US Supreme Court: Video Games Qualify For First Amendment 458
Wrath0fb0b writes "The United States Supreme Court threw out a California law prohibiting the sale of violent video games to minors. Notable in the opinion is a historical review of the condemnation of "unworthy" material that would tend to corrupt children, starting with penny-novels and up through comic books and music lyrics. The opinion is also notable for the odd lineup of Justices that defies normal ideological lines, with one conservative and one liberal jurist dissenting on entirely different grounds. In the process, they continue the broad rule that the First Amendment does not vary with the technological means used: 'Video games qualify for First Amendment protection. Like protected books, plays, and movies, they communicate ideas through familiar literary devices and features distinctive to the medium. And the basic principles of freedom of speech... do not vary with a new and different communication medium.'"
As an American Conservative... (Score:3)
Let me just say; Hear hear! Well done Supreme Court.
Our rights (ALL of them) are not to be given away to petty tyrants for any reason, even "For the Children".
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This case isn't about the rights of children. It's about the rights of the stores, the publishers, and the developers.
Honestly, however, most stores will probably *voluntarily* continue to not sell Rated-M videogames to minors, because they will not want to P.O. the parents and the large (but perhaps minority) portion of the population that thinks it's not right to sell such material to minors. This ruling doesn't mean stores are forced to sell them to minors, just that they have the *freedom* to choose to
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In particular, it's sometimes hard to determine whether or not you *are* selling to a minor - consider an online retailer: it would be pretty easy for a minor to order something with their parent's credit card, name, address, so they wouldn't know they were selling to a minor.
If it's the parent's credit card being used, the parent will learn about it when they look at their statement, I know I reconcile mine. If it's a stolen credit card being used, there are already bigger problems in that household than a child buying a violent video game. Ultimately, the online purchase age verification takes care of itself with the use of a credit card.
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On a side note, before there were prepaid debit cards, when we wanted "R" rated movies or cigarettes we just stole them. Kids will always find ways around age restrictions, sometimes what they do to get around the restrictions is worse than what's being restricted.
Another good point. It brings to mind the glaring "elephant in the room" example of this phenomenon: the humongous illegal-drug industry spawned by the anti-drug laws. I was about to include "in the US", but it's the same in most of the world.
Outlawing something that most people don't find wrong and part of the population wants is mostly a way to get such illegal activity. And once the illegal supply process has become a business, there's strong pressure from most of the political spectrum to not int
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Outlawing something that most people don't find wrong and part of the population wants is mostly a way to get such illegal activity.
And it all starts with speeding on the highway. Such a minor crime, and we see people getting away with it all the time. People do it because they think they have something to gain, but it really isn't much. Just a few minutes a day even if they're driving for more than an hour each way. The governments legitimacy as a rules and standards making body declines from there. Citizens see that some of the laws really aren't that serious. Hell, even the police speed everywhere. The citizens start to wonde
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This isn't an issue with the children's rights, its about the publishers' rights to free speech. However, I can see making them label the games so the kids' parents can decide. Parenting is for parents, not governments. I let my daughters play Quake when they were 12 (in fact we had lots of fun fragging each other on the home network) but it was MY decision. They were my kids, and I raised them like I wanted to (both are still gamers, the youngest is now assistant manager of a GameStop store making damned g
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Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:5, Insightful)
You totally missed the point since you stopped reading. The GP isn't saying the government is requiring something of the parents, but simply that because the government is NOT requiring retailers to police what games children buy/play, by default, the parents are required (not by law, but by the LACK of law, and by their own set of standards) to take responsibility for what they do and don't want their children playing.
That is to say, the parents are required by their own conscience to BE good parents, or not.
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:5, Insightful)
Let me just say; Hear hear! Well done Supreme Court.
Our rights (ALL of them) are not to be given away to petty tyrants for any reason, even "For the Children".
As a fellow conservative, I must disagree. I see no problem with a state limiting what a minor may buy. Just a state may place limits on buying alcohol, pornography and cigarettes, I see no reason why a state may not place age restrictions on video games.
Note: No is saying that minors are not allowed to play these games, only to PURCHASE them. As a parent, I not only appreciate the idea that I would have to be the one to purchase the material, but I also like the idea that other parents would have to purchase the material for their kids. It's a parent's responsibility to keep up with what their kids are doing. This law would have helped a parent do that. As for the parents too lazy to get off their ass to buy the games? These are the same parents that won't monitor what their kids are doing and are EXACTLY the parents of the kids I don't want owning violent/pornographic video games.
With all that said, I would more than likely buy such games for my kids and even play them with them, but I like the idea of ME being in control.
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Another example, cigarettes. So what if a store can't sell them to your child. He/she can still get them somewhere else, have someone else buy them, etc. I don't really care if a store can sell my son cigarettes or not. I raise my children not to smoke, regardless of the source
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Eh.
You can't make it impossible for anyone to get anything, but that doesn't mean that making it harder for someone to get something serves no purpose.
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:5, Insightful)
I see no reason why a state may not place age restrictions on video games.
Because that is the state putting a restriction on speech which they are specifically denied the power to do. This is what the Supreme Court determined and is true. Just because you "do not see the reason", doesn't make it false. Read the Constitution and learn & accept the limitations on the power of The State that were included - they were put there for a reason, from lessons learned from the experiences of the people at the time. When it comes to abuse of power from the State/Government they knew a lot more than we do, they lived through it - their experience/wisdom should be learned from and respected.
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The state can and does put limits on speech where harm is likely or actual. The Supreme Court has ruled that they must be reasonable restrictions. I haven't yet read the decision itself in its entirety, but the excerpts that I have seen from skimming through it have suggested that one of the major issues is that no significant harm to children has been demonstrated. Children cannot purchase pornography, for example. Libel and slander laws are generally constitutional. The Supreme Court has also found t
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Just a state may place limits on buying alcohol, pornography and cigarettes
None of which are protected by the first amendment, BTW.
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:5, Interesting)
The middle one should be.
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Obscenity is excluded so that the jobs of the morality police are easier.
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Obscenity is excluded so that the jobs of the morality police are easier.
No, Obscenity is excluded so that parents and families don't have to deal with issues of trying to protect their kids from public displays and advertisements that include pornographic images.
It's one thing to task parents with the duty of proper child rearing, which society has always done and which this SCOTUS decision reinforces. It's something else entirely to then turn around and make that task nearly impossible by allowing the porn/adult industry to inundate all of public life. (more than it already h
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I am American and have lived outside the USA. We need to get over our sex hangups. Public displays of violence, like the ads for major blockbusters are surely worse for children than seeing images of procreation.
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Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, Obscenity is excluded so that parents and families don't have to deal with issues of trying to protect their kids from public displays and advertisements that include pornographic images.
Funny how your ideals don't match our reality. How many arrests under obscenity law have anything to do with selling or showing porn to children? When you have to fly porn producers from California to Pennsylvania [wikipedia.org] in order to find someone they offend, what is the point of "community standards"?
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Pornography is protected by the Constitution. The problem is that the Constitution is not respected by those who are charged with upholding it. There is no obscenity exception in the First Amendment.
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Just a state may place limits on buying alcohol, pornography and cigarettes, I see no reason why a state may not place age restrictions on video games.
My first reason would be - because it doesn't seem to stop kids from getting their hands on it anyway. And oddly enough, the most common place for kids to sneak out booze/porn/ciggies from is... from their parents. ;)
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What if the parents are too lazy to be parents, and so just buy any game their kid wants? I'm not trying to make a moral judgement here, I just think it's silly to equate a good parent with one that will buy stuff.
It's incredibly easy for anyone to get anything these days without buying it. If the parent won't buy it, the kid can torrent it. I can just imagine the lobbying now: Lazy parents encourage piracy! Kill them all (and their kids!).
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Interesting)
There are some "conservatives" (I'll call them the Glenn Beck inspired conservative) that feel that the intent of this country was as a "Word of the Bible" following Christian country with all morals and values enforced.
Ironically, it would make The Constitution the most hypocritical document ever written... but that's not part of their thought process.
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If I'm ignorant, maybe it's because of his approach. I've attempted to sit down and watch episodes of his but I can't stomach to watch them anymore. My father has just about all of his shows recorded and every time I'm at the house Glenn Beck is on. At no point have I heard him "defend" atheism. Maybe if he spent less time preaching how Jefferson was really a Christian and more time on his "defenses of atheism" I might have had a chance to hear them. Every time I've tuned in, he approaches a matter in
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Informative)
"As a fellow conservative, I must disagree. I see no problem with a state limiting what a minor may buy. Just a state may place limits on buying alcohol, pornography and cigarettes, I see no reason why a state may not place age restrictions on video games."
One of the reasons Justice Scalia gave was that, historically, many children's books and stories were very violent. "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.Certainly the books we give children to read — or read to them when they are younger — contain no shortage of gore," Scalia added.
A 7-2 split is pretty strong, even though two members of the majority made it sound like they'd support some sort of lesser restriction, that still puts it at 5-4 against any restrictions.
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We'd best make it a criminal offense to sell certain books, movies, music, comics, etc to children because they might be corrupted by the evil influence of Elvis' hips. With more or less the sole exception of pornography, these are unhindered by law -- why should video games (which have a rating system similar to movies with similar voluntary enforcement, note that books have no such restrictions) be the exception?
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Limiting purchase is also limiting sale and distribution; the speaker's rights are being infringed. Nobody has come up with a way to limit someone's ability to buy something, which doesn't somehow also limit someone's ability to sell something. And since so much speech today is for-sale speech (i.e. not everyone is handing out pamphlets for free; some people sell books), putting limitations on sales in considered equ
Re:As an American Conservative... (Score:4, Interesting)
I see no reason why a state may not place age restrictions on video games.
Because children have first amendment rights too. The fact that you can't see this is why conservatives are so fucking scary.
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If you feel that the government has any business deciding who can buy what games, you're not actually a conservative at all.
Historically speaking, conservatism's libertarian wing is something of an anomaly, and exists largely in reaction to the rise of the concept of welfare states. It's those scurrilous 'liberals' with their 'innovation' who want to destroy the moral foundations of society by decriminalizing blasphemy, lesse majesty, and other such crimes against the morality of the people.
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If you feel that the government has any business deciding who can buy what games, you're not actually a conservative at all.
STATE governments. Not the FEDERAL government. I believe that STATES should have the right to determine what a child should and should not be allowed to purchase.
This is a state's rights issue which falls in line perfectly with my conservative beliefs.
The reason this was voted down is because the court says it violates the First Amendment (Freedom of Speech). Making a purchase is NOT an expression of Free Speech. If it is, I want to voice my opinion and go buy a big fat joint! Playing the game is not e
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STATE governments. Not the FEDERAL government.
14th Amendment says that distinction is no longer important when it comes to the rights of citizens.
MAKING the video game, however, absolutely is an expression of free speech. But that's not what was on trial here. What was on trial is "does the state have the limit the purchasing power of minors". I think it does.
"You're allowed to make this work of artistic expression, but you're not allowed to distribute it to a class of people" is without a doubt a Free Speech issue. Trying to separate the making from the selling is a clever dodge around Free Speech but not one SCOTUS is going to fall for.
You can disagree with how the decision was made -- after all, Free Speech is not without any restrictions at all so just becau
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Then you might want to become a liberal. Thomas (arch-conservative) and Breyer (moderate liberal) voted against the majority but Alito (conserative) and Roberts (conservative) indicated that their support for the decision was soft and that they thought it was too sweeping according to the WaPo story on it. That makes the next challenge, essentially, start from a 5-4 decision... ripe for change and "clarification."
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Note that the "reasoning" of Thomas was that the original view of the First Amendment at the time the Bill of Rights was enacted "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."
wow (Score:2)
Responsibility Where It Belongs (Score:5, Insightful)
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The court said that parents should filter what their children see and do. Score one against the nanny state monitoring us for our own good.
If a parent won't get off their ass to buy the games for their kids, this parent won't monitor what their kids see and do.
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Right, and the alternative is telling all parents what they can and can't allow their children to buy. Don't delude yourself, banning children from buying these materials isn't likely to result in any shortage of such materials getting into the hands of children. Which presumably this is all about.
Free Speech Applies to Speech (Score:2)
The people who failed that test should be disbarred. Maybe exiled.
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The people who failed that test should be... Kicked from the #law_of_the_land chat channel as an obvious bot. Think of it as a human rights Turing Test.
Interesting 7-2 division (Score:5, Informative)
Only Thomas and Breyer dissented; one of the most conservative, and one of the most liberal.
Re:Interesting 7-2 division (Score:5, Interesting)
"But what sense does it make to forbid selling to a 13-year-old boy a magazine with an image of a nude woman, while protecting a sale to that 13 year-old of an interactive video game in which he actively, but virtually, binds and gags the woman, then tortures and kills her? What kind of First Amendment would permit the government to protect children by restrict- ing sales of that extremely violent video game only when the woman—bound, gagged, tortured, and killed—is also topless? This anomaly is not compelled by the First Amendment. It disappears once one recognizes that extreme violence, where interactive, and without literary, artistic, or similar justification, can prove at least as, if not more, harmful to children as photographs of nudity. And the record here is more than adequate to support such a view. That is why I believe that Ginsberg controls the outcome here a fortiori. And it is why I believe California’s law is constitutional on its face. "
Basically, the court had previously ruled that it's ok to ban porn sales to children, and the court is generally bound to prior rulings unless overturned by new legislation. The logic used to ban pornography sales to kids still applies to this case. Not saying it's a good law, but Breyer's position makes a lot of sense.
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A typical Breyer cite:
Weber, Ritterfeld, & Mathiak, Does Playing Violent Video Games Induce Aggression? Empirical Evidence of a Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study, 8 Media Psychology 39, 51 (2006).
A typical 0Thomas cite:
C. Mather, A Family Well-Ordered 38 (1699).
Truly, one can be wrong in a myriad of ways!
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And to the points made in the dissent in this case, at least they were well thought out and reasonable. I think the court made the right call, but I did find it interesting in Thomas' argument about how even in speech matters the parent is still the intermediary, I can say what I want, but the parent has control over what their children can here. I don't find this totally unreasonable of a concept.
My issue with the law was that government would have to make a determination of what content meets a violent
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They wern't reasonable in my opinion. One justice compared violent videogames with child porn, and the other missed the point of the arguments entirely.
Re:Interesting 7-2 division (Score:5, Insightful)
Thomas' argument about how even in speech matters the parent is still the intermediary, I can say what I want, but the parent has control over what their children can here.
This was an interesting argument, but it kind of fell apart when I thought about the situation at hand.
Essentially: How can a child be at a game store, in position to buy a game, without the parent having relinquished (or be ineffective at) their roll as the intermediary?
If the parents want a store to drop their child off at confident that they will not be sold a violent game, it is a failing of the market to create such a store. Such stores could exist side by side with stores that do sell violent games to children (the situation we currently have). It is not the place of government to create that type of store at the cost of every store that would not follow the model.
Furthermore, legislation against the child buying that M-rated game isn't going to do anything to stop all the other forms of speech the child will potentially be subject to while in the store without supervision or on the way to/from the store.
As Scaila says in his opinion, such legislation does not enforce parental authority, but instead imposes government authority.
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My biggest question with the ruling is now: "How does this affect the FCC language blacklist?" If video games are protected as free speech and the content contained within can be violent and/or full of language how does that differ from a television show's rights of free speech?
This is crap reasoning (Score:2)
I'm sorry. I see this all the time on Slashdot.
Just because they have a legal reasoning disagreement doesn't mean someone is bought and paid for.
Hey, Ginsburg supports abortion rights. She must be bought and paid for by the abortion lobby. Or she may just support that there is a legal right to have an abortion.
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That is not rare at all. Thomas doesn't comment during the question and answer period with the lawyers when it is argued before the Court. He writes opinions all the time.
How... Ironic. (Score:5, Insightful)
The Court’s decision today does not comport with the original public understanding of the First Amendment. The majority strikes down, as facially unconstitutional, a state law that prohibits the direct sale or rental of certain video games to minors because the law “abridg[es] the freedom of speech.” U. S. Const., Amdt. 1. But I do not think the First Amendment stretches that far.
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. I would hold that the law at issue is not facially unconstitutional under the First Amendment, and reverse and remand for further proceedings."
Justice Thomas should, perhaps, stop to consider that the "practices and beliefs of the founding generation" establish a number of other interesting boundaries to the distribution of various freedoms...
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I think judges don't know what speech is any more. Recently we saw that confidential data having to do with what drugs are being prescribed to be used in marketing is speech. Now, adult materials in the form of a game is speech.
My first reaction, like so many others was "okay, then kids can buy porn now too right?" I think judges are flipping coins in their chambers and announcing rulings or something like that.
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To play devil's advocate, a consistent response might be -- Some of those other practices and beliefs were overturned via the amendment process, which isn't the case here.
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If little Timmy Jones were to, after being denied a hit of sweet, sweet, GTA, file a civil-rights case against Mr. and Ms. Jones for the suppression of his free speech rights, the fact that the constitutional framers did not see themselves as freeing children from the restrictions of their parents/guardians would be relevant to his getting shot down. As far as suggesting that the mores of the writ
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The 14th amendment specifically codified certain rights in a way that likely contradicted the framers' intentions; but anything not so codified, and there was a lot, would presumably apply equally to the 'framers' understanding of the limits of a right' argument.
This doesn't make any sense. (Score:2, Insightful)
Kids can't buy porn.
Kids can't see R-rated movies.
Kids shouldn't be able to buy violent video games.
As a life long gamer I see absolutely no problem with restricting sales of games with violence or sex to adults only.
What's the point of challenging that? Do we want 8-year olds to save their lunch money and play Grand Theft Auto?
Re:This doesn't make any sense. (Score:4, Insightful)
You, like many people who don't live in the US or don't understand how the laws work, are missing the point, which is that the *government* does not regulate any of those things. The US movie industry is self-regulating, that is, production houses submit their movies to the MPAA, which gives the film a rating. The producers don't *have* to do this, but if they don't, their movie likely won't be shown in any US theaters, who generally require every film to carry an MPAA rating.
Again, the government has nothing to do with this. Additionally, the government cannot punish theaters for allowing kids in to R-rated movies, as that would be unconstitutional restriction of free speech. It's entirely up to the theater itself, a private company who has the right to deny access to anyone they want.
Currently, the video game industry works the same way: ESRB ratings are voluntary, not required by law, but publishers submit their games for ratings because they want their games in stores. It's up the stores, private companies, to decide whether to enforce these ratings.
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Do we want 8-year olds to save their lunch money and play Grand Theft Auto?
I don't. But there are better ways to prevent this from happening. Parenting. And supporting store policies that don't allow sales of violent games to minors. No need to brandish police force or put people in prison over it.
Because you're comparing apples to oranges. (Score:3)
First, there's two different issues here ... porn vs. violence. The courts have long established that porn is considered obscenity, and therefore, does not qualify under the First Amendment. They've never said the same thing about violence, which they're re-affirming here. (Although, I wasn't sure if they were saying that animal cruelty was or wasn't considered obscene)
In the case of kids seeing R-rated movies -- it's not illegal. It's the movie producers an theatres acting as a group to set standards,
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What's wrong with 8 year olds playing Grand Theft Auto? Great game. Honestly, anyone that talks about GTA as if it's some horrific soul destroying thing, has never played it. There are many darker games out there. I was playing stuff like Mortal Kombat when I was 9. You could rip your opponents head off, with their spine still dangling and dripping blood. You could rip out their still beating heart. To this day, I've never actually tried to do either of those things for real.
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Sudden outbreak of ... uh what?! (Score:2)
We need a new tag for this...
The Terminator wanted this law. (Score:2)
The strangest thing about this law was that it was supported by Arnold Schwarzenegger .
Great ruling... (Score:2)
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I believe it was even posted here on
Keep the old wives' tales to yourself.
Now abolish software patents (Score:2)
Now abolish software patents, because it's mathematics applied to a different medium. (Other than the human mind.)
Why is sex obscene but violence is not? (Score:3)
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There is "cartoon sex" that's also considered porn.
How is porn different? (Score:2)
What makes grand theft auto protected and porn not?
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There are quite a few differences, actually. First and foremost, to restrict any speech, the government must be able to show the court that the speech in question would "surely result in immediate, direct, and irreparable damage to the nation and its people". The accepted argument is that grossly obscene pornography causes harm to the viewer and also to the moral fabric of the nation. Once you have established this, it's easier to also say that since children are not adults, that the threshold for "obsc
Well, at least that's consistancy. (Score:2)
So.... (Score:2)
Lord of the Flies + Pick-a-path books .. (Score:5, Interesting)
You gotta love supreme court opinion that reference both Lord of the Flies:
...and 'Pick a Path' / 'Choose Your Own Adventure' type books:
And understands the difference between causation and correlation:
Re:The fall of the free empire (Score:5, Insightful)
Very true ... in my lifetime, the most notable example of this was when Tipper Gore was trying to get a bunch of music banned. This, of course, led to Dee Schneider in the most ball-hugging jeans you could imagine testifying about why what she was proposing was just plain wrong.
Everyone wraps themselves in the flag, and talks about freedom, but often they only mean for people who they agree with. You can't have free speech if you don't support the right of people to say offensive things just because you'd rather not hear it (or because you think it's causing out moral decay).
It's amazing how vocal people can be about making sure that the rights of other people are limited so as not to offend their own sensibilities.
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Daniel "Dee" Snider would not be referred to as "her."
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Sorry. Reading comprehension fail on my part.
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You are correct, Tipper Gore is being referred to as "her"
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The answer to that is easy, if unpopular:
Your "right to live" exists solely by your ability to defend it.
You have the same "right to live" as anybody or anything else, which is none.
We live in a civilized society, where we have negotiated out most of the anarchist might-makes-right tendencies of our forefathers, but you walk down the wrong dark alley on the wrong night and those negotiations mean jack squat.
so, to answer your two riddles, the vampire and the renal patient have absolutely no right at all to
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I don't recall being present at these negotiations. Yet somehow, I am not exempt from them. This passes for "civilized society" by today's standards, but I don't think it's all that great. And I don't think the police could stop someone from killing you any better than you can yourself. They provide "justice" afterward.
Re:The fall of the free empire (Score:4, Insightful)
I disagree with that thesis entirely.
Their right to live does not mean in any way that I'm required to surrender mine. Just because you might need an organ donation, doesn't confer an obligation upon me to give it to you. The same as the "right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" doesn't actually guarantee you a job or to be happy ... merely the right to look for it.
Because, as soon as you start doing the calculus of whose life is more valuable ... you start using the poor as spare parts for the rich.
In my opinion, both of your examples are nonsensical and contrived. That isn't about 'offending someone else's sensibilities' .... it's about making your own rights inferior to that of someone else. I don't see any ambiguity in where to draw the line you seem to think is a broad and fuzzy expanse ... your rights can't extend past the security of my own person.
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Very true... Suppose there's a hungry vampire just in front of you, about to die if not by your blood. Which right to live is bigger? (from a book I read a long time ago). Let's get a not so hypothetical and fantastic case, let's say you're in front of a severe renal patient and known to be a compatible donor. You don't want to live with a single kidney, which right is more important, his right to live or your right not to have your organs harvested?
This was actually the scenario (or close to it) used to defend the moral right of allowing an abortion in the case of rape/incest. The notion that your body cannot be used to provide life without your consent (although in the philosophy readings I saw, the actual example was 'what if Fred Astaire needed one of your kidneys...").
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You're always limiting the rights of other people, including their right to live, by asserting your rights. The problem is where to draw the line.
For a country based on certain inalienable rights, Americans sure don't understand the concept very well. While there are some exceptions, for the common good (such as not yelling "fire" in a crowded theater) If someone is able to limit your right by asserting theirs, then you didn't have a right in the first place. The reason they are called inalienable or basic human rights is because they cannot be reduced by others (without violating said right).
So, in the United States, there is a current trend to ban
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There is a difference between a right and an entitlement. A person has a right to their own kidney. They aren't entitled to anyone else's kidney. Sure, there are contrived cases where the distinction is blurred, but with consistent definitions, that doesn't occur much.
There is a lot of confusion over rights, and many lists of 'rights' contain entries tha
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Except it was an attempt to give those ratings the weight of law. Movie ratings have no legal standing. Any attempt by congress to require ratings on movies would fail for the same reason it failed for music.
As a side-note: Remember books? Barnes & Noble has more violence and sexual content than
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If you are going to condemn any society with even modest morals legislation (excluding major things like murder) as tantamount to slavery, there has never been a free people ever.
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We are not free but slaves of puritanism...
This is a major victory for News Delivered Through Video Games, no matter how bad the news is!
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We are not free but slaves of puritanism...
Not sure if you read the article, but we non-puritans just won a 7-2 victory in the Supreme Court today. It's not 9-0 but it's still pretty decisive. Even [insert the opposing side of the other side that sort of matches your own ideology here] is on your side. I couldn't have jumped to ./ any quicker after reading the story elsewhere.
Not surprising (Score:3)
> we non-puritans just won a 7-2 victory
Sort of, yes. This is how everyone expected the case to come out, because it's really hard to convince nine intelligent people whose brilliant and successful clerks grew up playing mortal kombat that violent video games mess kids up... and it's doubly hard to do so without somehow implying that the government can ban books.
Does anybody know of any really good studies on the subject of violent video games? (Something that actually has a control group, for example?
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Does anybody know of any really good studies on the subject of violent video games?
I'd also like to see one that shows real-world effects and explains why violent crime rates aren't exceptionally high despite the seemingly high amount of people that play violent video games.
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Tornadoes aren't drawn to trailer parks. Smaller, more common tornadoes are just sufficiently powerful to do substantial damage in a trailer park, because trailer parks are fragile compared to houses / business districts.
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Heh, looks like he didn't even read the summary, let alone RTFA.
But he got First Post, so, um, Yay for him I guess?
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What about Rated R movies?
What about them? As far as I know, there is no law restricting the sale of R-rated movies, and the MPAA rating system is strictly voluntary, just like the ESRB. Not to mention that the FTC continues to release their annual report that the ESRB is the best voluntary rating system [ftc.gov] in terms of its enforcement at the retailer level.