Gamers Gain Political Voice 181
GameDailyBiz has a rundown on the just-announced Videogame Voters Network. The network has been established by the ESA with the intent of organizing gamers into a political force. Will Wright: "Computer and video games represent one of the most important new media developments of this generation. Unlike many other forms of entertainment they offer players the opportunity to explore, be creative, learn through interaction and express themselves to others. It is vitally important that we protect and nurture this new art form so that it can reach its full potential. Like most new forms of artistic expression that have come before (music, novels, movies), the primary critics of video games are the people that do not play them."
OMG!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
This won't make a difference (Score:4, Insightful)
This sounds like a good idea from the perspective of trying to protect the gamer's "rights" but in the end it will do nothing for the average gamer and everything for those who seek to control gamers. Lobbying groups and voting groups only have power as a minority unless they have the money to get real attention from Congress. This group won't raise anywhere near what is required to move Congress to act.
When Congress does act, it will always act in ways to make itself powerful. Laws that seem to help the masses really only help a select few, with the masses losing more of their rights. I'm a firm believer that the interstate commerce clause was written to give power to Congress to just keep the states in line in not usurping the rights of the people. Nowadays, most people think the clause gives Congress the power to do anything it wants to do.
If you really believe we're supposed to live freely, you have to leave the gaming market to the competitive market -- developers aren't going to make games that people don't want to play. If even 5% of the entire nation decides to buy a game, that's stil 15 million people. Yet 15 million people is a minority in voting -- if 95% of the nation is against a particular game, why should 15 million people be shut out?
I'm also anti-voting [blogspot.com] as I feel voting is what causes the minority decision to be criminalized. The best voting is voting done with your dollars -- each and every action you make to buy something or to refuse to buy something creates the rules of the market. These are rules that change every day as the buying decisions change to reflect what consumers want.
The end result will be more rights lost as the voting group gives up a little bit in order to gain a little bit. The problem is that no one gains anything when it comes to Congress, except for the preferred few. What you really think you're gaining is something you had a right to all along, until you decided to give up some of those rights in exchange for protecting some other rights that never really needed protecting. In the long run, the slippery slope rule says you'll lose all the rights as those in power taste more and more of that power.
Re:OMG!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
Bad Idea. (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:You seem to forget... (Score:1, Insightful)
Voting with your dollars is using voluntary cooperation to make changes.
Voting at the polls is using coercion via force to make changes.
Only one is peaceful and freedom-loving, the other is called government.
Re:This won't make a difference (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhhhh... voting rights act of 64'? Americans with disabilities act? Freedom of information act?
Or, like, ALL of the amendments to the Constitution that guarantee personal liberty? I cite numbers 13, 14, 15 and 19 as personal favorites, but it applies to all of them. They ALL start in Congress, dude.
The one thing that I do agree with is that you should not vote. It's nothing personal, I'd rather everyone was a part of the process, but if you don't see the capacity of Congress to do good (despite its obvious and frequent shortcomings) it's probably best that you sit this out and leave it to those of us who want to keep expanding the sphere of personal liberty, through, well, proven methods.
(shrug)
Re:You seem to forget... (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course, I suppose those without money have no right to express their interest in society. If they want to, they can just go get some money, using the free and equal access that all Americans have to education, employment, housing, and medicine. In, you know, the fantasy world where the colluding interests of the moneyed powerful can be countered by the spending habits of the earning class.
"Ivory Tower" gamers (Score:4, Insightful)
The primary critics of video games are the people that do not play them.
Yeah, and how many propenents of video games don't have kids? Exactly.
I know plenty of gamers who think GTA goes way over the top for something targeted at kids (ratings aside, they know their primary audience). They also think parents aren't educated enough, or are too fucking lazy, so we all end up suffering for the sake of the fuckup parents.
Gamers tend to become elitist snobs to anyone who brings up regulation of video games. That's the wrong way to affect change. Maybe this political party will smack some sense into more than a few people and realize some of these games are violence porn (How many opponents of videogame regulation would buy their kid a Hustler? Raise your hands high! Thought so.)
Re:Gamers or Developers.. (Score:3, Insightful)
The difference between comics and games history (Score:5, Insightful)
The Escapist recently had an article on this here: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/35/17 [escapistmagazine.com].
Back then, comic book stores rolled over. Perhaps out of fear, perhaps out of patriotism - after all, their government leaders wouldn't do the wrong thing, right? It took comics decades to crawl out of that "kids only" hole - and now, the industry is dominated by Japanese manga which didn't have such restrictions (all jokes about tentacle hentai and schoolgirl panties aside).
This time, I think the game industry "gets it", and luckily, they're forming a group to handle it. If done right, it can be something like the recent Anti-Broadcast Flag that I participated in last year. Gamers, when certain bills are under debate, can be organized en masse to send personal phone calls, emails, and letters to their local congresspeople with the same message: we support protecting children, but not at the expense of giving up 1st Amendment freedoms. Laws saying selling Mature games to minors is fine - laws saying no mature games at all or no mature games allowed in stores is not.
This would be the most powerful way to combat some of these silly laws. Some of them are well meaning - people upset and confused at a new medium that is "untraditional", and all they see is the bad and not the good. Others, I believe, are using the issue to promote their own agenda or pocketbook (and I think we know who I'm talking about here). By making massive communication movements in the media and politics when pressure is needed, politicians will have to really think about what they're doing, and if it's worth the political effort when there are other more important issues to deal with. (Such as, I don't know, hunger, homelessness, medical coverage, retirement issues, security, campaign finance reform - oh, wait, nevermind, the latter is a pipe dream.)
This organization has a lot of potential, and it's a group that I believe we should all support. It might not make a lot of difference in the short run - laws under consideration will go on. But we can either do what many in the comic book industry did - go down without a fight, or we can drag political leaders kicking and screaming into the modern age while exercising some discipline of our own and behaving like adults.
Of course, this is all just my opinion. I could be wrong. Either way, I've signed up, and I'm ready to pick up the phone and put in some dollars when needed.
Re:So now... (Score:5, Insightful)
"So now slapping on a bunch of colours onto something is art?" - painting
"So now saying a buncha words is art?" - poetry
"So now being able to form sentences for a few hundred pages is art?" - books
Re:You seem to forget... (Score:2, Insightful)
~ Wizardry Dragon
Re:Really though (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:You seem to forget... (Score:5, Insightful)
Congratulations on having a personal experience outside the norm, but not everyone is so fortunate...in fact, most are not. Claiming that education has nothing to do with income is like claiming that starvation has nothing to do with poverty...it sounds and feels good, but has nothing to do with actual data examining life earnings correlated with educational attainment.
"Employment "rights" have been slowly destroyed by the law, not made better. Minimum wage laws have made it very hard for the young, the uneducated and the minorities to find entry level work that teaches them responsible work ethics as well as a trade. "
Are you honestly trying to say that workers had more access to a safe work environment and non-discriminatory hiring practices in the era before the government enacted regulation enforcing such things? Where exactly was this happening?
"The Americans with Disability Act has made it much harder for the disabled to get jobs, and it has made it much harder on employers to even interview someone with a disability."
Ah yes, I recall that prior to its passage, employers were falling over themselves to hire former mental health patients, the wheelchair-bound, and deaf folks until the nasty government made them stop. Oh wait; actually, the complete opposite happened.
"Business licensing and regulations have made it difficult for the common man to start a business -- just trying opening a restaurant or a small retail store today. In the past you could open either with very little income compared to what you need to pay today just to get an occupancy permit."
I'm sure that the prevailing economic conditions in the modern market, which require massive amounts of initial capital investment to set up a business that can keep costs low enough to price out smaller competitors, has nothing to do with this.
"Housing prices have been put out of reach of millions by government currency inflation (which is the sole cause of housing and consumer price increases in the past 20-30 years). "
This is either a hilarious interpretation of the data, or an unfounded assumption, seeing as homeownership has continued to rise steadily through the latter half of the 20th century. Perhaps the rise in housing costs is the result of a middle class demanding larger and better-equipped homes, thus insuring that there is less profit incentive to create low-income housing. In fact, this would jibe with the fact that the rising cost of new homes is largely a factor of building styles and rising material costs.
"On top of this, the housing and rental market is made more expensive by ridiculous property tax increases which make it near impossible for the poor, elderly and uneducated to live near opportunities to make good money."
Because if there's one thing keeping the poor, uneducated, and elderly from making money it's property taxes. Lack of access to education has nothing to do with it, so we should slash property taxes in order to defund education, because that'll really help all those poor and uneducated. Oh, and BTW, since when are the elderly supposed to be "making money?" I always thought that went against the concept of "retirement."
"Medicine was available to almost every poor person until the HMO Act of 1974, which created a trap for those without insurance. "
OK, now you're just talking out of your ass.
"Up until the early 70s doctors made housecalls and charged very little"
And provided nowhere near the level of healing ability as a modern doctor, and certainly did not provide this service to everyone.
"once insurance was nearly mandated by government (either as a required benefit or used to circumvent tax laws for employers), the price of medicine skyrocketed.
Re:Not a threat to gaming (Score:3, Insightful)
Remember that society is just "the way things are now", and that "slippery slope" is the same as "logical fallacy".
Having said that, and I apologise if I came across as offensive, I do support clearer labelling for games and educating parents about the danger a violent game presents to a young psyche. Banning, however, has never been the solution to any media-issues. Prevention is for crimes and crimes alone, where I define crime as a malicious act that affects a non-consenting person.
Nice... er... truism (Score:3, Insightful)
Aside from the we-all-know-what-they-mean, this is actually a bit ambiguous. If they mean critics of certain games, then gamers definitely count, so that can't be right. If they mean critics of games as a whole, then... wouldn't it go without saying that those who don't like it won't do it?
Re:"Ivory Tower" gamers (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes they do, and it isn't children.
http://www.theesa.com/facts/gamer_data.php [theesa.com]
"Who Purchases Computer and Video Games?
Ninety-five percent of people who make the actual purchase of computer games and 84% of people who make the actual purchase of video games are 18 years of age or older. The average age of the game buyer is 37 years old. "
These games are marketed towards adults, purchased by adults and played by adults.
The 'what about the children' is a red herring.
ESA??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:OMG!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
So... American politics as usual?