Anyone know of any action sites in UK to contact ? We really need someone with clout to be our voice. I'm just not aware of one.
If anyone knows, please pass it round.

thanks.

PS Browns from Labour Gov, though its hard to tell the difference anymore. Its more like the Tax Everyone Gov. I'm pretty sure this enquiry is merely an introduction - not to banning as that could impact business (taxes) and games being sold ( taxes ).
no, this is an intro to a new 'protect our children' tax. Kind of like the Green Tax which does nothing but stop the poorer of the country from being able to drive or fly - leaving the rich and gov officials nice empty roads and skies.
I'm thinking perhaps it will inflate the tax of 18+ games so that each game costs £100- (1/4 game, 3/4 Tax ), but its ok to tax this industry because we're protecting the children... no dont ask how... no no, just pay please......

'Stefan was a young, innocent boy with a promising future. This was snatched from him in a gruesome and horrific attack. I want to discuss with the Prime Minister what can be done to stop these games being sold.'

Oxymoronic statement of the year award, talk about the first half of the sentence containing no connection whatsoever to the second half.

Britain borrowing a page from Australia's book, eh? I guess things have come full circle now.

Keith Vaz = UK version of Jack Thompson. 'nuff said.

Vaz has a better pic for his GP articles than Thompson ever has.

Well, firstly, they could enforce the age ratings. Parents could find out what games their children are playing and check to see if there's an '18' in a bright red circle on the box.

Of course, it would be a good idea to actually enforce the ratings. I'm pretty certain it would be a lot easier for a 12 year old to buy a copy of GTA than Deathwish. Clearer labelling isn't going to help. just a perception that games can be every bit as violent as movies.

Wait, does that mean if I own a violent video game, I'm going to be murdered, too?

This comes shortly on the report of one of these guys mentioning rapeing games and this murder together, and people in his own government shot him down on both.

I really hope the boy's mother slaps the guy and tells him to stop bringing up the games her child was playing as they don't have any effect on what the murderer did.

What are these people trying to distract people from that they keep wiggling the "violent gamer" puppet?

"Stefan was a young, innocent boy with a promising future. This was snatched from him in a gruesome and horrific attack. I want to discuss with the Prime Minister what can be done to stop these games being sold."

WTF? Can you push any agenda now just by referring to a tragedy that has nothing to do with it?

This is an incredibly stupid thing. I have every sympathy for the parents of Stefan Pakeerah, but they have no expertise or qualifications to give an opinion in this matter. Even worse, their view of the matter has been skewed by the fact that their loss has been tainted by all of the alarmists and anti-game brigade (one who shall remain nameles went so far as to contact them to point out the alleged connection). Their emotional baggage stops them from being able to look at this issue objectively and I'm concerned that this meeting is going to push the British Prime Minister into taking some kind of ill-considered action on the matter. If you were a politician, would you risk appearing to ignore the advice and feelings of 2 citizens who have lost their son?

This is why juries are screened. Personal opinion and experience will colour your perspective and affect your decisions. There is no way that the video game industry can get fair treatment when things like this happen.

It will boil down to the sympathy vote. Listening to the proper research, taking into account the police findings that the game had nothing to do with the murder and that the motive was robbery in order to fund a drug habit, or even common sense will unfortunately not win out in the public eye against the tears of a bereaved parent.

Perhaps I'm being a little callous here, these people have suffered a terrible loss. Put it this way however. Imagine that you are a tall black man who has been falsely accused of rape. The jury for your trial contains 12 women who have been victims of rape in the past by tall black men. Are you going to get a fair trial?

I see nothing of drugs on that web site, did you link the right story?

So... When you play violent videogame you will get killed?

The mother claims that the murderer lent her child the game two days earlier, but that the murderer was the one who owned it. She also claims that the murderer like violent movies. I kind of wonder where this information comes from. Did she know he was lending an adult game to her son and did nothing about it? Or did someone tell her this game was found and lead her to conclude it was from the other kid (think of a JT interview with a murdered leading him to conclude that games made him do it). Scotland Yard said there was no connection between the violent game and the murder. Also, I don't see violent movies being pulled off the shelfs after this.

It's fairly obvious this is more a case of violent people liking violent things rather then vice versa. What this reminds me of is something from Dr. Who. People point out that wereever the Doctor goes, there is death and destruction. It's a valid observation, but draws entirely the wrong conclusion because you can't identify the relationship from a correlation.

Nothing to worry about, the ratings over here are already well enforced, and any movement against the independence of the BBFC or to enforce stricter controls will look like heavy handed censorship.

Brown has bigger issues to worry about anyway.

it'd be nice if they tackled an issue that would actually help.
like...
mental illness?

@ Zerodash

Average Politician: "Facts that i don't like?? Those don't exist. That's funny."

I find it hard to be sympathetic towards the boy's parents when:

1. they use his death to further both their's and the PM's cause,

&

2. the mother at least knew the kid had dealings with the older boy. If she knew he was dangerous, then I hope that teaches her a ****ing lesson.

The whole thing reeks of bad parenting, and the mother is just as guilty as LeBlanc.

"Stefan was a young, innocent boy with a promising future. This was snatched from him in a gruesome and horrific attack. I want to discuss with the Prime Minister what can be done to stop these games being sold."

This is the epitome of the ridiculousness of the whole video game violence "debate." Here we have the horrific murder of an innocent boy, with the whole violent video games debate seemingly tacked onto the end as if this Vaz guy is just using the murder as fodder for his platform.

It's like a schizophrenic conclusion. "Murder! Horror! Attack! Innocence snatched!

...Oh, and, uh, ban violent video games."

So are we pretty much agreed Vaz has no idea what he's talking about?

Two things:

One, I find it very hard to sympathise with Pakeerah's parents because they obviously weren't very good at their job. They let their son get involved with boys much older than him, play 18-rated videogames even though their son was 14 (I wonder if anyone's taken them to task for that yet? Maybe the point could be raised at the Commons) and overlook his situation to the point that he was actually killed because of how deep he was in with these drug dealers. They are hypocrites, because they supported violent games getting into the hands of underage children when they let their son play Manhunt.

Two, Pakeerah was not "a young, innocent boy with a promising future." He was up to his neck in drug dealing and other crimes at the age of just 14. God knows what he'd've been like once he'd hit 20. So no. I resent this whole episode being spun as an anti-videogame anecdote when really that's the last thing people should have been concentrating on.

....hmm....guess i just can't argue with stupid politicians and parents....their
kid was involved with crazy ass drug dealers, but this freakin' video game was to blame? if this were the sixties, it would be comics and elvis....if it were the eighties it would be heavy metal....people need to realize that bad people do bad things because life made them that way or because they chose to be that way. like i said before, it's a lack of faith in humanity and a lack of seeing the reality of things.

So, they've ruled out a connection to the game, found out that the VICTIM not the KILLER had a copy of the game, and also found out that the victim was entirely in the wrong...Yet they still wish to ban violent video games?

Am I the only one not getting this?

@Thomas

I understand that her mother wouldn't want to blame her or her son(Notice, however that's exactly where the blame should be) and that a scapegoat would be the only way out of that.

But why not blame drugs? Would it not make more sense to crack down on them rather than something completely harmless?

I suppose, however, for that she would have to admit defeat, so to speak. But putting millions of people's happiness and entertainment in jeopardy just because you can't accept the fact that your deceased son brought about his own death isn't just idiotic, it's selfish.

Regardless of what I have said, though, I don't see this going anywhere.

I would not paint Australia with the same brush as the UK. Sure we have had a few games banned for stupid reasons, Getting up for inciting graffiti and dark sector for its "dark tone". But it has never gotten as political as this. We are currently trying to get an 18 rating here, not trying to go backwards. At the moment the internet porn is copping the brunt of politicised christianity.
I feel for the UK and hope this doesn't effect their gaming.

They have no right to bitch when they let him play the game they're whining about now. Think about how many farm kids there are. I know kids who have killed animals on there farms (real animals) and they are some of the nicest kids around, who know that killing a person is a lot different than killing an animal for food, just like killing a game character is a lot different than killing a person.

@GamePolitics
I propose that we start staging peaceful public protests to combat this blatant idiocy. If ANONYMOUS, of all groups, can pull off a protest without a hitch, then SURELY us gamers can do it, too! What say you of this, GP?

Is it just me or does this have a similar feeling to the way that the pain of relatives of victims of the world trade centre incident was used at every opportunity to push the conservative agenda? I don't know much about gordon brown, is he a conservative? His name certainly sounds like a conservative's one.

@Edward
Don't forget how the OFLC refused classification to that crap leisure suit larry game, apparently it was too sexual for public consumption. Now I played that initial version (just don't ask how) and I've literally seen stronger content in a PG rated teen grossout comedy that would insult the intelligence of the average 14 year old who would be legally allowed to see it...

Holy crap, I've just had an epiphany. I finished assassins creed the other day, are assassins going to come for me???

It's all so stunningly obvious.

Mother let's 14 year old son play violent game.
Son dies horribly, killed by 17 year old friend.

GAMES KILL KIDS!!!

Although, correct me if I'm wrong, wasn't Manhunt 18+ in the UK? Neither of these kids should have been playing it...

Following the trend of making unfounded accusations with absolutely zero evidence, I'd say that the lacklustre parenting of these two children ultimately led to the younger's demise.

Well, it's about as likely as any other crackpot theory. I figure if everyone is doing it these days I may as well get in on the fun ; )

We do our best, but it's sad to watch, as Douglas Adams once put it, "in the UK 'knowing stuff' is considered some kind of freakish anti-social habit."

I live in London, the average price of a 3-Bedroom house is close to a quarter of a million pounds, in these situations, the only way to hope to afford a mortgage is for both parents to have full-time jobs. In these situations, there is no-one at home to instil a sense of family, or a sense of values into a child, he or she is lumped off to school, then left in front of the TV, there is precious little interaction between Parent and Child anymore. It is THAT which is the source of the problem for many families out there, not Video Games.

Brown, and Vaz, are both fully aware of that fact, but to solve it would mean doing something about the living costs in the UK, and the only thing Brown is intent on doing is raising them. Much easier to blame a spectre of 'Evil Videogames' than deal with a real problem.

The Irony here is that the Government is also concerned why all their highest qualified IT academics go and work abroad....

I still don't get the connection to vidija games... its not like the Manhunt DVD is a disguised nanomachine swarm that invaded Warren LeBlanc's neural pathways, mind controlling him to make him kill... or was it?

To all those wanting this stuff in the UK fought against. I'm trying to rally support (including willing bloggers) to help with my site, which is designed to do that.

Its been proven in court that the only person connected to the death of this teenager to have a copy of Manhunt was this teenager himself.

if anyone wants to help with the site, email me paul at stateofgameplay dot com.

I dont disagree with the idea of children not getting this game in their hands, its all about trying to make sure that as adults we dont get punished for irresponsible parenting.

So aside from the made-up video game connections, how is this situation different from any of the others that involve a murder in the family? The Prime Minister is making it look like all other deaths do not matter, or at least to the same degree. But the fact that it was the VICTIM that owned the game, this makes it a thousand times more retarded.

I think the critics' brains are short-circuited. Just the mention of a video game regardless of its context in the event makes them jump to the same conclusion.

Why do people still try to go after Videogames when the real murder they have no control over???

mmmmm

same old politics...

I think I finally figured out the link between violent games and murder.

Once you have let out all of your anger on the game, you have non left to defend yourself and you are wide open to murderers who have been unbalanced by parents that didn't let them vent their feelings with games...

After all, every time a kid gets killed it turns out that he owned video games...

Fact is, I don't think the government is going to do anything except pay lip service to this. The UK Games industry is worth well over £1 billion (according to ELSPA).

Gordon Brown must have been told that the victim was the one with the game, and been informed of the conclusions from the police. Other MPs have pointed out this so I imagine the PM's teams of advisors were aware of it.

They're scapegoating. They're looking for something to blame in order to seem less like the bad guy. How I see it, stop scapegoating, grow some balls and admit to your own bad parenting.