Banning Hunting
Manhunt 2, that is.
The government's board of pet censors have seen fit to deny us the dubious pleasures of the sequel to Manhunt. See here for details.
Which of course is a cause for celebration. Keith Vaz said so. And the parents of Stefan Pakeerah, murdered apparently because of the original game, are also relieved. So the banning of the game must be a good thing.
Except, actually, no, it really isn't.
After all, Keith Vaz is hardly the moral leader he might fancy himself to be. And the parents of Stefan Pakeerah may have suffered an appalling tragedy, but that doesn't mean that they have some awesome insight into the mind of their son's killer. The police might have a better idea of why their son died, and the BBC reports:
"Police said robbery was the motive behind the attack on Stefan in Stokes Wood Park on 26 February 2004 - and not the video game blamed by Stefan's parents."
As unpleasant as the game may be, there is no reason to ban it. It may inspire people to suddenly go on a violent rampage, but let's face it, the chances are, it won't. And if you are going to ban stuff because it may inspire violence, then you have one hell of a lot of stuff to ban. I mean, Saturday's Doctor Who ended with the Doctor and co surrounded by terrifying cannibals. Ban that. Eastenders this week featured a woman chained to a bed, about to undergo an unwanted C -section. Ban that. Mark Haddon's hugely enjoyable and highly acclaimed A Spot Of Bother features an aging gent trying to remove a lesion from his own body in the bath with a pair of scissors. Ban that. And that perennial addition to GCSE reading lists, Lord of the Flies, is basically about kids being shitty and violent to each other. Ban that.
The simple truth is there is no real link between violence in real life and fictional violence. And even when you can find the most tenuous of links between violence and fiction then you might be surprised by what apparently inspires violence. After all, it wasn't the likes of Driller Killer that allegedly inspired Jeffrey Dahmer to take a drill to the heads of his one night stands. It was that Sci-fi romp, Star Wars Episode IV: Return of the Jedi.
This is just another small, but still glaring, example of the nanny state. The government doesn't trust you to play a video game without turning into a dribbling, murderous sociopath. Which is further proof that we are governed by patronising wankers.
Rockstar games have six weeks to appeal this ruling. I hope they do so. And win.
Labels: Free Speech, Freedom, Random
posted by The Nameless Libertarian @ 8:26 am
5 Comments
5 Comments:
The examples you give of "stuff" that should be banned upon the criterion that they may inspire violence are not interactive. By their very nature, the videogames Manhunt and its sequel are. Furthermore, these two controversial games are experienced by players in the 'first person'. I wonder how this key difference affects the impact of such "fictional violence" on the consciousnesses of those who partake.
Well, I would argue that TV programmes are - to a limited extent - also interactive. They require someone to use both their listening and viewing skills. Sure, these are more passive skills and they may not require the viewer to be proactive or actually enable the viewer to change what happens on the screen. But it is also worth nothing that someone playing Manhunt or some other bag of crap violent video game is killing computer graphics, which at best only crudely represent human beings. TV programmes show realistic and easily identifiable human representations. So the Eastenders characters may be more easy to identify with than the Manhunt characters by showing clear, photographic representations of humans rather than the much less realistic computer graphic representations.
Also, a negative impact on the consciouness of an individual playing a computer game does not lead to related behaviours. Pakeerah's killer may have played Manhunt but the opinion of the investigating officers put the cause of the killing as robbery, not playing a computer game.
Ultimately there is a world of difference between shooting a computer graphic by pressing the "a" button on a game controller and going out with a weapon and killing a living, breathing human being. I have yet to see any evidence that suggest on screen violence leads to reali life violence. All bar the psychotic or schizophrenic can tell the difference between reality and fiction - and statistics prove those suffering from severe mental illness such as psychosis are much more likely to hurt themselves rather than someone else.
OK, "to a limited extent" you could also argue that books are interactive and, in fact, everything outside one's own mind. But that is the stuff of solipsists and their philosopher friends.
And while it's convenient and, for want of wrong, right, to maintain your position while the jury's out on this highly subjective topic, it might be worth considering that computer-based simulations, similar in nature* to first-person 'shootem-ups' and the like, are increasingly being used to help train people to fly aeroplanes, navigate ships and so on. These experiential tools are considered to be more effective than their more passive book or video/dvd counterparts, which I would suggest makes the question of their influence on the users' consciousness a valid one.
Who knows exactly by what process such experience is sublimated by an individual mind and what precisely that consists of, especially when emotional responses are involved.
*far more so than books, for example, the only main difference being the context in which they are used...
It was my understanding that a flight simulator places the would-be pilot in a replica of a plane cockpit, and then took them through a variety of real life, real time exercises. This is very different from setting up a normal person as some sort of gangster who only has to hit a button on a game controller in order to shoot someone. The simulators act as effective training and teaching tools because they make someone do exactly what they would have to do in real life in order to deal with a particular situation. Games such as Manhunt don't. If you were pressing the "R" button on a games controller in a life or death struggle in reality to reload your gun, then you wouldn't have long to live. Simulators replicate real life, these sort of games caricature it.
People have been trying for years to link fictional violence with real life crimes. Jamie Bulger was murdered because his killers watched Child's Play 3, right? Well, no. That was rejected by the police who investigated the case - one of whom commented that The Railway Children was more likely to have inspired the killing. Cho Seung-Hui was alledged to be inspired by the violent movie Oldboy - except investigators found no evidence he had ever seen the film. And Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were "inspired" to commit their crimes by Marilyn Manson - except, they hated that band's music.
I appreciate that there is a difference between a computer game that allows you to control some of the action and a film/song, but I have yet to see or hear any evidence that shows a causal link between video game violence and real life violence. Those who are disturbed or ill enough not to be able to tell the difference between an - albeit unpleasant - computer game and real life may just as easily be triggered into violent action (against themselves as well as others) by something far more innocent.
Oh, and this is not a "convenient" position to hold. I would be far happier if someone could prove a link between these sort of things and violence, because then we could have a more tangible and rational explanation for the awful things that some humans do to others. But until there is solid proof of a link, I think outright censorship is wrong and the adult public* in this country should have a right to be able to choose whether they buy this violent game or not**.
*Don't forget that there is a classification system in this country that should prevent this sort of game falling into the hands of younger people who may be more influenced by the violence in such games and films. Sure, these games and films might still find their way into the hands of the young in some households and some schools, but that is more of a problem with enforcing the system rather than the system itself.
**I, for one, wouldn't.
Also, think about why people enter a training simulator and why people play a computer/video game. Those entering a simulator will be going in to learn. Those playing a computer game will be doing so for very different reasons, be it entertainment, peer pressure or, yes, perhaps even titillation.
As you probably know I'm no expert in this, but I would reckon that the differing motives people have will mean different parts of their brain are exercised, so the mediums will inspire and affect different parts of the mind and the individual's psychology.
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