Will the Supreme Court Allow California to Ban Violent Video Games?

It’s funny how the beginning of a new year can make everything feel so vibrant and full of possibilities.  After all, time is relative.  Our perception of it is based off of our calendars and clocks which we derived from our planet’s orbit.  But to other species, it’s determined by food availability, weather, sun light, and any number of other survival factors.  They seem to get along well enough without clocks and certainly don’t blow off fireworks or watch balls drop at midnight each time 365 days pass.

Yet for us humans, a new year holds so much promise.  Perhaps it’s because it’s the only time of the year where one can truly feel like they can see ahead at what’s to come, much like a hiker on a mountain summit looking off into the horizon to plot their course.

Sorry, I wasn’t planning to get this philosophical on you guys.  A new year always turns me into an armchair Socrates.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is because I was going over the current 2011 docket for the U.S. Supreme Court and realized that this is the year the highest court in our land will be deciding whether or not to uphold California’s law banning the sale of video games to children.

After hearing oral arguments last November, the court’s decision for Schwarzenegger v. Entertainment Merchants Association is due out this year.  Both sides have recently written their own respective op-ed on the subject, with the bill’s originator Senator Leland Yee writing a piece in support and Activision Blizzard VP George Rose penning one in opposition.

In case anyone out there isn’t familiar with this case, way back in 2005 Gov. Schwarzenegger signed AB 1179 into California law which made it illegal to sell violent video games to minors.  The video game industry argued largely that the new law violated the First Amendment, while supporters argued the bill was constitutional and a necessary safeguard to protect children.  Up until that point the video game industry largely regulated itself when it came to content ratings for their games, which were and still are provided by the Electronic Software Rating Board.

However, because the new California law would have criminalized selling violent games to minors, game developers would have less incentive from a profitability stand point to create games with any violent content.  Thus the law would have something of a chilling effect on creativity since if a developer can’t profit from games with any violent content, than there’d be less reason to make one.  And after a long legal battle, the case finally went up to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Now, both sides seem to have valid arguments.  In this day and age, video game development costs are on par with major motion pictures.  The industry itself is valued in the billions and therefore any laws of this kind could spell disaster for it and consumers who would suffer from poorer quality games (imagine if the only movies that were available had Hannah Montana in it).  Furthermore, the law is also somewhat unconstitutional as the film, book, and music industries provide products that contain equal if not more violence than found in video games and yet remain self-regulated.  On the other hand, though violence in any form of entertainment or media has yet to be definitively proven to cause violent behavior in children, video games with disturbing content shouldn’t be readily available to minors as they can be quite traumatic.

So it seems then that we’re at an impasse.  But, like most impossible situations in life, upon closer inspection they’re not always quite as impossible as they seem.

Though pundits and representatives from each side may want to make this law seem solely a legal debate in nature, the fact of the matter is that it’s not so black and white.  Really, when it comes to minors, regulation of any inappropriate content should always exist.  However, such regulation should be done by the parents or guardians of those children.  I’m reminded of the flack President Obama received when he told parents that they had to step up when it came to raising their children.  His words were simple: if you have a child, they are your responsibility.  Yet for some reason in this age of 24/7 news networks, his message became garbled into an attack against . . . who knows?  Everyone, I guess if you’re to believe Fox News.

Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that when it comes to controlling what kids see or don’t see, the decision should be handed down by responsible parents rather than pushed off to the legislature.  After all, laws are only respected if people can see why they are important.

But what do you guys think?  As always, sound off below.