http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/l...re/6767623.stm

Funny, I thought I lived in a free country...

Not that I have any interest in playing it (gfx card couldn't hack it anyway), but I'm an adult, I can decide for myself what I do with my time.

Right, not some pyscho, a piece of software. When is this hand-wringing going to stop. Awww, poor little Johnny was unduly influenced by this nasty game. Er, no, if little Johnny can't differentiate between fantasy and reality, then he is a fscking headcase who should be in a straight jacket.

Sure, the state dictating to people what they can do in their own homes, what's not to like?

Freedom doesn't preclude restrictions or censorship. Those are both functions of the legislative bodies of the individual countries, states, municipalities, etc. In the U.S. we have some protections from abusive censorship granted by our 1st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In the U.K., though, I haven't a clue.

I think that their point is that they want to stop the headcases from being pushed over the edge. But there is no way to draw the line. A movie in the US, "Taxi Driver" influenced a nut case to shoot President Reagan. If the movie "Mary Poppins" influenced people to dance on root tops, would it have been banned?

In the US we did have a song, "Funny Farm", that many States banned. A guy was chanting "I'm on my way to the Funny Farm, Ha Ha". People turned themselves into the state institutions in droves! So it was banned because the Mental Institutions couldn't handle the load. However wouldn't it be better to require all stations to play it at least once a day? Anyone who would be influenced by such a stupid song is crazy anyway and belongs in an institution. It was actually a good screening tool.

HAHA! I whole-heartedly agree!

The U.S. Bill of Rights is derived from England's Magna Carta.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta

And I'm pretty sure I learned that in ninth grade.

True. However, the operative word there is "influenced". I do not believe that the Magna Carta had any provisions guaranteeing free speech or any of the other rights granted by the 1st Amendment. I don't know enough about U.K. law to say what their current rights are these days.

Perhaps that's because free speech is one of those self-evident and inalienable rights that doesn't require the approval of any legislative body.

The US Constitution's Bill of Rights is where these inalienable rights were legislated.

No, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were defined as inalienable in the Declaration of Independence, which is not law.

And when in the course of human events lawyers get out of control again... well, there's a remedy for that too.

I questioned US history lessons in school. The puritans were persecuted for a reason: Their attempt to impose their beliefs, and stifle creativity and the arts. As soon as the puritans 'escaped', more like thrown out , England flourished (English Renaissance).

"How uptight do you have to be for the English to say: Get the fsck out!" - Robin Williams

I seem to recall that the English Renaissance pre-dated the Mayflower thing.

Exactly, it can't be done. If spilling someone's coffee makes them go on a murderous rampage, what're you going to do? Ban coffee? Ban people from walking within arms length of each other? Criminalising innocent people in order to pander to the delicate sensibilities of a few deranged wackos is not consistent with my understanding of concepts such as "democracy" and "freedom".

.

LOL.

I have long believed this. In the UK, there's currently a lot of talk about deterring people from committing crime (apparently, the prisons are "full"). On the contrary, I'd _encourage_ people to commit crime. Then those who are prepared to casually ignore others' rights can be identified and removed from society. I don't want to live in a country full of would-be criminals and wackos whose only reason for not committing crime is that their tiny shrivelled nads don't produce enough testosterone to let them risk the consequences.

As for this censorship, today it is merely an insult to intelligence of the public, the "authorities" are basically saying "We think you're too stupid to type a few words into google, so we'll ban this thing and prevent you from gaining access to it". Censorship is only justifiable in a very few cases (e.g. for matters relating to national security). Censorship based on personal prejudice (I don't like this so let's ban it) is immoral.

In any case, this whole concept of banning things in order to "protect" people from some alleged bogeyman would seem to rub up against (at least) Article 17 of the ECHR.

Anyway, I'm off to amazon.com to order Manhunt 2.

What games of this type do is disrupt the command and control mechanisms of our social engineers. They promote "in group" violence which victimizes people who live within the aggressor's community. Thus people who are in close proximity to the aggressor will most likely be the victims of their assault.

You may think that it does not effect you but it does. It affects where you live. Where you travel and even how you dress.

If you read this article, http://www.killology.com/article_teachkid.htm ,you see that video games are excellent teaching tools for training impressionable minds to use in game skills in real life situations.

So if you think about it, the ban on the game is an attempt to make you more free then less; because the ban seeks to limit the number of potential aggressors within your community. Don't you want to live a community where you are free from the possibility of being robbed, raped or murdered?

I know I want to live in place free of fear and violence. How about you?

I totally agree. That game is disgusting. It's banned where I am (UK) and also the rest of Europe. The government has a duty to protect its populace from obscene material, in exactly the same way that violent pornography is also banned here, because it is undisputably a deleterious influence on society, inciting acts of violence and aggression.

Levels of violence far inferior to what has been reported in connection to this game have already been studied finding for example, a direct correlation between amount of violence seen on screen and murder rates (e.g. the peak in murders 3 days after the heavyweight boxing championships) and also even more alarmingly, between the viewing of violence in childhood and adult aggression (Eron et al, 1972).

Am I saying that e.g. boxing should be banned? Not necessarily, no. The matter is one of proportion - and as much as one may see the artistic 'merit' of this game, unlike boxing, the direct and immediately negative effect of such exceedingly violent video games on people's behaviour - both in the short and long term - is without equal.

A look at the science:
Though more work needs to be done on links between the amount of violence in a game and real life hostile behaviour, the underlying connection between in-game violence and real-world aggression has been consistently shown. Read this meta-analysis (an overview of all the available credible scientific papers on a topic) for more info.
http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/fa...-2004/01AB.pdf

To quote the review:

"[the] ...effect of violent video games on aggression is as strong as the effect of condom use on risk of HIV infection (Weller, 1993)."

and even more damningly:

"These results clearly support the hypothesis that exposure to violent video games poses a public-health threat to children and youths, including college-age individuals" (emphasis added).

No, I most certainly don't.

Free from the possibility ??? !!! ??? The only way to remove the possibility of violence is to lobotomise the entire human race.

I want to live in a society where people are free to live their own lives without being dictated to by the government or by the "majority". I want to live in a society where people behave in a civilised manner BECAUSE THEY WANT TO, not because the've been socially engineered by the dictatorial fascists in power. I.e. in a democracy.

Entirely subjective. Personally, I find religion disgusting, does give me the right to call for it to be banned?

That is a fascist statement. In a free country the government, by definition, has no right to dictate morality to people. Morality is a personal issue (I believe the death penalty is immoral, does that mean I can invade Texas?).

Whether games affect aggression or not is irrelevant. You conduct yourself in a civilised manner. Period. Your "feelings" are irrelevant. Lots of things make me aggressive. Incompetent government makes me a lot more aggressive than any computer game has ever done. So what? I've never been in a physical "altercation" with anyone. Why? Because I'm an adult, I conduct myself in a civilised manner. Anyone who mindlessly allows themselves to controlled by anything (games/books/religion/whatever) is a danger to society.

So what? What does that have to do with adults? You can't ban something because it _might_ adversely affect a certain portion of society. Children aren't mature enough to have sex, does mean sex whould be banned? And frankly, any "college-age" individual who can't control themselves in society needs to be removed from it, regardless of what they do in their spare time.

State sponsored social engineering is immoral, illegal, and fascist. If you think it's acceptable for the government to tell you what you're allowed to see, do, read, and/or think, then you are a slave.