April 8, 2008
Video games, as every GamePolitics reader knows, have become a political football.
It is often easier for elected officials to target the virtual mayhem in games than the real causes of violence in society such as crime, drugs, poverty, mental health issues and the easy availability of guns.
But in the three years in which GamePolitics has been tracking the nexus of politics and video games, we've noted some truly remarkable displays of political hypocrisy. The five listed below especially stand out. After you take a look, please feel free to vote for your choice of "biggest political hypocrite." The poll is located in the upper right sidebar.
Boston Mayor Thomas Menino (D): Mayor Menino led a 2006 movement to have ads for GTA: Vice City Stories removed from public transportation and got the local transit agency to commit to never again carrying an ad for an M-rated game. Now he is at the center of a legislative proposal that would equate violent games with pornography. In between attacks on video games, Menino hopes to lure game developers to set up shop in Boston. Because it's, you know, such a game-friendly city...
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R): The man who signed California's 2005 video game into law, and ordered the state to appeal a 2007 ruling by a U.S. District Court judge that the law was unconstitutional, is himself the star of many a violent movie. What's more, he appears in character in several violent games based on the Terminator films. Like the one pictured...
Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D): Gov. Sebelius threw her support behind an unsuccessful 2006 attempt to legislate video games. Earlier this year it was revealed that Gov. Sebelius' son John created a Grand Theft Auto-like board game called Don't Drop the Soap and marketed it from the taxpayer-funded Governor's residence.
New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D): During his 2006 election campaign Spitzer railed against video game content, saying, "Nothing under New York State law prohibits a fourteen-year old from walking into a video store and buying… a game like ‘Grand Theft Auto,’ which rewards a player for stealing cars and beating people up. Children can even simulate having sex with a prostitute…" As everyone now knows, it was the "sex with a prostitute" part that brought Spitzer himself down in 2008. He shoulda played GTA instead...
British Labour MP Keith Vaz: Vaz got into the video game violence debate in 2004 when a 14-year-old constituent, Stefan Pakeerah, was brutally murdered. Vaz alleged that the controversial Rockstar title Manhunt inspired the crime. A Scotland Yard investigation, however, established no such link. Vaz would go on to criticize Rockstar's Bully and Manhunt 2 games. While he has attacked the make-believe crime of video games, Vaz, as documented by the BBC, carries significant real-world ethical baggage.
It is often easier for elected officials to target the virtual mayhem in games than the real causes of violence in society such as crime, drugs, poverty, mental health issues and the easy availability of guns.
But in the three years in which GamePolitics has been tracking the nexus of politics and video games, we've noted some truly remarkable displays of political hypocrisy. The five listed below especially stand out. After you take a look, please feel free to vote for your choice of "biggest political hypocrite." The poll is located in the upper right sidebar.
Boston Mayor Thomas Menino (D): Mayor Menino led a 2006 movement to have ads for GTA: Vice City Stories removed from public transportation and got the local transit agency to commit to never again carrying an ad for an M-rated game. Now he is at the center of a legislative proposal that would equate violent games with pornography. In between attacks on video games, Menino hopes to lure game developers to set up shop in Boston. Because it's, you know, such a game-friendly city...California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R): The man who signed California's 2005 video game into law, and ordered the state to appeal a 2007 ruling by a U.S. District Court judge that the law was unconstitutional, is himself the star of many a violent movie. What's more, he appears in character in several violent games based on the Terminator films. Like the one pictured...Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D): Gov. Sebelius threw her support behind an unsuccessful 2006 attempt to legislate video games. Earlier this year it was revealed that Gov. Sebelius' son John created a Grand Theft Auto-like board game called Don't Drop the Soap and marketed it from the taxpayer-funded Governor's residence.New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer (D): During his 2006 election campaign Spitzer railed against video game content, saying, "Nothing under New York State law prohibits a fourteen-year old from walking into a video store and buying… a game like ‘Grand Theft Auto,’ which rewards a player for stealing cars and beating people up. Children can even simulate having sex with a prostitute…" As everyone now knows, it was the "sex with a prostitute" part that brought Spitzer himself down in 2008. He shoulda played GTA instead...British Labour MP Keith Vaz: Vaz got into the video game violence debate in 2004 when a 14-year-old constituent, Stefan Pakeerah, was brutally murdered. Vaz alleged that the controversial Rockstar title Manhunt inspired the crime. A Scotland Yard investigation, however, established no such link. Vaz would go on to criticize Rockstar's Bully and Manhunt 2 games. While he has attacked the make-believe crime of video games, Vaz, as documented by the BBC, carries significant real-world ethical baggage.
Comments
I voted for Arnie. He made his millions off of violent media (that I watched as a child and am no worse for wear), and now he's supporting restrcitions on it? Vote-pandering hypocrisy to a letter.
~~All Knowledge is Worth Having~~
Spitzer does have quite the impact over here....
I wonder if he is aware of this vote....
I went with Spitzer simply because he made himself Mr. Squeaky Clean even though he was a dirty boy.
Followed by Ahhhhrnold.
I went with Keith Vaz -- the others could be explained away as being simply misinformed on gaming issues, but Vaz is the one who's deliberately ignoring the counter-evidence to his number one issue.
Fangamer
Same with the Terminator one, but at least T2000 bears a strong likeness to Arnie.
~~All Knowledge is Worth Having~~
I didn't say that sort of thing would be easy. But sometimes if you want to make a stand for what's right, you have to make sacrifices.
It's like all of those "Made In America" stickers on products. The products themselves are made in Mexico, but the "Made In America" sticker was actually made in America. The sticker isn't saying that the product was made here--it's saying where the sticker was made. You have to think about it reeeeaaaally carefully, in order to get past the bull. And after thinking about it, Spizter is off the hook.
Arnie, though, got to where he is by exterminating people in movies. His image is used in a couple games, and I'm sure he's getting royalty checks from it all. And now he's like, "Children! Get to da choppa!"
So, Arnie wins.
Kansas's Gov.: Funny, but it would have been a bigger problem had SHE made the game herself.
NY's Gov.: More of a problem along the lines of his complaints about prostitution. He was an adult and so was she.
Vazzy: A combo of John Bruce and Boston's Mayor. A boob in general.
So that leaves Arnie.
While the argument about his involvment in the movie industry are extremely valid, especially the recent Conan issue, there is another issue that sets him apart.
The Oxnard school shooting.
We'd heard plenty from old child psychologist Leland Yee about the effects of violent video games on kids. And Arrnie had no problem parroting and supporting those views. He vehemently wants to "protect the children".
But where was Leland Yee, the Governor, and oh so many vocal folks after the school shooting at the Oxnard school because of a claim of homosexuality. And the shooter himself claims he was driven to it by other students who verbally and mentally abused him by making fun of the possibility that the kid who was shot may have had a thing for the shooter.
You can't blame video games for overwhelmingly promoting bigotry and hate. So, using the arugments by so many "experts", we have to assume SOMETHING drove this kid to kill the other kid.
So, what can we blame that would have promoted bigotry and hate, even peripherally (after all, media exposure tends to be peripheral and not so direct, but it gets blamed)? Video games? Books? Movies? TV? What's used to repeatedly teach kids to hate other people who are "inferior" or "immoral". Hmmm....
Uh...
Oh dear...
We can't blame that!
It's more important than the children!
I've got an idea! Let's pretend it didn't happen.
So, what DID we hear from Yee and/or Arnie?
:: chirp chirp chirp ::
Yeah. There's consistancy for ya.
:/
Mind you, I'm glad the event DIDN'T apparently become sensationalised. Nevertheless, it IS a sign of inconsistant behavior on so many individual's, organization's, and politician's part.
Nightwng2000
NW2K Software
Also his law wouldn't ban violent games just make them illegal to sell to kids and who knows maybe a contract forced him to be in those games.
(Just to be clear I live in California so...)
Firstly, theres something sickening about the game itself. Secondly, there's her defense of it. And finally, she used taxpayers money to promote it.
All in all, she shows about as much decency as a rattlesnake
Gonna think about this one before voting...
Arnie still gets royalties every time his likeness is used . . .
So he's still getting paid for those movies, and the Terminator video games.
~~All Knowledge is Worth Having~~
If I remember right, the whole Sebelius was overblown and just accusations of misused funds. And accusations don't make a conviction.
Arnold isn't necessarily a hypocrite just for having a game that he wishes to regulate. (though I bet he would not back a bill to regulate violent movies, and then that would qualify as hypocrisy in my book).
Same with Menino; not necessarily a hypocrite just because he's cool with game devs setting up shop in Masshole.
And Vaz, well, the accusations against him are petty, and even if all true, nothing to do with video games or any particular ethic that would make him a hypocrite.
Arnie was the freaking Terminator. He has starred in movies and his likeness has been used in games. (Not terrific games, I might add)
Sebelius is pretty damn outspoken against any and all video games, but when a board game comes along and is more violent than a good portion of said games, she's okay with it.
Spitzer goes without saying.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
Menino has no problem essentially calling people scumbags, of whom he wants revenue from. I have a very big fucking problem with that kind of shit.
The Governator has whimped out and forgotten his past. I've forgiven him for it.
Sebelius doesn't mind her son doing things she complains about others doing. Her and millions of other "parents", unfortunately. Fuck her and the rest.
Spitzer was once almost as vitriolic in his attacks on games as old Jacky Boy, then got caught with a whore and hasn't had a thing say ever since. At least he shut up.
Vaz is just a doofus, and since he's on the other side of the pond to me, I'm not particualraly concerned about his hypcorisy. Meh.
So my vote's for Menino. He can cram his "I hate you, give me money" tactic up his ass.
Of the three, Spitzer won. Based on the bio, he lied specifically about the content of the game concerning prostitutes (while you technically could, it's minimally significant) and seemed to have already fell victim to such prostitution. Menino could simply be trying to attract T-rated games, and Schwarzenegger seemed to want M-rated games away from young players (but both botching the attempts to do so.)
Honestly if I went to court, I'm hiring Tack, god he may be wrong on EVERYTHING, but my god would it be amusing, and man can he argue! Unles I'm on trial for a felony, then I'm hiring a DECENT lawyer.
Easy... why? he actually did something ILLEGAL in America.
The Governator, on the other hand, has actually been involved in the gaming industry, even if only directly and at that time made no equivocation about whether or not said games should be marketed to kids.
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger: Close but not really, he did not really do all in real life but then again nether did gamers and there games...
Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius: Don't drop the soap sound like fun the board game not in the prison shower...
British Labour MP Keith Vaz: He lied about what video games had is a big one but that is not bad as....
New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer: HYPOCRITE in every sense of the word. It's diffrent to do it in a video game but in real life. tsk tsk tsk. What's worse is that this bastard is married and have kids. At least in the game you are single....
...
wait... that's not him?
...
er....
The big faggot is Menino. I already hate him.
...wait is that her? Dang! All is forgiven my good sir.
Thats the prostitute he was caught with, i believe.