War on videogames just became more distractionary than ever before - Political Forum

oanswat · #1 (**permalink**) 11-20-2007, 06:53 PM

Hillary wastes time with another videogame battle. I hope I don't have to vote for her because she's a useless politician.

Read this and tell me that the world doesn't have bigger problems to deal with.
Manhunt 2, ESRB in senators' crosshairs - PlayStation 2 News at GameSpot

iTaliAN_ICe · #2 (**permalink**) 11-20-2007, 10:36 PM

I've always felt that the government isn't responsible for censorship of media or video games. It's solely the responsibility of parents to regulate and monitor what their children see or play, and the advocacy of government censorship is nothing more than calling for a government-provided crutch for irresponsible parents who have "better" things to do than take care of their children themselves. If your child can go to a store, purchase a violent video game, and play through it without your knowledge, you probably aren't a very good parent.

To me, this is just one among many reasons not to vote for or support Hillary.

Seer · #3 (**permalink**) 11-21-2007, 01:42 AM

I’m a democrat, and I say that this “family entertainment protection act” is bullshit. If I were a parent I wouldn’t want my kid to take me out to buy him a game because he’s too young to buy it himself (even if it’s manhunt, which is a totally fucked up game).

Also statistics show, people who play lots of video games make better surgeons.

PS. Hillary knows nothing about video games. She is only doing this for other people who don’t know anything about video games so she looks like she’s strong on ‘family values’. This act won’t change much anyway even if it passes.

dahermit · #4 (**permalink**) 11-21-2007, 04:28 AM

Quote:

...Also statistics show, people who play lots of video games make better surgeons.

Show us these "statistics".

Caltex · #5 (**permalink**) 11-21-2007, 09:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iTaliAN_ICe

I've always felt that the government isn't responsible for censorship of media or video games. It's solely the responsibility of parents to regulate and monitor what their children see or play, and the advocacy of government censorship is nothing more than calling for a government-provided crutch for irresponsible parents who have "better" things to do than take care of their children themselves. If your child can go to a store, purchase a violent video game, and play through it without your knowledge, you probably aren't a very good parent.

To me, this is just one among many reasons not to vote for or support Hillary.

100% agreed. Censoring what children see on television and in other media forms is the parents responsibility, not the governments.

Kazikli Bey · #6 (**permalink**) 11-21-2007, 11:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iTaliAN_ICe

I've always felt that the government isn't responsible for censorship of media or video games. It's solely the responsibility of parents to regulate and monitor what their children see or play, and the advocacy of government censorship is nothing more than calling for a government-provided crutch for irresponsible parents who have "better" things to do than take care of their children themselves. If your child can go to a store, purchase a violent video game, and play through it without your knowledge, you probably aren't a very good parent.

To me, this is just one among many reasons not to vote for or support Hillary.

Agreed as well, but i feel the government should have some say over the age ratings for these games and the timeslots for certain movies and shows (which they probably do anyway)

Caltex · #7 (**permalink**) 11-22-2007, 10:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kazikli Bey

Agreed as well, but i feel the government should have some say over the age ratings for these games and the timeslots for certain movies and shows (which they probably do anyway)

Pretty much every TV has the settings available to block certain channels, Digital Cable and Satellite have options to block programming based on its ratings. Parents have no excuses for not monitoring what the kids see on TV, even if the kids are home alone watching TV.

If a cable network wants to show blood and gore at 3:00 in the afternoon, they should be able to if their customers want it. It should be the parents responsibility to block or password off that channel. Banning it to be played until the evening is censoring the content that a network can sell to it's customers.

For Video games, it's in the developers best interest to self regulate ratings, as to avoid the potential wrath of angry parents. =P

Iostream · #8 (**permalink**) 11-23-2007, 03:28 AM

I HATE Jack Thompson

Seer · #9 (**permalink**) 11-23-2007, 04:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seer

Also statistics show, people who play lots of video games make better surgeons.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dahermit

Show us these "statistics".

Quote:

The results, published in the February issue of Archives of Surgery, showed that "video game skills translated into higher scores on a day-and-half-long surgical skills test", Reuters reports. Of the 33 surgeons from Beth Israel Medical Centre in New York, the nine "who had at some point played video games at least three hours per week" boasted "37 per cent fewer errors, performed 27 per cent faster, and scored 42 per cent better in the test".

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/02...m_up_surgeons/

Quote:

The correlation between video games and surgical skills was apparently so high that it proved to be an even greater indicator of performance than either the length of an individual's surgical training or their prior experience with laporscopic surgery.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/02/20/g...ns-study-says/

Quote:

NEW YORK - All those years on the couch playing Nintendo and PlayStation appear to be paying off for surgeons. Researchers found that doctors who spent at least three hours a week playing video games made about 37 percent fewer mistakes in laparoscopic surgery and performed the task 27 percent faster than their counterparts who did not play video games.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4685909/

There are some doubts,

Quote:

"The problem with correlational research of this sort is you don't know whether it's good hand-eye coordination that's causing both doctors to play a lot of video games and be good at surgery, or if it's playing the video games that gave them the good hand-eye coordination," Cooper said. "It's impossible to say whether it was actually the video games that were responsible for the better surgical skills."
...
Gentile also believes video games are able to revolutionize the way surgical training is performed. He said the current model for surgical training is outdated, comprised of a "see one, do one, teach one" approach where surgeons learn by observing and performing surgeries.

"One problem with that model is that all of our bodies are actually really different from each other," Gentile said.

"With video games, we could scan in a hundred different cadavers. We could have surgeons practicing on their PlayStation 3 all these different combinations of complications and errors and body types and ways to do the surgery, all before they ever see a patient."

Gentile embraces the option of innovative training, and thinks that a kind of virtual surgery could be beneficial.

"We could do a lot better than 'see one, do one, teach one,' and video games could get us there," Gentile said.

http://media.www.iowastatedaily.com/...-2747157.shtml

LiveUninhibited · #10 (**permalink**) 05-03-2008, 03:08 AM

The bill that required the ESRB to actually play the games they rated made sense to me. I do agree that it is the parents responsibility to regulate what their children do, but we can't expect them to know enough about video games to make an informed choice unless the ESRB is effective.

I started playing GTA IV recently. It's pretty fun, a great way to get out frustration. Anybody think video games actually help people by helping them get out their emotions or whatever without harming real people?