down to: people who genuinely don't understand what's going on having their fears exploited by people with an authoritarian agenda, who really aren't as interested in protecting The Children as they are in expanding and strengthening their power. That offends me even more than the spineless cowards who are letting people like Jack Thompson set the agenda for the rest of us.

According to Richard Bartle, though, the age of pandering politicians attacking video games and video gamers to score points with those 20 percenters isn't just coming to an end, it's already over :

We've Won. Get Over It.
I'm talking to you, you self-righteous politicians and newspaper columnists, you relics who beat on computer games: you've already lost. Enjoy your carping while you can, because tomorrow you're gone.

[...]

Dwell on this, you smug, out-of-touch, proud-to-be-innumerate fossils: half the UK population thinks games are fun and cool, and you don't. Those born in 1990 get the vote this year.

[...]

This anxiety you sense, this fear of what you don't comprehend: hey, it's OK. Parents who didn't play computer games do feel alienated, do feel isolated from their children; they do feel frightened, and naturally so, because they can't keep their children safe if they don't understand what they're keeping them safe from.

GTA IV will be officially available in about 7 hours here in Los Angeles, but is just 4 terrifying hours away in New York. How will our nation survive this great terror? Will we be able to Keep Calm and Carry On?

Rockstar's Dan Houser:

The ‘controversy’ story gets a bit frustrating… if this was a movie, a book, or a TV show, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. We’re an easy enemy to divert everyone’s attention from the stuff that really matters.

There’s an argument that video games have caused this massive upsurge in youth violence–they haven’t, it’s actually gone down. So it’s got nothing to do with the content; it’s to do with the medium.

So the self-proclaimed morality police can just calm down. Relax. The Children are going to be just fine, no thanks to them . . .  especially the ones whose parents have responsibly taken an active role in their lives.

Comments

[Joe]

While chilling on my break at the local coffee house, I came across this in the business section of the times. It's nice to see things like this getting out in the open in a good light.

[Gaerin]

Ok, when did you start calling me Shirley?

[Henrik Bennetter]

Aw for crissake! I'm 37 and I'm not even sure I'm old enough to play this game! I sure as heck would never allow my kid to play until I deem him "worthy". Or at least responsible enough. It's the same story as when "parents" complain about things their kids have seen on TV. The real problem is "parents" that use the TV as a babysitter without having the faintest idea what's on. If people only invested time and love in their kids we would never have any problems.

Anyway, speaking of GTA, check out the latest comic from Backward compatible.
http://www.crispygamer.com/comics/backward/

"It's full of Tony Starks."

[pcyopick]

Here's an example of how video games actually HELPS my family.

I'm a widowed dad of three great kids, Brendan 8, and twin girls, Jessica and Ciara, that are 4. Since my wife passed away in October of 2006, everyone in the family has been grieving for their loss in different ways. The children were far too young to go to their mother's funeral, and they don't always understand what they are feeling.

My son loves helping me with RPGs, and since we just finished Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey was a natural. In the game, two children, Mack and Cooke, have their mother die. I didn't really know what to expect from my son, but he told his sisters about it, and we all started watching the game as a family.

We saw the funeral, and the children participating. My kids saw other kids their age dealing with the same thing they are going through, and a remarkable thing happened. We all started opening up our feelings to each other, and started talking as a family. Of course, they had lots of questions, some, like about their mother's funeral, I could answer, while others, like where is mommy now, I could only give suggestions. My son has a councillor at school to help him deal with mommy's death, and she called me this week to find out what made Brendan progress so quickly.

I strongly believe that I as a parent should decide what video games, movies, television etc. my children should see. We have all three gaming consoles, and my children haven't turned into budding young serial killers, just because they play Bomberman or Wii Mario cart. Nor do I believe they will be musicians, just because we enjoy ROCK STAR.

[westpilton]

I'm sure the people at Rockstar Games are thinking, "Shhhhhhhut up." Every time a transit authority is forced to remove ads, I bet it boosts their sales in that area by at least 10%.

[Ryan]

I agree with a lot of what you said, except for the part about "single-player narrative works of art."

I don't know about GTA4 (I'm not planning on buying/playing it), but GTA3 and Vice City did not have very compelling storylines. The free roaming open experience was the entire game. The storyline was boring and tacked on as an afterthought.

GTA3 and VC were "works of art" in the sense you could run around the big virtual world and do stuff, but the stated goals and objectives of the storyline were pretty much an afterthought, which destroyed a lot of the value of playing the game.

Maybe GTA4 changes this, but I doubt it. And any game where the fun comes not from the characters, story, and actions derived from those, but in randomly driving around doing... stuff? Nah, I'll pass.

[Jessika]

@CrisW Well, if you're talking about training kids for the military, notice the same Morality Police aren't going after the official Army of Two video game. Train them early!

@GobTheIllusionist It's not only Republicans though. One of the loudest opponents during the Hot Coffee episode, as mentioned by Wil, was Hillary Clinton. I posted about her not too long ago when she spoke out again against video games on the campaign trail.

Wil, as always, you do a righteous rant when you get stabby!

[dealer]

Excellent post Wil.

I stopped by Walmart on the way into work this morning to pick up my copy so I didn't have to go out at lunch or after work and let me tell you it was a nightmare. 13 year old boys, obviously trained on the latest murder simulator, had lured all of the employees into their cars, only to pull around back and gun them down like common prostitutes! The store was ablaze and the entire town was in full riot. Clearly everyone was amped up at 6:45AM from 6+ hours of video game casual sex, drugs, and rock and roll.

Ok not really, but with the way things are now, GTA should be pretty low on the "things we are worried about" list.

[Devster]

Education is the best weapon, so take action, folks. Write a preemptive letter to your local paper reminding them that all the next-gen consoles support parental controls - so parents can at least use them. 'Lift' the line from Dan Houser ("if this was a movie, a book, or a TV show, we wouldn’t be having this conversation."). Hit GamePolitics.com for other ammo. Buy "Grand Theft Childhood".

[FlyoverSteve]

Wil,

Let me first say that your points are spot on. This is the LAST thing that the government needs to be involved in. The ratings system is in place, so that a consumer who cares to be informed can read it and know what is supposedly in it.

To those of you in Australia and New Zealand, I don't see how you can blame the US ratings board for your governments requiring censored versions to be imported. That's not US policy, unless I'm missing something?

Now, to those of you blaming this on Conservatives, that's a bit short-sighted and opportunistic. Wil mentioned the Satanic Panic from the '80s. Who was that? Oh yeah. Tipper Gore. Both sides of the political isle have their personal axes to grind where The Children (TM) are concerned.

It all boils down to parents needing to step up and do their job - parent their children by applying their personal beliefs and standards and enforcing them in their own homes. If a parent abdicates that role and leaves their kids to their own devices, they will only have themselves to blame for whatever comes of that decision.

Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

Kahuna

[Becky..Absent Minded Housewife]

Yeah...but what does this have to do with Miley Cyrus wrapped in a sheet?

[GeekessDaisy]

As a mother of 3 boys I couldn't agree more with what you, and most everyone else, has said.

It's up to me to decide what is ok for my children, not the gov't.

[ccpetersen]

So, like... there's an incredible amount of murder and mayhem in the Bible. Yes, that selfsame book that most of these thumpers who are yelling about murder and mayhem in video games read and hold up as their "code" of behavior.

And, there are adherents to just about any religion that you can name (with a few notable exceptions) that abuse their religion and use it foist... ah... murder and mayhem off on people who don't believe JUST like THEM.

(Note: I'm not saying ALL religionists are like this, so don't go there with me... just. don't.)

And, when someone points out this incredibly sick use of violence in the Bible and by fanatic adherents to the fist-pounders getting their lace panties in a knot over GTA or other games, what do you hear?

*crickets*

So, take all this hypocritical vomit for what it is. And, if you're a parent who thinks that it's best that your child is older before they can play a game that is legal for YOU as an adult to play -- more power to you. The system works as it's supposed to.

But, this pissy-pants blathering from the fear and loathing brigade does NOT do much except expose them for what they are... whiners and lamers.

[ccpetersen]

NB: saying that it's good to NOT have the gubmint involved in deciding these things isn't the issue. It's the fanatics who are infesting government with their lunatic ideas who are driving this fear and loathing. It's not that "big government" is doing this -- it's Big Nosies who are using government to shove their views down everybody else's throats.

[namedpipe]

I disagree with some of this. This game should be rated Adult, no purchase buy anyone under 17 should be allowed. There is a place in the world for adult content, but ads on busses is a little much. This is a terribly misogynistic series, and while it shouldn't be outlawed I find no sympathy for those who try and defend it.

[Toby O]

I was never attracted to any of the GTA series, but would like to address the philosophical argument.

Should government have any say, at the local, state, or federal level what ads are displayed? In the case of Aus and NZ even edit the version that is sold? Doing so does not preclude parents from protecting (or exposing) their children, but it is, I think, a light fizz of social conscience attempting to help the children who haven't got protective parents, however ineffective it is against the real problem.

[Paul William Tenny]

Keith Boesky (via DHD) had some great comments on this last Thursday. Just skip past Nikki's crap and read the quoted stuff, it's well worth your time.

"Just to place some perspective on the market, I pulled some information from The Entertainment Software Association and the list of the top selling games from Next Gen. According to The ESA, 85% of the games sold in 2007 were 'E', 'E10' or 'T'. This equates to the 'G', 'PG' and 'PG-13' ratings in the film industry. (The rating system is administered by a self imposed oversight board called the Entertainment Software Review Board.) I went through the top selling games to see what people were buying ratings-wise. The three “M” rated games accounted for roughly 23% of the slightly less than 90 million units in sales represented by this list. Contrary to popular belief, there is no Hostel in there and no Debbie Does Dallas. In fact I challenge anyone to find a single naked boob. More significantly, I challenge anyone to find a single scene involving gratuitous violence.

[Stephen G]

I think most parents are going to consider what their kids should or shouldn't play -- I know I do, and reading others' comments on here reinforces those perceptions. It's a shame those aren't the cases you'll hear about, though. "Parents Don't Let Child Play GTA4" isn't a headline you'll see outside the Onion. And reporting isn't going to take into account that different kids will be ready for more mature games, books, and other entertainment at different ages.

All of this is what drove me to film my four year old reviewing GTA4.

[ecpyrosis]

I agree that video games are an art form and should be considered as such for purposes of deciding what's appropriate or not, and free speech covers the rest, so Rockstar can do what they like. But that in no way mediates the simple truth that the main interaction with women in these games are as "ho's" and that beating them to get your money back has always been an acceptable part of the series. In any great work of art I would still find that objectionable if it was put out there without any commentary on how terrible it is.

Slightly o.t., though related - have you seen this? http://www.sadlyno.com/archives/9360.html wow. Just...wow. Reading SF and playing video games might not fry your brains, but listening to some of the people who create them might. And Niven! Wtf?

[dake]

Personally, I hope Rockstar sues these transit authorities for the total amount they paid for the ads... The transit authorities forfeited their contracts (and thus, the money received thereby) the second they pulled the ads before the agreed upon endpoint.
Also, frankly, if I were them, I would sue for slander, libel, and defamation, as the pulling of the ads could be construed as a government entity (transit authorities ARE considered public agencies) making a statement( or judgement) about the relative merits of the game, which I'm pretty sure is both not allowed and actionable.

So I think Rockstar should just put its legal dept to work... I would bet that they can either get a hefty payment, or a quick restoration of the ads if they work on it.

[Grev]

I actually equate this to who is generally thought to partake in the activity over here. There's a reason there was a Comics Code Authority in the 50's. There's a reason why soft drinks have a cap on caffeine content, while coffee and Red Bull don't. There's a reason why it took forever for there to be a primetime cartoon that actually uses dirty words as often as a live-action show in the same time slot. Because comics, soft drinks, and cartoons are lumped into the "for kids" portion of most people's brains...and it seems they're trying to drive video games into that place, too.

[Celtic Mama]

A woman was just on our local news in Philly talking about "the level of violence" in this game sending the wrong message. She couldn't say what "the message" was. Killing people for points was obscene to her. Okay, then, why no outcry to ban Call of Duty, Splinter Cell, or ANY first person shooter? Why this game?

She says kids can walk into a game store and just play it. That's such a load of bullshit!!! I'm in Gamestop A LOT with my 2 sons buying games and trading games and we know you CAN'T walk in and play a rated M game. They give you the 3rd degree if an adult tries to buy a rated M game. They say parents and grandparents buy and it don't know. Well, anytime my kids ask for a game I do my parental duty and I investigate it. They wanted Bully and I had to check it out and ask people who had played it and I let them buy it. These "righteous" people piss me off!

[cmjsrevihc]

lol, wandrew, it is totally like Mrs.Lovejoy's outcry.
It's Bully all over again. Three months ago, the sme people were all over Bully, and obviously none of the people criticizing the game had played it. I enjoy Bully as a fun adventure with missions, and you can choose to NOT be a bully in the game. No one complains about a Harry Potter game, where you go to classes and once in awhile have to fight Malfoy. And why. Because it's fighting jerks with wands, not real word fists? Oh, but wait, then there are those people who complain it's black magic and Satanic. I guess I can't win ;)

[neilm]

Thought this perspective might be of interest:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2008/04/gta_the_outrage_fades.html

[kendiara]

My brain has been running "Blame Canada" on a continuous loop all day today in preparation for the news stories about GTA4. The game stores here have to try and be the gestapo because invariably some parent is going to blame them when they walk in on the "Warm Coffee" achievement...

I'm just looking for Wil...