Jack Vs. Video Games
Jack Thompson is in the news again, rather a lot lately. When it comes to the debate on video game violence, I think there are a couple of things that are clouding the issue:
Videogames are new. A certain amount of this unquestionably comes from the fact that video games are a new medium. Plays, books, the waltz, movies, jazz, rock ‘n roll, etc. have all been regarded as a corrupting influence on the youth of the time. It’s hard to separate out how much of this is legitimate, and how much of it is old people’s predilection for objecting to new things. It’s telling that there is a big hue and cry over kids being able to buy M rated video games, but no outrage all over the fact that it even easier for kids to walk into the Borders and by R-rated movies on DVD or books with mature content. People complain about the ESRB’s rating system, yet the problems with the MPAA’s rating system — illuminated at length in This Film Is Not yet Rated — are virtually ignored. Of course, as anyone who’s ever worked in a videogame store can tell you, a lot of parents are staggeringly, devastatingly ignorant about video games. Some parents just can’t wrap their heads around the idea that a videogame might not be appropriate for children, and some just don’t seem to care. (Not to mention the parents who doggedly insist that there are Mario games available on Xbox, and other unfounded misconceptions).
Jack Thompson himself is the kind of figure whose absence from the debate would benefit both sides. Keeping mature content out of the hands of kids, and giving parents the tools to do so, is a worthy and legitimate cause. Considering that the notion that kids aren’t mature enough to handle violent videogames is at the heart of this issue, it’s ironic and unfortunate that Thompson has a way of coming off like a flailing man-child at times. He insists on calling violent videogames “murder simulators,” accuses anyone who disagrees with him of being in the industry’s pocket, and had no qualms about calling the head of the IGDA an “idiot” and “jackass” on national television. This does not speak well of his desire to have legitimate debate on the issue, and indeed it’s very much his style to repeat whatever he’s decided is the truth over and over. I really do wish that gamers wouldn’t threaten him with violence though. Real-life violence doesn’t solve anything.
Of course, Thompson can’t seem to comprehend why it is that he gets those kinds of threats and people like Leeland Yee and Hillary Clinton don’t. Of those involved, no one else has so consistently threatened to sue their critics, no other major public figure has behaved like a common troll in public forums (GamePolitics had to ban him from commenting multiple times), and I’m pretty sure no one else has ever had the gall to compare the release of a game developed in Scotland on a Japanese-made a game console in the United States to the attack on Pearl Harbor. In the latter case I’m not even sure who’s being insulted more, and yet when questioned about this he resolutely insisted that he was justified in saying so. The latest on him is that he is filing a civil suit against the Florida Bar, as well as Kotaku and others. This time he managed to include a “liberal conspiracy theory,” and he managed to display incompetence at being a lawyer.
I have no idea why Jack Thompson fascinates us so, but it probably needs to stop. This is an important issue for a lot of people, and his side deserves one better than him to represent it.
