The Vulcan defense

Can video games make kids more violent? No one really knows. I prefer to think that kids with violent tendencies are just naturally attracted to games that allow them to act out those tendencies. Anyway, unless you live under a rock or are an ignoramus, you probably know that video game violence has gone to court.

On Tuesday the Supreme Court heard California’s appeal and debate of whether states can restrict the sale of violent games to children and teenagers. Video games now reach into two-thirds of American households according to the video game industry. Many games put players into a fantasy drama of good versus evil. And more than a few of those contain violence.

The state’s lawyers have argued that the games are getting ever more realistic in their graphics and sound, and that they can immerse the young in an evil world of intense violence, torture, burning, and mayhem. Nonetheless, I think California is in the wrong here. Parents should be the ones policing their children’s video game addiction.

Enough about that… I really just wanted to point out this surreal exchange from the oral arguments (Supreme Court oral arguments often contain such tidbits):

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: Would a video game that portrayed a Vulcan, as opposed to a human being, maimed and tortured, would that be covered by the act?

MR. MORAZZINI: No, it wouldn’t, Your Honor, because the act is only directed towards the range of options that are able to be inflicted on a human being.

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: So if the video producer says this is not a human being, it’s an android computer simulated person, then all they have to do is put a little artificial feature on the creature and they could sell the video game?

MR. MORAZZINI: Under the act, yes, because California’s concern—I think this is one of the reasons that sex and violence are so similar—these are base 12 physical acts we are talking about, Justice Sotomayor. So limiting, narrowing our law here in California, there in California to violence—violent depictions against human beings.

Check out Wired for a fuller account of the oral arguments. Or just read them yourself.

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Artist, satirist, and occasional blogger, Andrew has been drawing since he could hold a crayon. He started with squiggles, but they were darned good squiggles if he says so himself. And he will, just ask.
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