We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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The slave begs for the lash ELSPA director general Mike Rawlinson said:
The discovery that the Video Recordings Act is not enforceable is obviously very surprising. In the interest of child safety it is essential that this loophole is closed as soon as possible.
In this respect the videogames industry will do all it can to support and assist the government to that effect. ELSPA will therefore advise our members to continue to forward games to be rated as per the current agreement while the legal issues are being resolved.
FFS!
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Obviously, the irony that many stores are, out of fear for losing custom, maintaining a “responsible” sales policy despite there no longer being an obligation to, is not lost on this man.
It sort of puts into disrespute the need for such laws in the first place.
Ok, I mean it IS lost on him. Damn.
Well, they know that even a slight indication of disagreement will just open them up to attack. Corporatism at its finest.
I’m trying to put together a Cats post about this thing. The Act, introduced by Graham Bright MP, was a classic rightleft puritan stitch-up. The Commons Debate on its introduction is a classic example of how shit the Commons is, and always has been. it’s just a circle jerk. Some nice quotes include, from Graham Bright-
What kind of a pathetic git is this man?
And this odious example of what has been so very wrong with our polity for a very long time-
That’s how we do it here. We pretend the government isn’t censoring because they empower a quango to do it.
Nice quango, at arms length, far from democracy, can’t blame the government, nothing to do with us that you can’t watch a movie, we’re a free country, it isn’t censorship!
Makes my blood boil, it really does.
Might do a T-shirt:
I Spit on the VRA’s Grave
ELSPA? But videogames were never covered by the act anyway, and until now it was always opposed to compulsion. What is it up to?
Declare your interest, Ian!
19% APR
Droll.
I did enjoy the Times’ headline:
Error leaves children unprotected under 1984 Video Recordings Act
“Quick Mildred, lock the children in the cellar until they are protected again!”
Sam Duncan,
Actually it is a terrible muddle, the VRA probably does apply to some games, and you can be prosecuted for selling a game that has been voluntarily submitted to the censor to someone under the age the censor decrees the game is suitable for.
The industry is protecting its lobbying position, and has been sucking up to compulsion for some time now, in aid of ensuring that the compulsion is of a preferable variety, i.e. to use PEGI.
A bit of context:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/06/18/game_age_limits/
Ah. It looks like I’m a bit behind the times regarding ELSPA’s position, then.
This thread makes me want to sell cigarettes and CDs of Half-Life (or better yet, Strip Poker for the Commodore 64) to small children.
I see this occurred under the Thatcher government. It may not have been an accident, I always suspected old Maggie of being a closet pron-monger.
What’s interesting about this spat is the reason why this law is unenforceable: apparently it’s a technicality caused by some apparatchik back in John Major’s time failing to get the correct permission from the Supreme Government in Brussels before passing the law.
Kind of shows you who’s really in charge, doesn’t it?
How do we get rid of them? You don’t.
It reminds me of the drug companies in the United States supporting (indeed spending millions of Dollars in ads for) Comrade President Barack Obama’s health care take over.
The one true thing the left says is that many businessmen are greedy cowardly pigs – who can be made to support anything via a mixture of promises of special favours and (even more) out of FEAR.
Not all business people are such “pragmatists” out to “make a deal” (out of a mixture of greed and fear) – but far too many are.