As you mentioned, there would have to be a commission set up to regulate the law – I find it interesting that California, which is essentially bankrupt, would even attempt to enlarge the size of its government when they are laying off civil workers on a huge scale, and dropping the pay of many who remain down to minimum wage.

Additionally, a certain amount of law enforcement would have to be allocated to investigating claims of illegal sales (and, perhaps, setting up ‘sting’ operations) of video games…when they could be out catching real criminals who pose a threat to the population at large. It just leaves me scratching me head.

I agree that the part cited would fall under violence rather than sexuality, but considering that legal precedence is often fluid (meaning that precedence from an unrelated but circumstantially similar case is often used in other court cases) it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that other ‘adult’ themes would fall under the purview of the legal definition of an ‘adult’ game.

And the language used in the original bill which the Court struck down was, indeed, intentionally nebulous. While LAW can be very specific, LEGISLATION is often written with possible future interpretation in mind.

An example would be the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which supposedly allowed for terrorists to be tried by a military commission as opposed to a court of law for any nefarious act they committed. But, as the law reads, anyone can be labeled as a terrorist (or “unlawful enemy combatant”) at the whim of the Executive branch with no more proof other than accusation, and be given no Constitutionally legal recourse in defending themselves legally. The Obama administration cited the act when they declared that detainees held in places like Guantanamo Bay not only had to rely on a military commission to have their day in court, but they could also be held indefinitely at the behest of the Executive branch…even if they are found not guilty by the military commission. These abuses of civil liberties are a direct result of the intentional vagueness of the legislation; I believe that the California law (which was also left open to a great deal of interpretation due to its language), among a great many other bills and acts, was left purposely vague in much the same fashion. From a legislative point of view, it’s much easier to have some legal maneuvering room that to have to re-write and pass a new law every few years to cover unforeseen circumstances. Unfortunately, this ‘slacking’ often leads to misuse and corruption of intent.

Great questions, Aeternitas. I’m not sure if you are contributing to my insomnia this evening or not (it’s almost 4 am as I write this), but I’m grateful for the brain exercise :>

The section you quoted referred to sexual assault, however that’s merely one tiny area of a vastly larger field of human behavior, and in my opinion properly belongs under violence rather than sexuality.

The issue I’m not understanding, is the use of the term “adult” when it seems as if the suit was exclusively concerned with violent video games. You’re saying this was done deliberately as part of a legal strategy?

While the suit seemed to rely heavily on the ‘violent’ content of games, the actual definition of ‘adult games’, as defined by the California law, does indeed include graphic sexuality…although it does not explicitly state it.

If I may quote from the article:
“The legal definition of violent games, according to the suit, would be games, “in which the range of options available to a player includes killing, maiming, dismembering or sexually assaulting an image of a human being…in a way that is patently offensive… appeals to minors’ deviant or morbid interests…and lacks serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value.”

The last two sections would indeed cover sexual topics, and are intentionally broad – if the SOTUS would have allows such a law to remain uncontested the vagueness of the law would ensure that, from a legal standpoint, further embellishment and interpretation would be easily inserted by the state.

The wording of the last few bits are almost identical to the laws concerning pornography; this was done intentionally in order to use legal precedence from past cases involving pornography in future cases which would involve the sale of video games. Law itself is very much about precedent…and legislation is worded very specifically in order to apply precedent and interpretation where none exists.

Luckily, as the Court branded the legislation with a big, red stamp of “Unconstitutional” this will be something we don’t have to worry about. For now.

What about games with sexual content? I find it really amusing for example, that at my local Blockbuster, the only copies of Catherine to be found on the shelves are those with the “alternate” box cover. Personally I don’t see anything wrong with the regular box cover. Grand Theft Auto games however, I find to be offensive and I laugh at the notion that they are in any way “adult.”

I wonder if the industry wins the recovery suit, if we’ll see a commemorative Home T-shirt :>

And, which I appreciate the civility of your reply, I must add that the call for such was not mine…but, perhaps, a good idea none the less.

@Kid: To clarify, the FCC has oversight over all broadcasts of a terrestrial nature. Even cable channels are subject to FCC regulation, although the regulations vary (sometimes drastically) from the rules concerning major network broadcasts.

Interesting thing is that the “majors” are still under the same rules they followed years ago even though there is no more open air broadcasting. I wonder if that will change soon?

@Filthcrow: Interesting point about the ‘skewering’ of the ESRB ratings. If you look back through the history of mainstream entertainment in the US, violence (even extreme violence) has always been somewhat acceptable, while sex had (until recent years) been something which wasn’t talked about.

Flicking through the TV dial 50 years ago one could turn on The Guns of Wil Sonnet (a western with gunfights galore) or I Love Lucy (a comedy where the husband and wife team slept in SEPARATE beds). Go to the movies and you could see gangsters gun each other down and cartoons which can be considered extremely violent, but even the mere mention of a ‘garter’ would bring a gasp of surprise to an adult audience.

This lopsided social norm also found its way into government: regulations stated that a kid could buy a comic (filed with violence) or pulp novel (do they even have those anymore?) but one has to be 18 to get Playboy.

There has always been a puritanical bent to our socital norms which seems to favor violence over sex; this has only lessened in the last 35 years or so (that being said, I personally find that mainstream media has become over-sexualized).

Historically speaking, the focus of this trodding down of sex and sexuality in our media has almost always come from religious fundamentalism…but I wonder if perhaps the complexities of sexuality are just that much harder for humans to digest than the inelegant simplicity of violence.

I like to have a rating system (no matter how flawed) for my own guidance but I would never want my ultimate decision to be imposed on somebody else.

Over the air radio and TV stations are subject to sanctions by the FCC but cable channels are not (or so I understand). This seems somewhat strange to me and perhaps that will be another wall to fall. We’ll see. Perhaps this is not relevant.

Obviously print media and internet sites can control as to what they allow.