game girl advance: It's Not Your Fault

It's Not Your Fault

Hey, just blame video-games! As it turns out, a couple of lawmakers in Seattle would like to force makers of video-games to be liable whenever some idiot kid loses their mind and goes on a shooting spree.

Since there's no point in even going over how rediculous this sounds (and how this is the wrong state to try and get that legislation passed; hello, Microsoft?), let's extrapolate what else could happen if this law were to be, uh, legalized, due to precedent.

Gun manufacturers would be liable every time someone is killed using a firearm. While this sounds good, it would allow families of criminals to sue the companies that made the cop's gun.
Knife manufacturers would be liable every time someone used a knife in a slaying.
Parents would be liable, as they made the kid (Grandparents could also be found liable, as they made the kids that made the kid).
Movies and TV Shows are reduced to lumps of people sitting around breathing, after being sued by everyone and their Moms due to sex and violence issues. Eventually, even breathing is found to be offensive and sexually suggestive.
Pipe-wrench, lamp, and candlestick manufacturers everywhere are sued due to "unsafe" equipment that allowed spouses in a fit of rage to hit their significant others.
Playboy is sued in record numbers for teen pregnancies.
Mtv goes bankrupt (besides the morally part) after parents everywhere sue for their kids getting bad grades.
VH1 is sued for causing short attention spans with their new "Worst Week Ever" series.

Anyone got any others? Posted by bowler at March 04, 2005 08:07 AM

I'm suing the video game industry for the countless hours I've spent in my public school days staring at the ceiling and pretending the panels were tetris blocks. Man, I fucked wasted hours and I still don't know Calculus all these years later.

My main problem with this isn't even the censorship of games. It's allowing people to blame video games whenever someone does something stupid. If I bludgeon my fucking head on a brick wall, maybe I can sue Nintendo and say I grew up with Mario. Maybe when I try to shoot my dog, I can blame Duck Hunt, cause that fucker kept laughing at me. Not to mention putting bombs under dinosaurs or shooting a gun at blue doors to get them open.

I like to paraphrase Chris Rock and say whatever happened to kids just being crazy?

Posted by: Mike on March 4, 2005 11:32 AM

skyknyt: So true! I've always found it interesting that religion never takes the flak for people who say that God told them to kill people.

I also agree with Jane's point about the fate of TV and movies. People always think that making more laws is the answer, but they don't realize that more laws require more lawyers. Eventually, creativity becomes the sole domain of those who can afford to have a law firm in their back pocket. And even those people will probably play it safe to avoid prosecution under vague censorship laws.

Posted by: Casey on March 4, 2005 03:44 PM

A quick couple of things that need to be pointed out about the legal system: if the statute essentially establishes absolute liability (I wouldn't know), then no precedent would be needed to establish its application. It just is the law. Something happens, someone goes to court, boom, apply the statute and it's done. Judgment for plaintiff.

That's assuming that such a law can be drafted so as not to run afoul of the first amendment - trust me, it's not hard to find a lawyer who'll make a pretty damn good case that interactive entertainment is an instance of free speech, and will file every appeal they are allowed to make. If it gets to the U.S. Supreme Court, and they side with the lawyer for the game makers, the law is essentially done for.

On the flipside, if the law does not lay absolute liability at the feet of a game company, there are all sorts of issues about making a strong case of causation leading from a game maker to a victim, that would pretty much ignore the free agency of the actor/aggressor. To anyone suying under a negligence based law, I'd say: good luck. You're really gonna need it.

I'm willing to bet even if passed the statute is going to become a dead piece of law that's on the books just so legislators can pat themselves on the back and say they've been pro-active on violence caused by videogames.

Posted by: turandot on March 7, 2005 09:29 AM