Court: Calif. can't ban violent video game sales

[Hop2089]

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday refused to let California regulate the sale or rental of violent video games to children, saying governments do not have the power to "restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed" despite complaints about graphic violence.

On a 7-2 vote, the high court upheld a federal appeals court decision to throw out the state's ban on the sale or rental of violent video games to minors. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Sacramento had ruled that the law violated minors' rights under the First Amendment, and the high court agreed.

"No doubt a state possesses legitimate power to protect children from harm," said Justice Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion. "But that does not include a free-floating power to restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed."

The California law would have prohibited the sale or rental of violent games to anyone under 18. Retailers who violated the act would have been fined up to $1,000 for each infraction.

More than 46 million American households have at least one video-game system, with the industry bringing in at least $18 billion in 2010.

Unlike depictions of "sexual conduct," Scalia said there is no tradition in the United States of restricting children's access to depictions of violence, pointing out the violence in the original depiction of many popular children's fairy tales like Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella and Snow White.

Hansel and Gretel kill their captor by baking her in an oven, Cinderella's evil stepsisters have their eyes pecked out by doves and the evil queen in Snow White is forced to wear red hot slippers and dance until she is dead, Scalia said.

"Certainly the books we give children to read — or read to them when they are younger — contain no shortage of gore," Scalia added.

But Justice Clarence Thomas, who dissented from the decision along with Justice Stephen Breyer, said the majority read something into the First Amendment that isn't there.

"The practices and beliefs of the founding generation establish that "the freedom of speech," as originally understood, does not include a right to speak to minors (or a right of minors to access speech) without going through the minors' parents or guardians," Thomas wrote.

Source

The Supreme Court has some common sense and we need them because states like California don't and end up spewing bullshit. Really violent video games don't cause violence, the environment that the player is around causes it.

 

[BlueStar]

Surely the topic title is misleading? They're not trying to ban violent games, just restrict their sale to minors. As an adult I'd rather there were age restrictions on games so when someone comes up with the argument "But think of the children" when trying to call for game content to be toned down I can just point to the age restriction, shrug and say "They're not allowed to play them anyway"

 

[Warrior522]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3ALwKeSEYs

This is a day of glorious celebration. One question; who voted against us?

 

[spinal_cord]

We have age restriction here for video games just as we do for movies. I've seen store staff get around it though, they just tell the kids to get their parents to hand over the money for them.

 

[dickfour]

Good, I don't trust the government to do or regulate anything. California is broke anyway. I suppose they would have had to hire a bunch of political cronies to make sure the law was implemented. Another one of those retire at fifty and collect full pension for life situations.

 

[Hanafuda]

This is a day of glorious celebration. One question; who voted against us?

It was a 7-2 vote ... in other words this was a strong win for those against the censorship. But as for who voted against ... it was a mixed bag, one conservative (Clarence Thomas) and one liberal (Stephen Breyer).

 

[Yumi]

Surely the topic title is misleading? They're not trying to ban violent games, just restrict their sale to minors. As an adult I'd rather there were age restrictions on games so when someone comes up with the argument "But think of the children" when trying to call for game content to be toned down I can just point to the age restriction, shrug and say "They're not allowed to play them anyway"

I thought every country had a restricted rule for selling to minors?

A 12yr old can't just walk into a game store and ask for Grand Theft Auto...or can they? >.>

 

[nunavat2010]

So parents should hack theirs kids wii's and get M-rated .iso's and show them how inappropriate it?

I like when video gaming industry spin first amendment or whatever to suit their profit gouging strategies. Oh, well in Canada electronic lock breaking (i.e. wii hacking) and downloading .iso's is not yet illegal at least for next two months.

Nunanvat2010 the Pirate!

 

[notmeanymore]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3ALwKeSEYs

This is a day of glorious celebration. One question; who voted against us?

But Justice Clarence Thomas, who dissented from the decision along with Justice Stephen Breyer, said the majority read something into the First Amendment that isn't there.[/p]

Reading Skill -1

 

[chrisrlink]

who saw this comming like really that ban made CA look like CN (China) im glad the supreme court did something right now if only the DCMA was ruled (or parts of it) unconstitutional

 

[shadowmanwkp]

Not really great news in my opinion.... There is an age restriction on certain video games for a reason. My 9-year old cousin was scared to death when he saw a friend playing call of duty black ops. Playing games that aren't for the target audience can lead to serious trauma's or even imitating. Do not get me wrong on this point though, in general video games can mean no harm, but it isn't a good idea to expose too young children to this, you wouldn't show an 8-year old kid the movie saw, would you?

 

[DeathStrudel]

Surely the topic title is misleading? They're not trying to ban violent games, just restrict their sale to minors. As an adult I'd rather there were age restrictions on games so when someone comes up with the argument "But think of the children" when trying to call for game content to be toned down I can just point to the age restriction, shrug and say "They're not allowed to play them anyway"

I thought every country had a restricted rule for selling to minors?

A 12yr old can't just walk into a game store and ask for Grand Theft Auto...or can they? >.>

Most stores have policies that they won't sell violent games to children unless their parent is with them. But this is the decision of the store, they're not required by law to have the policy



QUOTE(shadowmanwkp @ Jun 27 2011, 01:51 PM)

Not really great news in my opinion.... There is an age restriction on certain video games for a reason. My 9-year old cousin was scared to death when he saw a friend playing call of duty black ops. Playing games that aren't for the target audience can lead to serious trauma's or even imitating. Do not get me wrong on this point though, in general video games can mean no harm, but it isn't a good idea to expose too young children to this, you wouldn't show an 8-year old kid the movie saw, would you?

That's why parents should be paying attention to the games their children are playing. It should be the parents, not the government, that stops their children from playing games they are not old enough for

 

[Sterling]

The state of California was try to restrict the sale/rental every violent video game to minors. The rating system is still in place, and places like EB and GameStop all have a ID policy for people. It's a good thing the Supreme Court has a bit of sense with newer tech.

My bad, I'm an idiot with reading at times. Like Death Strudel says, it's up to the parents if they fail at parenting, or become the model parents. I know my parents wouldn't let me have many T rated games unless it had very little of certain content, or until I grew up.

 

[Zetta_x]

Not really great news in my opinion.... There is an age restriction on certain video games for a reason. My 9-year old cousin was scared to death when he saw a friend playing call of duty black ops. Playing games that aren't for the target audience can lead to serious trauma's or even imitating. Do not get me wrong on this point though, in general video games can mean no harm, but it isn't a good idea to expose too young children to this, you wouldn't show an 8-year old kid the movie saw, would you?

Your 9 year old cousin was scared to death because the first 9 years of his life you and other people hid him from such things. Does anyone else thing the cause of such events is from the parents trying to hard to 'protect' them? Jumping through flowery meadows, killing, and everything in between is a perfectly natural activity, quit trying to prevent exposure of it.

 

[nando]

how does pushing an evil witch into an oven compare to running over prostitutes?

 

[nando]

Not really great news in my opinion.... There is an age restriction on certain video games for a reason. My 9-year old cousin was scared to death when he saw a friend playing call of duty black ops. Playing games that aren't for the target audience can lead to serious trauma's or even imitating. Do not get me wrong on this point though, in general video games can mean no harm, but it isn't a good idea to expose too young children to this, you wouldn't show an 8-year old kid the movie saw, would you?

Your 9 year old cousin was scared to death because the first 9 years of his life you and other people hid him from such things. Does anyone else thing the cause of such events is from the parents trying to hard to 'protect' them? Jumping through flowery meadows, killing, and everything in between is a perfectly natural activity, quit trying to prevent exposure of it.

so is killing a woman's children and impregnating her to ensure the continuation of our genes.

and what's wrong with porn? why can't children buy it? i sure wanted to when i was younger.

 

[Nimbus]

...

It's about ****ing time our court system got some ****ing sense again.

Not that it will last long....

 

[bowlofspiders]

This is great news. Glad this wasn't passed.

 

[Wombo Combo]

Even made it on the steam stores front page

Screenshot of my steam:

 

[DSGamer64]

Banning violent games is retarded, however not properly monitoring and regulating game sales to minors is an issue that still exists.