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Honduras Bans Video Games
from the not-really-solving-the-problem... dept
The latest country to ignore real problems and pretend to fix things with laws that do absolutely nothing useful is Honduras, which is now banning all violent video games. Retailers have six months to get rid of all violent toys and video games such as Quake and Doom. As the Register points out, the country has over 50% of people living beneath the poverty level. It seems unlikely that games like Doom are the major contributing factor to youth gangs.
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Game Ethics
The typical techie is obliged to say that there should be no regulation of violent video games, based on the "freedom" argument.
If we take that argument seriously, it should be OK to make games like "Klan Lynching 2002", "SimWifeBeating", "Child Predator III", "Animal Abuse Expansion Pak".
The line has to be drawn somewhere.
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Re: Game Ethics
The question here isn't whether or not violent games lead to violence in real life. The question here is how in a country where more than half the people can't afford to eat regular meals, can children afford to buy not only video games, but the game systems or PCs that are needed to play these games.
Growing up, I spent a lot of time in arcades and I still play a lot of video games, but I think that if it came down to being able to put food in my hungry belly, or be able to play Quake, I'd go for the food.
The other side of the equation is that once the violent video games are outlawed, they'll have even more attraction to outlaws, so I have to wonder if the youth gangs will be robbing people so they can afford to buy a PS2...
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Re: Game Ethics
Perhaps there is moral outrage at the notion of rich kids playing violent video games in a country where half the people are starving. This law would aim to appease such plebian moral indignation. That's the dilemma of democracy -- if the country is full of plebians, do you pass laws to appease their simplistic, hypocritical values?
An unintended consequence of the law could be that rich kids, deprived of easy access to video games, might join more vigilante groups where they play Doom with street kids.
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