Where Politics And Video Games Collide

I suppose the thing I will say about the UK system is that it does not discriminate any particular form of media and are actually pretty forgiving when compared to the ESRB with some forms of content, they realise that it's not difficult for children to figure out that women have breasts, for example, whereas I think it's only a matter of time before the US starts promoting anti-breastfeeding campaigns because it means exposing children to sexually related images which could turn them into sex-offenders, after all, nearly 70% of all sex offenders were breast-fed, so it must be true... (That would be funny, were it not an exact replica of how a censors mind works).

Should it be a legal requirement? Well, I think as long as it is applied across the board, it is not discriminating, it should, in theory, mean that the same bar is set across the board, and, if the Byron review does recommend balancing out all the media systems, would actually mean we could do away with stupid comments like 'possibility of harm' that the BBFC used regarding Manhunt 2, because they wouldn't be able to make the claim that some versions would inevitably fall into kids hands nearly so easily.

What is really needed in the UK is to get out of the grey, voluntary or not, the system needs to work, and at the moment, it isn't properly, for a great deal of reasons, street trading, Internet downloads and lack of monitoring are among the many culprits.

Some of those fall firmly on the parents shoulders, a parent still has to take responsibility for their child, raising awareness of that is probably enough of a job, so it won't be a short haul, but to be honest, the government want to fiddle around with the BBFC as little as possible, and equally, the BBFC tend to resist government interference quite emphatically, regardless of rumour.

I suppose in summary, whether the system is a law-based or an industry-fine based one, it has to work and be effective whilst also being unbiased, otherwise it is pointless, and it's that which needs to be focussed on in the UK.