Japanese ESRB Bans Rape Depiction In Games 662
eldavojohn writes "The Ethics Organization of Computer Software (EOCS), now 233 companies strong, and met in Tokyo yesterday to ban a controversial title from Japan known as RapeLay, an eroge game (something much more adult than the more popular dating simulators). It's gotten a lot of press as reviewers have noted at one point the player must force sex on a 12-year-old. More importantly, the large ($353 million annually) adult game industry in Japan will now need to stay away from rape in their games if they wish to remain a member of EOCS. RapeLay seems to be available on Amazon's UK and JP sites, sparking outrage and causing a former US Ambassador to Japan to write an editorial criticizing Japan, saying, 'Only Japan allows people to possess these hideous images without penalty. Six of the G-7 countries have found ways to protect the innocent from being prosecuted for possession of child pornography. Is it not time for Japan to find a way to punish the guilty?' Singapore's Straits Times has more details, pointing out that it's still not illegal to possess these materials in Japan. We discussed this and other games last month in an editorial."
I know what's gonna happen now (Score:5, Insightful)
Damn, the torrenting of this game is gonna skyrocket after the article. Teh forbidden fruit in action.
Just the beginning? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:2, Insightful)
Mod parent up!
Which would you pick, Slashdot - a (creepy) guy getting his rocks off to a simulation, or the real thing? Ban the simulation out of existence, then tell me what's left.
"Goodcall" "goodidea" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I am hopelessly conflicted (Score:5, Insightful)
wellbeing of fictional 12-year-old? who cares!
rape game is disturbing, but hardly hurting anyone.
Guilty of what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Raping a character in a video game is no more real than killing said character. At what point will we become liable for murder when playing a shooter? Put simply:
There's no crime here, asshole. The only thing anyone is guilty of here, is pandering.
Morals and all that jazz (Score:4, Insightful)
On a different note though, one of my professors had a very good reason to ban violent pornography, without going for the correlation link (which he bought into anyways. Professors are human after all). We had just finished reading J.S. Mills' On LIberty, which more or less states that "The only reason to abridge a person's personal freedom is harm to others. Moral disgust is not an adequate reason to stop someone, unless if they are going to harm someone else directly or indirectly (Say, if by being an alcoholic they are incapable of parental duties, etc)." His point was, if this pornographic material spreads the ideology that women are sexual objects existing only for men's pleasure, which causes women to self-censor themselves and their ideas due to peer pressure, fear, or general brain washing, then it must be banned.
But, politicians aren't arguing this, because they don't actually care about freedom, they care about making it look like they're doing something in order to ensure re-election. Because 90% of "concerned" parents in the suburbs are going to say "Rape is bad, rape games depict rape, so it must enforce rape, and this politician banning rape games must be fighting rape! Vote for him!" And we just helped him too, by the way.
Re:"Goodcall" "goodidea" (Score:4, Insightful)
Wow, you're the second guy today who has presented the "everyone on Slashdot" fallacy. What's hard to understand here? There's a wide cross section of people on Slashdot. We all hold different opinions. Those of us who hold similar opinions often hold them to differing degrees. That's what makes it so interesting.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Morals and all that jazz (Score:5, Insightful)
His point was, if this pornographic material spreads the ideology that women are sexual objects existing only for men's pleasure, which causes women to self-censor themselves and their ideas due to peer pressure, fear, or general brain washing, then it must be banned.
Sorry, I missed that. Can you explain the argument more? Cause all I'm seeing here is the old "frame it the way I see it, then ban it" bullshit that you criticized earlier in your comment.
Example: If a carnivore diet spreads the ideology that animals exist only for human consumption, which causes vegetarians to self-censor themselves and their ideas due to peer pressure, fear, or general brain washing, then it must be banned.
Example: If football spreads the ideology that physical violence is something men should be willing to tolerate and causes them to self-censor their outrage and appeal for legislative relief due to peer pressure, fear, or general brain washing, then it must be banned.
The argument is that if any activity is effective at spreading some perceived negative idea then it should be banned. So give me the activity you want banned and I'll frame you an negative idea you can use to attack it.
cartoons are NOT "child pornography" (Score:5, Insightful)
90% of video games involve depictions of violent crime, murder, war. Most people (with obvious exceptions, Jack Thompson), accept that they are FICTION.
Argue that these are disgusting, encourage degradation of women: don't say that they are in themselves criminal.
"Punish the guilty". Nice turn of phrase. Just declare something you don't like is criminal, assume anyone charged with looking at it is "guilty", and proceed directly to punishment.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:2, Insightful)
Because oh no, those poor imaginary cartoon characters need judicial protection!
Won't someone think of the imaginary children?
Those who have those urges towards children may feel prodded seeing the depicted acts to try them in the real world.
Yes, it's the same with murder and stuff, but those being legal doesn't mean we should make everything legal just because it's "imaginary".
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Morals and all that jazz (Score:5, Insightful)
Your examples point to a single idea (often capable of being practised alone) being put down. Example: The idea spreads that animals only exist for consumption, therefore vegetarians back down and self-censor themselves. The issue is, this is an ideological disagreement, not a discrimination issue. The idea is spreading contrary Vegetarian beliefs not existence and right/capability to express an opinion. Should the meat eaters get violent in repressing vegetarians, this is an issue entirely separate from whether or not to be carnivore/herbivore/omnivore.
The basic idea is, if you're spreading material that puts down a group of society specifically, not their ideas, but them, my right to say that under free speech is questionable at best. If I somehow begin spreading movies, using paid actors acting of their own free will, declaring the inferiority of "niggers," while not necessarily doing anything violent, most people would complain. However, should my movies/shows become super popular to the point where blacks begin to self-silence themselves because they are beginning to buy into the opinion that "those niggers" are incapable of intelligent thought, this would be extremely bad. Specifically, society is severely hurt when any major adult sector (male, female, black, white, asian, whatever) is silenced for any reason, self or otherwise.
Now, the important question when considering my professors point is, do women consider themselves to be less important in modern society due to the presence of violent pornography and these rape games? I honestly don't know. Sociology questions like this tend to be rather tricky. I would say, in the current atmosphere where most (non frat-boys) are ashamed to admit their usage of kinky/violent porn/videogames, no. If at any point it becomes normal for polite men in society to talk about their rape games, using lewd and aggressive terms towards the digital other gender, then we would begin to have an issue.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Depressing as this may sound, I'm inclined to suspect that such a game would succeed on this side of the pacific. Ditto just about any country. The only real reason you don't see such things is that the public outcry they would raise and the mob behaviour that would in turn be incited would burn them clean out of existence in no time flat.
"Demand for perverse behaviour" isn't a Japanese thing, it's a human one.
You might be wiser to ask why there is no such backlash in Japan, but then I could point out TFA as an example of backlash in action. Perhaps it simply took longer, or perhaps the threshold for such an outcry was set higher. Cultures vary, but the basic response when enough people are sufficiently outraged is universal.
Re:Thank God (Score:5, Insightful)
If it is ok to murder in games it should be OK to rape. Nothing wrong with it, and I have no reason to be anonymous!
This is something I've never understood. Why is it OK for a PG-13 type game to have the player mowing down hundreds of realistic-looking human enemies with an automatic rifle, but the moment there's any sexual content whatsoever the game is banned and there's a moral panic? Take the Hot Coffee GTA mod for example, the game is all about killing people and blowing shit up, and then there's an outcry over a scene where adults have consensual relations?
I'm not condoning actual rape in any form, but surely a simulation of such a thing running on someone's computer can't be worse than an equally detailed simulation of killing and then dismembering someone with a chainsaw? In extreme cases, it may even be a way for sexual misfits to satisfy their urges without harming actual, living people, letting them be functional members of society.
Re:Morals and all that jazz (Score:5, Insightful)
If I somehow begin spreading movies, using paid actors acting of their own free will, declaring the inferiority of "niggers," while not necessarily doing anything violent, most people would complain.
And rightfully so, but to ban the production of such films would be against the concept of freedom of speech. Ironically, self-censorship is exactly what has caused the withering away of such stereotyping.. yet your professor's argument is that self-censorship is something we should avoid, and do so at the expense of freedom of speech. Overcoming fear and peer pressure has always been a barrier to saying anything worth saying and without free speech protection we're just adding another barrier. The most effective measure to speech you don't like is not banning it, but speaking out against it.
Rape in Hentai?!! A striking and new developement! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Yes, makes sense (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmmm. Japan doesn't have a monopoly on perversity. American Idol, Australian Idol, Britain's Got Talent come to mind. Capitalising on humiliation and misery is arguably a form of rape, and I've only scratched the surface with what I know of those shows...
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Which would you pick, Slashdot - a (creepy) guy getting his rocks off to a simulation, or the real thing? Ban the simulation out of existence, then tell me what's left.
Do you have any evidence that less rape is committed as a result of the availability of rape simulation? Until such evidence is provided, this argument is on a par with the idea that rape games cause people to rape.
I'd go a step further and say both arguments are utter BS. They're both grounded in the same untested premise - that people are largely unable to tell fantasy from reality.
If a person is going to commit rape, offering them the alternative of a game that simulates it isn't going to stop them. This argument seems to boil down to the idea that the culprit can get what he wants from pixels, which is a bit like assuming that your average serial killer will be content with GTA.
Conversely, assuming that the game will make a creepy, but otherwise harmless man into a rapist, is equal crap. It assumes a level of mental malleability that adults generally don't have. People don't undergo radical changes in personality and ethics simply because of some piece of media they've taken to.
Humans are generally given far less credit than is due when it comes to their capacity to make their own decisions. If people were changed so drastically by what they consumed for entertainment, the world would be a far, far bleaker place.
That being said, I'd say "rape simulator" rates right up there with "torture for dummies" as something that really doesn't need to exist. On the other hand, I'm loath to suggest censorship in even such an extreme case - I'm of the opinion that the act of censorship is generally worse than the thing being censored. So in this case I'm torn...
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow (Score:2, Insightful)
I hope I'm not the only one honestly disturbed that rape games have customers. Funny, as I'm a big fan of GTA4.
Two issues come to mind:
1. The harm of rape simulation
While there's evidence [amazon.com] that violence and rape instincts live in ever man (and higher ape, for that matter), instinctively I believe there's difference between simulated rape and violent video games.
Violent video games are rather cathartic, and serve that need pretty well. Going around a fake city in a tank and blowing up every douchey car is just wholesome fun. But what does rape simulation appease? It's not sex, that's what porn is for.
2. Free speech
Normally I'm a blind attack-dog in favor of free speech. But here, no, I can't be. If free speech means anything more than "just let everyone talk," it has to have a purpose behind it -- such as letting different ideas being heard, or letting the truth be heard, then there has to be a some sorts of speech it encourages, and others it's agnostic to. I can't think of any case for free speech helped by defending a rape simulator.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:1, Insightful)
Indeed, but when most of us "kill" or "murder" said characters, we're playing games like TF2 or L4D. Games where you can have an arrow sticking through your head and keep on going, or your only worry is getting eaten by zombies. Not very realistic.
Now, lets say you knew someone in college, and he spent most of his day playing a single player game where you murder people. Lets say it has superior graphics to the current stuff - at least as good as Crysis.
The primary objective is to abduct and subdue people in different ways, take them to a hideout, and then murder them. Lets say you have options like... carving them up, strangling them, pulling them apart on a Rack, throwing acid on them, cutting off their limbs, flaying them alive, etc. etc., all while they writhe in agony and scream. Makes a pretty picture, doesn't it?
Don't you find it creepy that this guy plays it all day long? I really feel that some fantasies don't have to be fulfilled... we shouldn't go there, even if that sort of game will have no effect on most of us.
Re:Morals and all that jazz (Score:4, Insightful)
That's why I chose them. I wasn't trying to set up straw men that I could then push down, I was trying to show that it is possible to make perfectly good arguments for banning all speech and only be rejecting the suggestion of banning any speech can you maintain free speech.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:5, Insightful)
wow.. you really don't get it do you? The exact argument you just made for a "serial killer simulator" was made by Jack Thompson for his "cop killer simulator", the only difference is the audience. According to your logic there's something wrong with the people who watch Dexter.
It's not your cup of tea, great, good for you, go back to watching football and leave other people alone.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:1, Insightful)
Exactly right.
I think people start to complain about games when they consider them to be sadistic.
What you described is sadistic, and people would complain about it even without seeing how realistic the graphics are, just the same as they complain about depictions of rape. Rape is always sadistic.
It's still funny how these things are ok in movies though (ie. Saw).
Errant Legistation (Score:4, Insightful)
I think sexual assault is terrible, and it disgusts me that people want to play games that simulate such things.
But I disagree with this law. I think freedom of expression is a valuable personal liberty. The legal system should be concerned with protecting the welfare and safety of the citizens it governs, not guiding what kind of intellectual content can be distributed among adults.
On a more personal level, I find it ridiculous that rape simulation should be outlawed, but murder simulation is not. We as a society accept that murder is a worse crime than sexual assault. This is why murder charges have more severe punishment than rape.
The only argument that would make this kind of legislation rational would be if someone could establish that sexual assault in video games encourages acts of real world sexual assault. I'd be surprised if it were true. Most studies conclude that violence in movies and video games does not encourage real-world violence. I can't imagine any reason why rape would be so different than any other violent crime in this aspect.
Re:ban them both (Score:5, Insightful)
And what's the reason behind this, now? The ban on child porn is, rightfully so, assumed to protect the kids that are used in the material.
If we disconnect rape from the consumption of media, which is a good idea IMO, and there is no victim in drawn childporn... what reason remains to ban it?
No victim, no crime (Score:5, Insightful)
In order for something to be a crime, it must be demonstrated that it causes harm, suffering, or loss. There has to be a victim. Now, the victim could be argued to be society as a whole, but I've not seen any actual proof that rape games make people rape or violent games make people violent.
I have played the game mentioned in TFA out of curiosity. It was linked to on a forum I frequent. It wasn't disturbing to me at all because I took it for what it is: fiction. Fictional depictions of death don't disturb me either, and I think any reasonable person would consider death worse than rape.
Rape is terrible, so is murder. Those crimes are even more disturbing and tragic when they happen to children. But that's not these people are arguing against. Raping children (or anyone) is ALREADY illegal. The opponents of this game are not arguing against rape, they are arguing against free speech but are confusing the debate by painting the other side as being pro-rape. Stop confusing the issue and argue on the facts. You are talking about banning a form of expression. What is being expressed is a terrible thing, yes, but freedom of speech doesn't just protect things you find agreeable. Polite speech doesn't require protection.
Censorship is always worse than what is being censored.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:2, Insightful)
Japan has low rape rates compared to other countries.
If Japan's rape rate declined after the introduction of these games that could possibly be relevant, otherwise not.
Of course, that could just mean lots of rapes go unreported.
I suspect so, avoidance of stigma would be very important there, from the little I know of Japanese culture.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:2, Insightful)
Who are you to decide whos fantasy gets fulfilled in a video game and whos doesnt?
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:1, Insightful)
I really see nothing funny about the post, or the sentiment. We've been taught that a harsh word directed at a child can damage his self esteem, we've been taught that sexual and racial stereotypes damage children, we've been taught many things about rearing children. These games teach kids, what, exactly? Don't give me some silly bullshit about the games being targeted at adult audiences - anyone who tells me they didn't find Dad's or big brother's stash of porn, booze, tobacco, guns, or drugs before they reached age ten must be TERRIBLY retarded.
So, we have impressionable kids playing games that teach that you MUST rape little girls to succeed.
Fuck. Just fuck. I'm sorry people - I believe in free speech, I believe in libertarian values, but GTA is just about the bottom of the frigging gutter. Anything lower should NOT be sold as "entertainment".
I would MUCH RATHER my kids watched some stud banging a big tittied broad on a twenty x film, than have them learning that rape is acceptable. There have to be some kind of limits on the violence we are willing for our kids to see, hear, and experience, even if it IS just a stupid fucking game.
Of course, there are those who were raised as animals, and are raising their own broods as animals. Maybe this trash is fitting for those people, and their kids.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't find it any more creepy than someone who spends all day watching TV, or someone who spends all day playing GTA, or someone who spends all day posting on Slashdot.
I really feel idiots who think people shouldn't be allowed to do something because it's "creepy" to them should fuck off. There is a *lot* of weird shit out there that people get off to and much of it thoroughly creeps me out, but I'm smart enough to realize that this is an entirely subjective matter and it is not reasonable to deprive a person of something they enjoy, even if they don't absolutely need it, even if it creeps out 99.9% of the population, on such grounds. And no, "a few utter psychopaths who see it might think 'gee replicating that in real life with no concern whatsoever for the fact that I am doing it to real people seems like a good idea'" is *not* proper justification for it either. That sort of person already has serious mental issues and trying to remove anything that could possibly be an influence on them from society as a whole is an utterly futile endeavor.
RapeMurder? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:2, Insightful)
Or maybe we're playing America's Army, an unrealistic murder simulator that's creepy not only for the fact that people play it all day long, but then sign up to get paid to do it in real life.
The options could be putting batteries on genitals, raping with billy-clubs, various other naked activities, waterboarding, etc.
Don't you find it creepy that a member of the administration responsible for all of this in real life is more concerned about completely virtual environments that don't harm anyone?
Our imagination helps create reality (Score:1, Insightful)
Why am I not surprised that only one post in the entire discussion (so far) mentions "reality"? This /. place has really declined over the years...
Our imagination, the mental images and models that we construct in our minds, these unreal things are not without import. Very often we use them to create reality.
Amusingly enough, reality persists in being evasive towards our simplifications. It is obviously true that for some people the horrible images are just escapism and those people never attempt to act out their fantasies. In other cases, the harms can be enormous. I think the greatest fantasy-based harm of the recent past is actually the big dick Cheney's faith-based war in Iraq. The economic cost of that fantasy is most optimistically estimated around $1 trillion--but the meter is still running. I suppose the cost in lives is much more important. We have a pretty solid number over 4,000 for American lives--but no one has a solid count for the trivial Iraqi lives. (Having studied a lot of math and a fair bit of sociology, I actually buy into the demographic approach that comes up with a statistical estimate of over 1 million prematurely deceased Iraqis.) All because of Cheney's fantasies? Or was it just for the sake of enriching Haliburton?
I think these computer games are quite bad because they are more personally involving and easier to follow. However, in recent years I've mostly been wondering about horror-suspense writers who create these super-vicious criminals in their minds--and then skillfully transfer their insane ideas to their readers. I suspect the success of Silence of the Lambs may explain a lot of the bad things that have happened to America and to the world...
Re:And in real life... (Score:3, Insightful)
Reporting bias and Living out your fantasies does not add up to the difference either.
Living out your fantasies did not even begin to occur in Japan till recently. Have rape rates gone down?
Your deduction is not so clear as you perceive.
As far as reporting rates go, check out this: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap_percap-crime-rapes-per-capita [nationmaster.com]
Look at the countries near Japan. India? Turkey? Qatar? etc. Reporting bias is either pretty damn substantial or these countries are safe havens for women.
If anything, it is cultural and biological factors play bigger parts in these figures. Not the freedom to play video games or watch porn.
Re:And in real life... (Score:5, Insightful)
In reference to people being horrified by rape more than murder/killing, as I pointed out last time [slashdot.org] there is NOTHING a women could do to justify someone raping her. Killing is generally sugar-coated in video games to include some kind of necessity for the killing. Even in Manhunt you're basically being forced to kill to win your freedom and you're already desensitized to killing in video games in the first place since you're used to war games, where you have to take out the enemy before they take you out, so the idea of killing someone in a game doesn't seem all too foreign. There's no such thing as "justifiable rape", thus it's important not to confuse societal hang-ups about sex (which are often silly and misguided) with disgust at rape (which is there for a good reason).
Re:Thank God (Score:3, Insightful)
Hollywood. It has produced so many movies where hundreds of people are killed and shit blows up in a spectacular way. Yet there are not much movies where rape is glorified or even shown. Said movies have formed morals of some generations so it is seen as acceptable.
Re:Errant Legistation (Score:5, Insightful)
I think pretending we don't have these fantasies is unhealthy, and someone repressing their sexual feelings probably contributes to an inability to channel their more violent desires into harmless channels. If the thought of raping a schoolgirl turns you on - buy your wife a uniform and play together. More likely than not (55% chance) she's into the same thing.
IMHO: Fantasizing about rape is no more likely to make you a rapist, than reading SF novels will make you an astronaut.
MOD PARENT UP (Score:5, Insightful)
Nice job. This is what I always say as well. I love GTA, but am absolutely against real violence. I've never been in a fight, always preferring to find a peaceful way out. I certainly don't steal cars and use them to run over pedestrians, despite that being one of my giddy pleasures in GTA (GTA is satire, folks).
I'll go one up, though.
I've actually played the game in question, to see what the fuss was about.
It's the silliest, most pathetic thing I've ever seen. It's not even fun. It's not even funny. It's just dumb. It didn't make me want to feel 12-year-olds up on the train; it made me want to geek-slap whatever losers thought it up. I suspect that the only people who play it are the creepy shut-in otakus that populate the greasy periphery of Japanese culture. They hate women because they haven't figured out that being unwashed, boring, and lacking any interest in society doesn't really result in chicks flocking to your door.
There is no reason to ban much of anything. I'm all about coming down like the wrath of god on people who abuse children and/or take pictures of it, but I can't see how those pictures make the problem worse. I think that we all get pissed off at what is represented in those pictures and in games like this, and, lacking an appropriate outlet, we go after the easy target: the people who have the stuff. It's ridiculous, even when we're talking about actual images of actual people.
If we want child pornography to be illegal (we do!), then you go after the people who make it. If we want drugs to be illegal (we do--for some of them), then we need to go after the people who provide them. If we want to determine some entertainment to be obscene (I don't have a problem with that, actually), then, once again, we really only need to concern ourselves with those who produce it. All these arguments that people consuming or possessing these things we don't like is the problem because it leads to this, that, and the other are bunk, as far as I can tell. It's just a lot easier to find these people, because there are so many of them, so it looks like something is being done.
What's being done, however, is a bunch of probably-harmless losers getting their lives ruined and then forced to live on the public dime in jail. It's ridiculous. Even more so when we're talking about cartoon people.
Re:ban them both (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed. I can't count how often I've thought of strangling my boss. If it becomes a crime to even imagine having sex with a kid, then, logically, it would have to become a crime to have fantasies about killing your boss, too.
Then we'd have to get death penalty instated around the globe for we just cannot build all the prisons we'd need then.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:3, Insightful)
So your argument is that because it exists, children are forced to play it and become rapists?
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:3, Insightful)
Poorly thought out argument.
Any policy needs to consider desired effects and undesired effects. In this case we have the contention or thought that allowing someone to play a video game depicting an action might increase the chance that that person will engage in that behavior in the real world. There isn't strong evidence that this is the case, so it's possible that outlawing virtual child pornography will have absolutely no positive effect.
On the other hand, forbidding virtual child pornography is a form of censorship. Child pornography, virtual or no, is pretty fucking creepy, especially depicting the rape of a twelve year old. It's probably hard to make the claim that this software is a form of artistic expression deserving of protection. But forbidding virtual child pornography will have chilling effects on artistic expression. When Nabokov wrote Lolita, he caught flak for it, but he was a respected author, and it has an obvious artistic merit, so it was accepted as art relatively quickly. When Crumb started doing his stuff, people thought he should be locked up. It was certainly more extreme than Nabakov's stuff, and it was in a medium - comics- which most people didn't consider an art form. But now Crumb is a pretty well respected artist. Some of his stuff is very clearly disturbing virtual child pornography. It involves parents having sex with their kids, a guru getting his dick sucked by a giant 18 year old baby with monster tits. It's really disturbing and creepy. It's also a powerful interesting look into some of the more disturbing aspects of human nature and deserves to be considered art.
Right now interactive entertainment has a hard time getting taken seriously as an art form. Just like comics are treated very differently from novels at the judicial level, so too are video games. But any medium can be used as a medium for artistic expression, and all forms of artistic expression or communication (free speech, remember that?) deserve protection
If I start a blog advocating reducing the age of sexual consent to 12, and actively work to that goal, maybe start a forum discussing the morality of sex with 12 year old boys, that's pretty creepy disturbing behavior. It might increase the chance that some middle aged middle manager starts raping little kids. But a strong democracy requires us to tolerate even that kind of speech. Remember everyone, Hitler and Stalin included, supported free speech as long you said what they liked to hear. Free speech means tolerating speech you don't like. If you are censoring speech because it's creepy and disturbing to your sensibilities, you no longer have free-speech.
Finally, it's dangerous to make policy based on obscure, touchy feely emotional reactions. It's not clear at all what effect legislating against virtual child porn will really have. For example, there may be merits to softening the taboos associated with depicting child rape. Free expression of such themes might make it easier for people with harmful appetites (i.e. the desire to have sex with kids) to seek help. It might make it easier for victims to seek help and report abuse. Censoring virtual child-porn will also censor graphic, disturbing depictions which have an anti-child-rape message.
Looking at the example of violent video games: I'm a total pacifist, vegetarian hippy type. When I find myself frustrated by life (don't we all), I find playing violent, horrible video games a terrific release from my stresses and frustrations. It's harmless way to exorcize my violent tendencies. Who's to say that video games can't be used in a similar fashion?
As a general rule, Censorship is evil [parashift.com], and should only be applied to situations where there is a direct, observable, harmful impact: shouting fire in a crowded room, real child pornography, etc.
the hell? (Score:2, Insightful)
Only Japan allows people to possess these hideous images without penalty.
Lie. There are countries that allow drawings, CG representations fictional stories and the like depicting sex with children. In canada, a decade or so back, somebody challenged the law and had manage to have it overturned at least partly because because it was rediculous to treat drawings of non-existant children, fictional stories, etc. the same as real child-porn, where children were actually harmed. Unless they've put another law back in it's place, it's still legal to possess drawings of naked children having sex - provided no real children were used in their production. There are apparently some regional laws prohibiting depictins of rape in porn though.
Six of the G-7 countries have found ways to protect the innocent from being prosecuted for possession of child pornography.
So, 6 out of 7 are nice enough to not prosecute you for child porn possession, if you happen to be innocent. Leaving asside "innocent until proven guilty" issues, that means that one of the G-7 countries quite happy to prosecute the innocent for child porn charges. Which one is that, and why is nobody making a bigger stink about it?
Is it not time for Japan to find a way to punish the guilty?
Rapelay is legal in Japan, so the people who play it aren't guilty of anything other than being pervs. I assure you, if one of them goes out and rapes somebody in real life, the Japanese police will be all over it... and you do NOT want to go through japanese police questioning. They apparently learn how to do it by watching those old american cop movies where the cops could get away with anything... and then amp it up a few notches. The confession rate in japan is apparently very high.
Interesting side note: The article mentions that Illusion.jp has removed RapeLay from it's website... but a quick check shows that another game called "Battle Raper" is still up.
Re:The demand for such games?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe it's because Japan has one of the lowest rape per capita countries.
They have the lowest reported and recorded rape rate. In many places there is a lot of stigma attached to being the victim in these cases so victims are unwilling to come forward if they do they get little support, and from what little I know of modern Japanese culture I would guess that Japan is somewhere where this is a significant problem.
You can only state that the existence of the games reduces rapes if you can show that their rise has been responsible for a reduction in rapes. Can you point to any research that shows this to be that case?
Re:I am hopelessly conflicted (Score:3, Insightful)
Making people feel ashamed of themselves for their thoughts and primal urges seems counter-productive, to me.
It's useful for making people feel helpless and unable to cope with real life.
Cults and sects use it to brainwash people.
Re:Wow (Score:4, Insightful)
Hypocrisy isn't really all that funny.
A rape simulation is pornography, obviously.
Apart from that, your post seems to boil down to murder simulators being wholesome fun while rape simulators not being wholesome fun. You don't offer any evidence or reasoning to back this up, you simply assert it. Then you go on to make a mockery of free speech.
I find it funny, in a darkly cynical way, when people state how they're all for free speech, as long as said speech happens to be to their liking.
"I'll defend to the death your right to say whatever I happen to agree with."
The purpose of free speech is to let everyone have their say. Encouraging the speech you happen to agree with and censoring the rest is pretty much the antithesis of free speech; claiming to do this in the name of promoting free speech would make any politician proud.
It helps set a precedence where something can't be banned just because someone finds it disturbing. This, then, is something you can appeal to when Muslims want to ban criticizing Islam, Jews want to ban criticizing Israel, or your government wants to ban criticizing itself.
Basically, you either have free speech for everyone, including people who you find disturbing, or you don't have it for anyone. Choose one or the other; but don't delude yourself about what you've chosen and pretend to be an "attack dog" for free speech when you're trying to censor others. Either have balls to tolerate speech you find disgusting, or the spine to admit you're against free speech; but having neither makes you just plain pitiful.
Re:Morals and all that jazz (Score:3, Insightful)
The most effective measure to speech you don't like is not banning it, but speaking out against it.
Really? Tell it to the Chinese that their ban on the events of Tiananmen square in 1989 is less effective than speaking out against it. I bet they'll laugh their ass off. That is, if you can find someone informed enough to know what really happen in the first place. The Soviet Union did a pretty good job at suppressing religion, which seemed to be quite more effective than telling people they're full of superstition using my free speech. There's a reason why it's the first amendment of the US constitution, if talking back was the most effective solution we wouldn't need it. To "I think the colonies should declare independence", "Send him to the gallows for high treason against the Crown" was the most effective response.
We don't ban speech because it's not effective, we don't ban it because it's the essence of democracy to have, express and gather support for minority opinions and expressions as well as sharing them with others. That includes a satiric cartoon, an unpatriotic song or a youtube clip. Dakota Fanning was depicted as being raped in Hounddog [imdb.com], How's that not child pornography? Well, first and foremost because she was never raped. It's a story. Fiction. A depiction that leads you to believe that in the film the character she played was raped. While I'm sure this game is more graphic and interactive, it's also just fiction. A depiction that leads you to believe that the underage character was raped. Except with even less basis in reality.
And the whales, don't forget the whales. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
An even more interresting question is: why is consensuel sex in a movie rated 18, while a murder is rated 13 or so. The "we don't want the kids to imitate" argument doesn't work here.
Re:Guilty of what? (Score:4, Insightful)
As tempting as it is to get pedantic, I shall merely note that I never said any such thing. A nice way to launch into an argument that plays on emotions instead of using logic and facts, but please, this is Slashdot, not politics.
There is so much wrong with this sentence. So very, very much. People like you, who think that nobody should be allowed to do things that the majority doesn't approve of even if they have no reasonable justification for it, are, have been, and will continue to be, far more of a threat to people than any amount of perverts masturbating to Japanese rape porn could possibly be.
This is a false dichotomy. Your options aren't just "encourage" or "shun", there's also the ever popular "do nothing" option that lots of people do with lots of things. And no, "doing nothing" does not encourage rape any more than the lack of popular outrage about movies like Saw encourages torture and murder.
I guess it's a good thing I'm not encouraging rape or suggesting that anyone else should encourage rape or you might actually have a valid point and not be attacking a blatant straw man at all!
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:2, Insightful)
The Bible does discuss it, but not positively. When it gets punished every time it is hardly a motivator/instigator.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
Who said anything about kids? What the hell are you talking about? Video games, except the educational ones, are not supposed to be teaching ANYTHING to the kids. If you, as a parent, allow your kid to play this, or even play GTA, you FAILED!
And about your hyperbole about dad's porn stash, yeah I found it, by the age 8, so what? Asked that what the heck was that, after all he TAUGHT me to ask those things to him, and just said: "This are dad's toy, and they shall be yours when you are 14.". And since he, again, TAUGHT me that that would be the truth, I waited, and it was enough.
And come on, haven't you heard about locks, keys? Unless you are raising your kid playing GTA, and teaching everything he needs to know about break into your drawer, you just lock this thing way.
If your whole argument is that, your children will find it and play. I can only conclude two things:
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to make it illegal, you're going to show evidence that it needs to be.
Evidence? We live in a democracy good sir, we have to think of the children! ;)
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
"Why are some crimes forbidden to simulate, but violence, shooting people, and murder are fine?"
Because violence against the right sort of people is delicious to Abrahamic religions. OTOH, strict control and rationing of sex via marriage is part of how they maintain social control.
The most useful subject of such religions is one whose sexual stress is expressed as violence towards the infidel.
Before modding this down, have some Taliban or Church of the Creator.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:5, Insightful)
So, we have impressionable kids playing games that teach that you MUST rape little girls to succeed.
There's a lot of stuff I wouldn't like impressionable kids to watch, but the solution for this is a good rating system, not censorship.
The idea of censorship is to protect "public moral standards" and the innocent souls of adults, at the expense of the freedom of speech. That's why it's wrong.
Those games are already clearly labeled as hardcore rape simulators. If you allow your kids to play those, then fuck you.
Your drugs/booze/guns example is bullshit. If your kids actually use any of those, the result is much worse than playing a rape simulator.
P.S.
Rape is a horrible thing, but murder is still worse. I have no idea why you think that simulating and glamorizing murder (among other felonies) is somehow better than simulating rape. In the end, it's all about the bizarre American obsession with sex.
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:5, Insightful)
Just making sure I understand your viewpoint here. Would you then claim its acceptable as most people seem to to enjoy killing thousands of people in a war simulator? And how is getting a thrill by playing out a virtual version of that type of horror any different from any other type of horror?
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:2, Insightful)
Ever thought of a career as a spokesperson for, I don't know, any organization/movement that's a little on the fanatic side? Pro-Life? PETA?
Give it some thought, you're a natural.
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:4, Insightful)
I think Japan is just more open and catering to things that most other societies tends to pounce upon (strange from a culture that is generalized as one of heavy conformity and whatnot - in fact, maybe it's that conformity in culture that means that in private, people are more open about their fetishes and whatnot).
I'll admit, I find some shit - like gameshows, panties in vending machines, etc etc - just plain weird. But then, as an anime fan, and someone who enjoys hentai, I can appreciate that factor of their culture that makes so much hentai possible.
Actually, just a second ago I was having an argument with a mate who was questioning as to how the hell anyone can get off to a rape hentai. I was trying to explain that anime is not real life. I find the idea of rape completely sickening, and in real life, I'm actually rather conservative about sex (preferring to get to know a girl than just pick someone up at a club - and I have had offers). But anime is not real life...but to him, hearing that I enjoy rape in my animated porn pretty much means I must be a disturbed individual who enjoys rape.
I guess having an open culture which pretty much accepts everything and anything and industrializes it produces good things and bad - really weird shit that some people love and freaks you out, and really weird shit that you love and freaks everyone else out.
I mean take that quote from TFA:
*""Only Japan allows people to possess these hideous images without penalty," Schieffer wrote in an editorial in the Asahi newspaper on Jan 1. "Six of the G-7 countries have found ways to protect the innocent from being prosecuted for possession of child pornography. Is it not time for Japan to find a way to punish the guilty?" "
Protect the innocent? Oh, the poor anime characters. To someone who isn't used to this kinda shit, hearing "A game where you can rape someone!" sounds really fucking weird, and disturbing. Something only weird fucked up rapists would enjoy. But being around anime communities and whatnot, I can say that it's a much broader audience who enjoy it - people who are nice, and would never rape anyone.
But yeah...maybe I should've posted under AC - someone's so gonna report me and I'll have police at my door, or something. =P
~Jarik
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, you need to consider how civil a society can be when being raped is considered part of the punishment, and that's perfectly ok.
I don't even agree with YOUR post, though! (Score:4, Insightful)
Truthfully, a parent has not "failed" because they let a kid play a game like GTA. Rather, they only failed if they didn't accompany it with some explanation....
I've actually let my 7 year old play GTA on my PS3, but I made it clear it's a game where you play a "very bad person" and it's a story about people doing things you're not supposed to do in real life. She played a little bit, had fun driving the cars around and so forth, and basically got bored with it after a few minutes. So now? It's not some big "taboo" thing anymore to her. It's just another one of those games for "older people", and she's not that interested in playing some bad guy doing bad stuff.....
Sure, I believe there are things best kept away from kids until they're old enough to really understand and deal with the topics they present. But it's the job of a parent to make those judgment calls for themselves. Sometimes, maybe they're wrong ... but overall, who else knows a kid better than their own mom or dad? I'd argue that trying to simply lock up some video game like GTA to prevent a kid from ever playing it is parental laziness. You can't prevent your kid from ever seeing or playing the game at somebody else's house, some day..... You may as well confront the thing head on.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:4, Insightful)
The "we don't want the kids to imitate" argument doesn't work here.
Yes it does. Parents know that their children aren't going to go out and shoot someone in cold blood. Parents also know that, given the opportunity, their children will have sex. It would seem that the subconscious decision by parents is that if a child is not likely to do something, watching it on TV won't make them do it; but, if a child is likely to do something, watching it on TV will make it more likely. I'm not saying that is true, I'm just pointing out that a consistent logical system can explain the behavior.
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:5, Insightful)
But now times are hard and circuses too expensive to hold so frequently. And so, the masses must be occupied with something else. Moral outrage serves quite well in this regard.
Think about it. Who honestly gives a flying fiddlers about some cartoon sex abuse in a game for Japanese recluses? Is this the kind of thing that keeps people in Nebraska up at night. No.
People like outrage. It's a form of entertainment. People like to hear about all kinds of lurid and obscene stories so that they can feel morally superior and have an opportunity to get themselves all riled up. It's a great way to kill boredom. Just think about who gets the most interested in these moral crusades? It is hard working 9 to 5'ers who earn their keep and spend their free time productively. No. It's the TV addicts, and idle homewives, and OAPs who have nothing better to do with their time than get excited about what single Japanese men masturbate to.
As soon as the cash runs dry and the good times are over, the moral reactionaries come crawling out of the woodwork. It's a fine time to be conservative. But rest assured when the money returns and people have the means to party again, these same people will swing the night away with the best of them.
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:1, Insightful)
Psychologically, yes. The question is not, "Which would objectively be worse if it were real instead of a videogame?" If you're calling somebody a sick fuck for playing a video game, then the question is, "Which videogame experience is going to be subjectively more appealing to a sick fuck and repellent to a morally intact person?"
Ordinary, well-functioning people are more appalled by the suffering of one person than by the suffering of a mass of people, as evidenced by that famous Stalin quote ("One death is a tragedy; one million is a statistic") as well as by empirical research [sjdm.org]. This is not because it's rational (it's not), it's just because of how human beings are wired and how moral sentiments work in non-sick fucks.
So I think the GP AC (a different AC from me) was claiming that the guy who enjoys a game where he can vividly and realistically rape a single individual child is more likely to be a sick fuck than the guy who enjoys designing wargame strategies where the "deaths" of symbolic avatars are used as an accounting system.
Re:Protect the innocent! (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of human psychology centers around being able to affirm oneself and one's own existence through others. A person who identifies himself or herself by his or her interests will try to affirm himself or herself through others with the same interests. And everybody identifies themselves by certain interests at every point in life, even if those interests change over time. So if a person who's into extremism watches extreme acts (or simulations thereof), that person is able to affirm his or her existence through knowing that there's somebody else with similar interests in the same extreme, especially enough to make a movie, whether real or imaginary, of it. I think we'd all prefer these things to be simulations, reenactments, hollywood magic, instead of somebody's home video of it actually happening. But without such things, such people cannot affirm their own existence, and thus their psyche tears, if you will accept the crude term. The person will try to reconcile the matter, fill the void, as a protective measure before going insane. The result is the person acting on those interests. In the case where the interests are extreme, it is not something beneficial to society. So the simulations of certain extreme behaviors is beneficial. However, certain presonalities can lead to addiction, so it's always a good idea for these people to moderate their own consumption.
Professional competition, for example, is illustrative of this psychological phenomenon. People who watch sports competitions are often very into playing the same sports at some point in time, but may be somehow unable to do so or are unskilled at doing so. So they watch the professionals, who are able to perform amazing feats they can only dream of doing. But in watching such professionals accomplish those feats, it satisfies their own innate desire to do so, brought upon by their interest in the activity. This allows them to not attempt such feats and concentrate their energies on other activities. And professional athletes whose self-definition is grounded in their ability to compete in their sport of choice, affirm themselves by competing with others of their level or better. Take away their sports, and they lose their identity (look to the behaviors of retirees for a good idea of what happens).
On a related note, Buddhist teachings take the opposite direction, embracing the no-self as the solution.
Re:Obligatory (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you playing the mass murder simulators with one hand too?
Re:I know what's gonna happen now (Score:4, Insightful)
I am saying we should skip that decade where they go in and out of the criminal justice system before they have assaulted/raped/killed enough people to earn that 25-life sentence and give em ten (and make em serve most of it) on the first violent assault, armed robbery, etc.
And three-strikes, that oh so failed policy, isn't good enough?
Even gang bangers have a rudimentary understanding of risk/reward.
Well if you're interested in deterrence, why not just stick 'em in for life? Wait, I have a better idea, why not incorporate torture into the prison system? Or just kill 'em all right off the bat?
Hint: deterrence doesn't work. If it did, you'd see a drop in crime rates where three-strikes and DP laws are in place... but, funny that, you don't.
The proper approach is to attack the root causes of criminality. That includes fighting poverty, fixing schools, providing better support for single parents, things along those lines. You know, solving these problem children *before* they end up in jail. Unfortunately, your average whitebread, middleclass conservative, which constitutes a portion of the voting public, believes that's just nasty, evil socialism, and what they really need to do is jail those filthy "gang bangers" who are causing all the problems.