Soldier Of Fortune: Must Be 18 To Play 560
Here's the line that grabbed my attention:
Soldier of Fortune allows users to assume the identity of John Mullins, an anti-terrorist mercenary, who kills and maims animals and humans during a series of armed missions.
"Depending on which weapon is used, the participant can enact gory violence that results in the horror of evisceration, decapitation, dismemberment and victims burning to death," said a report from Mary-Louise McCausland, B.C.'s director of film classification.
Here's how I feel about people who complain that animals get killed and maimed in video games.
For relaxation and burning off some stress, I enjoy fighting some bots in QuakeIII or some human beings in MythII. I've never played "Soldier of Fortune," but the screenshots are roughly as bloody as Q3A's giblets of flesh when a rocket hits a dead body. Or Myth's (smaller, but painfully realistic) arcs of bleeding limbs that bounce around after an explosion, leaking red into the ground.
Myth's "WW2" plugin is quite good. It's fun to throw a grenade into a knot of unsuspecting enemy soldiers. That pretty much covers "evisceration," "decapitation," and "dismemberment" (distinctions without a difference, since the bloody body parts all start to look the same after a while). As far as "victims burning to death," the new plugin allows four or more flamethrower units on some maps.
I also work with a local animal rescue organization. Every week at shelters across the country, dogs, cats, rabbits, and other nonhuman animals are being put to death because nobody will take them. We try to take in a few animals, those we can find room for, to give them a chance at life that lasts longer than seven days. And we help educate adopters, to give the animals their best chance in their new home.
Also, I'm a vegetarian (vegan, actually). Why? Because in comparison to the quick, clean death of the shelter, most animals' encounter with humans is bloody and violent.
Every day, we slaughter and eat tens of thousands of cows, gentle animals. Every day, a million pounds of veal - or, let's call it what it is, baby cow. Sixteen billion pounds of pig every year (divide, please, by the edible meat per pig).
I'm sure I don't need to describe the conditions under which these animals live and die. Everyone knows about factory farms already. Most of us simply try not to think about it. When I hear about someone abusing a dog, or a horse, or some other "popular" animal, I can't help but think about the pig, or the cow, that at that exact second has finally given up its life, and whose muscles will be on a plate later this week.
And when I hear about lawmakers wanting to stop digital violence, I think about the one in my area who called about an accidental litter of babies from their unspayed and unneutered pets. In poor health, they didn't live long; but even if they had, unwanted animals rarely get much of a life. Every new litter either ends up in the shelter, or crowds some other animals in to be killed.
Is violence against animals more acceptable because it's done at arm's length, in gas chambers - or perhaps because they starve to death before their eyes open? Is that same legislator going to vote, in his career, to stamp out cartoon violence, or computer violence, or some other kind of unreal images?
The "animals" that you can "kill and maim" in Soldier of Fortune are dogs and cows. One area that the player fights in is a meat-packing plant, and there are a few cows in a pasture nearby that can be shot (or not).
How horrible that 17-year-olds might be able to pretend to kill cows in a virtual slaughterhouse. Of course, the real slaughterhouses in British Columbia pump well over $100 million annually into the economy, 15% of which comes from resources owned by the government.
Want to kill real cows? The government will be glad to subsidize your job. Want to kill virtual cows? Sorry, son, you're too young; we can't have you exposed to such violence.
So to the Attorney General and to the so-called "film classification" office of British Columbia, who are so concerned about violence, take a look in the mirror. What have you done for animals lately, besides double the rate at which you slaughter them?
Groups like this always claim that they are concerned about children being desensitized to violence. I only wish they had a chance to get sensitized in the first place. As if it isn't enough of a mixed message - the stuff that we force kids to eat while telling them that hurting animals is wrong. Now 17-year-olds can't play a video game because it's called violent - and real violence is still called dinner.
Re:No one in America kills animals for food (Score:2)
I always wonder whether a lion should feel guilty about eating meat, which I intuitively doubt, and then wonder why I should if a lion shouldn't.
--
Re:bad example (Score:2)
Still, I think that the main point is that while a gun isn't the only thing that lets people kill, it it the only thing (other than explosives, nuclear armaments, etc.) that lets killing be done on such a scale by a single person. You would have a hard time rushing into a restaurant and strangling 12 people before being overpowered, and very few people die in drive-by knifings (to the best of my knowledge, at least),
"Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:2)
Good grazy, man! You sound like a low-budget children's action show (Re:Dragonball Z [everything2.com], Power Rangers [everything2.com], etc.): The good guys are good because they kill (not arrest and rehabilitate, not kill by lethal injection, but kill as in murder) the bad guys. That's not the way it works in real life. Killing innocents does not waiver their right to a fair trial. Killing them, rather than arresting them waivers this right, and is therefore, wrong.
If the only way to prevent them from killing an innocent is to kill them immediately, without the trial, then it's okay, IMO, but otherwise it's not.
Re:it's on-topic (Score:2)
You're more than a little uninformed as well.
The top court in BC decided that under current law, the possession of child pornography was not illegal. They recommended changing the law so that it would be, but until that happens, the courts consider possession legal. Production remains quite illegal.
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Re:violence is worse than pr0n (Score:2)
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Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
NZ thinks like this too..... (Score:2)
Tough.
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
I tried working in an animal shelter... (Score:2)
We ought to... (Score:2)
Sorry for the extra-OT post. I like the idea, anyway... :) Mmmm, bacon...
Cultural Differences (Score:4)
Re:It's going to happen in the U.S. too (Score:2)
Dylan Klebold was one of them. Eric Harris was the other.
sadist and masochist? (Score:2)
look at evolution. The experience of pain evolved because it was unpleasant, so animals like us would avoid it and not get burnt to death or whatever.
Many worthwhile things can only be had through accepting pain, I would go so far as to say that any expenditure of energy is painful to some degree. You have to consider the results, not the process. Sometimes pain simply has to be endured in oneself and disregarded in others.
I also find it extremely irrational to consider causing physical pain absolutely unacceptable, but causing mental anguish acceptable (it's "wrong" to flog a criminal, but "right" to lock him up an make him watch his affairs fall to pieces and then treat him as a social leper). Pain is pain, whether caused directly or indirectly.
I wouldn't go out of my way to cause pain to an animal (or a human), and it is almost always preferable in practical terms to avoid causing pain (if for no other reason, just to keep in the habit), but you have to ask how far you are willing to go out of your way to avoid it.
Are you willing to risk fouling the meat and poisoning humans? Are you willing to reduce the quality of the meat and take a lower price? How much time of trained technicians are you willing to pay for to ensure a totally painless kill?
To me, the question isn't "What is the most humane way to end this being's life?" but "Which is the cheapest and most efficient way to convert this livestock to meat?"
What it boils down to me (for the specific case of slaughter) is: if the animal isn't just an object, you've got no business killing it; if it is just an object, why should you care about one particular signal in its control mechanism?
Re:Free people of the world! Don't emulate Canada! (Score:2)
OMG! I can't believe you're against free speech!
Telling people that the holocaust never happened is harmless, as long as it's false. What if it wasn't? The evidence is all there, and being forced to go look and prove it for yourself by facing the occasional denier is a good thing, IMHO.
Don't forget, there are also holocaust exaggerators: people who talk about mass produced goods made from the flesh of murdered Jews. This kind of propaganda was common and spread by the allied governments immediately after the war (and still spread in Israel). We don't need to demonize the Nazis, it clouds the mind to how such organizations gain support.
And a much more commonly, and dangerously, denied thing (even by our government) is our role in the holocaust. Concentration camps are expensive, the Nazis would have preferred to just ship their Jewish prisoners out of their conquered territory, but, to our eternal shame, we said "No thanks! We've got enough Jews here. You have to deal with them in your own way."
That should stand out in every Canadian's mind as much as the Japanese Canadian internment camps, if not more so.
Re:This is stupid (Score:2)
Yes I paid attention. Yes I knew this was about British Columbia. You get a point for being anal.
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Personally, I've never been 'reviled' by my peers for being a vegetarian; of course, I'm not terribly picky about what I eat (other than not eating meat). Granted, I dislike going to McDs or Burger King since there's nothing for a vegetarian to eat there but french fries and side-salads. (I've heard animal fats are used in the fruit pie things, not sure it's true.) Just about anything else is fine though; I eat pizza, pasta, salad, potatoes, etc, that is, things you can find at any mainstream restaurant. In short, nobody but you has, in my experiences, compared my decision not to eat meat with some drastic social faux pas.
2. Biology/Economy
This is a red herring argument. First of all, I've known plenty of vegetarians who were both overweight and underweight, and I myself hit smack in the middle of the 'recommended' weight for my height/build. Perhaps vegetarians are, on average, lighter than non-vegatarians, but then, -most- Americans are overweight, so... so what? Nor do I, or other vegetarians I know, take a lot of dietary supplements. (I do take a B-complex 'stress formula', but that's because of my caffeine intake and my stress levels, not my vegetarian diet).
Secondly, the limiting factor in agriculture is not how much usable nutrition can be crammed into a cubic foot of product, but how much usable nutrition can be derived from an acre of ground. If you want human-edible food, grow potatoes, soy, corn, or wheat. Further, cattle are generally fed on grain, in pens - free-ranging, grass-eating cattle are used only for extremely expensive cuts of luxury meats, so, you are turning human-edible food into other human edible food, -and- you are doing so at a 16:1 loss of usable calories (IIRC, 'Diet for a Small Planet', 1980 edition).
3. Ethically
I -utterly- disagree with this. I think that to breed a population of animals to be kept in pens, force-fed, and brutally murdered, in an essentially joyless life is -far- less ethical than going into the wild and ending prematurely the life of a creature who has at least -had- a life; if you make a point of only hunting lamed and elderly animals, that's even better. And, of course, deer are in constant danger of overpopulation so something will kill them - starvation or hunting. (Of course, the -reason- they're overpopulating is because humans killed all the wolves south of Alaska, so, this only applies in the north end of the US and the south end of Canada, really, and is the situation itself is the result of unethical behaviour.)
I will note that I'm not a vegan, and have no particular objection to the use of wool, dairy, and unfertilized eggs for various purposes, as long as the source animals are well-treated. I'll also note that I don't go around trying to 'convert' people to vegetarianism, but I do respond to blanket attacks on vegetarianism, -especially- attacks that try to portray vegetarians as being somehow 'worse people' than meat eaters. I would thank you to do your research before debating the merits of vegetarianism and meat-eating, and to keep bigotted personal comments out of the debate in the future.
--Parity
So what is the conclusion? (Score:2)
Important to remember is, that it's not one single person responsible for all the rulings and restrictions. In other words: the person who ultimately advised SoF to be made available to people aged at least 18, may feel the same way you do about eating animals.
How do you propose every new rule or law is to be introduced? First check to see if there's somewhere something happening that might look or sound hypocrite or contradictory to the proposed rule or law? That's impossible.
ratings and censorship (Score:2)
When a ratings system is first imposed, either by a government oversight committee or by industry consent (think the MPAA), the public is soothed with the statement that compliance to the ratings is a voluntary decision on the part of the consumer. At first this is true.
But after many years, as new "responsible adults" cycle into the pool of consumers and the old, more watchful ones cycle out, the public impression of the ratings begins to shift. People forget, or never learn, what the original justification for those R, PG, and NC-17 ratings might have been. They become receptive to the idea that the content itself somehow intrinsically merits the rating.
Then the lawmakers step in.
Protest ratings systems wherever you find them. If you have concerns about the content your children, or you yourself consume, then you assume a concomitant responsibility to learn about the issues. You cannot, one the one hand, harp about a lack of informed choices, and on the other hand abdicate your responsibility to go out and make sure your choices are well informed!
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
Two points... (Score:2)
I'm going to keep this as short as possible because I'm not interested in debating the relative merits of one set of ethics over another...
First point: Animated violence is no big deal, you only have problems with it if you cant teach your kids the difference between that and the real thing - and if you want then by all means forbid the purchase or rental of this game in your household. Its your job to do what you have to in order to raise your kids, you cant expect the government to babysit 'em for you.
Second point: Cruelty to animals sucks, no argument, but I'll still eat 'em. Binocular vision? Omnivorous dentition? yep, this is a meat-eating species. Yes, treat 'em as well as you can whilst they are alive but once they are meat, they are food.
# human firmware exploit
# Word will insert into your optic buffer
# without bounds checking
Re:Cultural Differences (Score:5)
Re:Moderate this mothergrabber up! (Score:2)
No, I don't think so. (Score:2)
He starts off talking about the rating, then about an article, followed by "my analysis follows." Of what? One of two things: either an analysis of the rating or of the article.
He does neither. Instead he rants about why we shouldn't eat meat and spends only the most brief amount of time trying to tie the two together.
If he wanted to talk about why to be a vegan, then talk about that, but don't try to bring it into a discussion because of a single sentence in a still otherwise shitty article to boot.
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:2)
Actually, I disagree. The article's author is doing an excellent job of pointing out how focussed people can get about trivial issues.
I personally eat meat. I wear leather. I even buy consumer products made in third-world countries by malnourished wage-slave labor. But I'm okay with all of that, because I'm a callous, insensitive, arrogant prick. However, I agree with the author, in feeling that people who condemn fictional violence and then go home and have a nice juicy steak are somewhat lacking in a sense of proportion.
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:2)
Do you get mad at the lions when you watch the Nature Channel when they eat deer ?!? No, you understand that it's all part of nature.
Stop being simplistic.
Killing animals and using their products is fine. Recklessly killing animals for the thrill is obscene.
You know what it was... (Score:2)
He said he has never played SoF and it shows. I'm sorry, but the giblets are the worst part of SoF realism wise. When you blow off a guy's leg, and shoot him while he spins on his other one, then you'll know gore.
As for cows, woop de do. I don't see him griping about Diablo 2, complete with a Cow Level(TM). Mind you, if he did, CmdrTaco would probably smack him upside the head, so I can see why he instead picked on the first person shooter instead.
I'm a rebel ... (Score:3)
Is banning the game the best long term solution to keep small children from turning into killers? No. This is a fix to a symptom. Instead of parents caring what their kids play, the government is having to step in and force the parents to buy the game for them, or turn the kids towards pirating the game. Once again, our complex society has done and end-run on some people who thought they were making a good decision. Those who do not comprehend their own lack of control over a complex system, are doomed to be at its mercy.
P.S.: Anyone who thinks that a video game(console, PC, or arcade) is a training simulator has either never played one, or never been on an actual killing spree.
Bad Mojo [rps.net]
No one in America kills animals for food (Score:2)
Re:I don't understand the objection (Score:3)
This was just step 1. Step 2 will be the government passing a law that says permitting a child to play a restricted game is prima facie evidence of child abuse. Child Protective Services will kick in your door, take your child, and raise it for you. (Ok, somewhat exaggerated. Maybe. But the ever-vigilant Nanny State does indeed think it knows better than you, so watch out.)
Re:It's going to happen in the U.S. too (Score:2)
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
"Seriously, I don't think that this piece of editorial tripe belongs in this story"
Let's see... it's an article criticizing a legal decision. Jaime pointed out one aspect of the hypocrisy in the legal decision- how does that not belong in the story? If you disagree with him, fine- but the point certain;y wasn't out of place.
Then again, if a province that slaughters thousands of animals a day but bans images of animal slaughter ISN'T being hypocritical, then I really don't understand the meaning of the word.
One final note- just because you feel evolution has made you an omnivore (which is a very debatable point- have you ever tried eating raw meat, the way every other omnivore/carnivore eats meat in the wild?) doesn't mean you SHOULD eat meat- aside from the fact that animals are tasty (I'll agree with you there), there aren't really any other arguments FOR eating meat, biologically, ethically, or environmentally speaking.
Re:Killing animals for meat ain't violence (Score:2)
I've said it before and I'll say it again here: No one in America kills animals for food. We have plenty of food without killing animals. Animals are killed because people want to eat a certain type of food. We are killing these animals purely for enjoyment: the enjoyment we get from eating a steak as opposed to something without meat.
Re:Britain? (Score:2)
Re:Jamie is a Liberal Pansy (Score:2)
Most liberals don't own guns! Don't you read the papers?
Re:Cultural Differences (Score:3)
British Columbia... is neither British, nor Columbian...
Talk amongst yourselves...
What's the big deal here? (Score:2)
Re:It's Bloodier Than Quake (Score:2)
This knee-jerk reaction of slashdot's of any limits put on anything remotely software or internet related as an infringement of our rights, is, ugg....boring after a while.
Slashdot: Land of Zealotry (Score:2)
What? This was an article on video game violence? Could fooled me...
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:4)
To me, Soldier of Fortune is a perfectly valid game, you're shooting terrorist, people who resigned from societies protection when they picked up guns and started shooting innocents. Whatever happens to a terrorist is fair game.
To say that shooting a terrorist is sickening is to say that our police are sickening. They shoot at terrorists. Should we condemn them?
As long as we're willing to let the actions of others protect us, we're obligated to not frown on those actions. I don't particularly like military service, but I'll never slam our military until all the petty dictators of the world retire and we start giving flowers to each other.
Similarly, I would have a hard time being a SWAT member, shooting terrorists, but as long as there are terrorists, I'll congragulate those strong enough to go out there and shoot them.
To say that this behaviour is disgusting is somewhat accurate, but it's something more people need to be exposed to, not less. Until we all understand the actions taken, on our behalf, to keep the world safe, we don't really deserve the protection of those actions.
I'd say everyone should spend a day, either watching a SWAT team take down terrorists, or as a hostage. Either way, you'll understand what's being done and why it has to be done.
To ban a game just because it has sensitive topics is to send a message to SWAT team members that what they do is so horrible they should never talk about it, that we barely tolerate them, despite the fact they risk their lives to save us.
Should people think that killing a terrorist is a nice clean job, where you just push a button and the guy falls down, saving the hostages? Hell no. They should understand the blood and gore, and the risk of death. Then they'll properly appreciate it.
I'd rather show _Saving Private Ryan_ or _Thin Red Line_ to every hotheaded young kid who thinks war is cool than have a bunch of clueless people running around talking about how we need to go passify some country.
Soldiering is gruesome bloody work, necessary work, but gruesome and bloody. We can't properly respect the job that soldier do until we understand this. The same goes from counter-terrorism. To demand that games get dumbed down does nothing for us except to really shock us when something bad happens. Hopefully by then we haven't gotten rid of our 'disgusting' protectors.
Re:Cultural Differences (Score:3)
I've only lived in Canada, but like most Canadians I can receive television and radio from both Canada and the US.
One thing I noticed recently when listening to the radio, is that the American censors absolutly butcher some songs. I really noticed this listening to one of the latest from Eminem, the one about the obsessed fan who drives himself over the edge a bridge (I can't remember what it's called). On American stations the song was rendered almost worthless. Practically every other word was scrambled, and an entire verse was removed (the one where the guy actually drives over the edge of the bridge, which is a rather important part of the story). In contrast, on Canadian stations the song was plated in its entirety, complete with four-letter words.
Television is similar. Explicit sex scenes in movies are cut on the American stations, but left in on Canadian stations.
That's not to say Canada doesn't have its censorship problems. Our equivalent of the 1st amendment is not absolute like the American version: it explicitly states that limits on freedom are okay if they can be justified within a free and democratic society. Of course that leaves a lot of room for interpretation. There are the Quebec language laws that many people have heard of. And "Little Sister's Bookstore" here in BC has had incoming shipments of controversial (read: gay and lesbian) books siezed at the border by Canada Customs. Ernst Zundel and other holocaust-deniers have been the subject of legal action for their beliefs, which is bad enough ("thought crime" anyone?) but what is really scary is that under the hate-speech laws, truth is no defense.
In comparison to all of the above, I don't think restricting under-18 access to a computer game is such a big deal in either country.
Re:You must be 18 to rent Warner Bros Cartoons (Score:5)
I was watching with the 4 year old child what I assumed to be a a family show about a talking duck and a talking rabbit. Soon the show turned violent when the rabbit hit the duck with a very large mallet. (Later, this same rabbit was seen wearing a dress and makeup. An obvious homosexual propaganda attempt to steal our children's prescious innocence and make them turn to the homosexual lifestyle.) Not five minutes later, the child left the room, got my large mallet from the garage, snuck back into the room, climbed onto the back of the couch and walloped me on the head 4 or 5 times.
I thought the child was going to kill me. Luckily the child's mother came home and found me in laying in a pool of my own blood with her child standing overme with the blood stained weapon.
Why did the child do this? "I wanted to play with the birdies."
Write your congressman and senator now!!! Hearings need to take place before another child blungons someone!!!!
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
to hell with these damned vegans (Score:2)
Re:It's going to happen in the U.S. too (Score:2)
--
Re:British Colombia (Score:2)
Re:Canadian gaming+porno (Score:2)
Umm... (Score:2)
I wasn't, I really thought we were omnivores, oh well no more salad for me.. bring on the bacon!
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
Pig Process IV! "The Oinking" (Score:2)
Pabloselbow CA (/.) 7/13/00 4:42 PM
ID Games announced today a complete departure from traditional shoot em' up games with the release of a carve em' up role playing adventure called: Pig Process [veal.com] IV! "The Oinking".
This release has drawn a lot of attention from groups apposed to such violence in the media including Louise McCausland B.E.'s director of film classification.
Starting Wednesday, it is against the law in Pabloselbow to rent the popular game Pig Process IV to people under 18 years old.
Pig Process IV allows users to assume the identity of the pig as it's being slaughtered. An experience that, many say, is just to overwhelming for the children.
"Depending on which industrial machine tool is used, the participant can experience the gory violence that results in the horror of evisceration, , gutting, decapitation and dismemberment" said a report from Louise McCausland, B.E.'s director of film classification.
She classified "Pig Process IV" as an adult game after a parent complained about its level of violence saying: "Yea, everyone loves Wilber, and we appreciate the work that PETA has done to bring this game to market, but this is just sick."
___
Ohh...kaaayyy... (Score:2)
Seriously, I don't think that this piece of editorial tripe belongs in this story. Sure, animal suffering is a bad thing, but if you want to highlight the plight of animals, don't be sneaky about it...stand up and write an editorial and give it its own title!
Now the issue of whether the editorial was related to the title, is very much open. But your points are just plain wrong. May I recommend that you know what the post says, before presuming to tell me to read it again?
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:3)
Yes, eating animals is violence against animals. To say it is not involves serious denial. Now, many say that violence against animals is ok. Personally, I have no problem with it. But to pretend we live in a nice, sanitary world, where cows just sort of magically turn into hamburger is to be in serious denial.
It's a bloody world out there in nature. In order for a lion to live, an antelope must die in pain. In order for you to eat a hamburger, a cow must die in pain. That's fact. It is not deniable. It is logical to say "that's the order of things" and go ahead an eat meat. It is not logical to pretend it isn't true, that we're not really hurting anything. That the kindly old cow doesn't really feel a thing. What utter bullshit.
People had a much better understanding of things when eating meat meant personally killing animals. When eating a chicken meant going and getting a live one, and wringing its neck on your own. But now we're so removed from that, we want to pretend that the meat just magically appears, in a factory some where.
Personally, I think that every child ought to be required to behead a chicken with his own hands to graduate high school. The fact that many nonvegetarians would find such a suggestion abhorrant says a lot about how screwed up and in denial this society is.
It is just like all the nonvegetarians who call hunting "barbaric" (something very fashionable these days). I mean, it is one thing to say that people shouldn't eat meat, and therefore shouldn't kill a deer. It is quite another to say that to kill a deer with a rifle is bad, but to slit a cow's throat in a slaughterhouse is perfectly ok. Can anyone not see how utterly hypocritical and illogical that is?
</rant>
Method of killing (Score:2)
Obviously I can't speak for every company which kills animals, but the pigs I've seen are put in a shallow pool of water and an electrified prod is put in the water, the pigs die instantly. I've heard plenty of herbivores imply that animals are basically tortured to death. What would be the advantage of prolonging the death of an animal? Companies strive to be as efficient as possible, and a quick death is more efficient than a slow drawn out death (the exception is, of course, when a slow drawn out death is important, such as with veal). I'm sure there are some small farms out there who can't afford anything better than a knife to kill their animals with, but I would expect that the majority of animals killed by humans die a better death than they would if they were killed by any other predator.
Re:Cultural Differences (Score:2)
As for the whole english/french canadian thing....
do you (being french canadian) realize that me, and everyone like me, grew up (B.C.) thinking that french canada was this cool place we wanted to visit, and we thought poeple speaking french all the time was cool.
Then, of course, I got older, watched the news, and realized that, becaues of stupid politics, French Canada was taught to 'hate' english canada, and they they looked at me like their 'oppressor' or a 'threat' to their society. A society that I really looked up to.
So.. now I don't find 'french' canada cool anymore...
Re:Bloodiest Game I have ever played (Score:2)
I try to be anti-censorship, but I really do think that if kids play video games where violence against what is obviously humans is a central focus, it desensitizes you against said violence. I saw a game the other day in the arcade called "slient sniper" or something where you have a big rifle with a scope and were picking people off rooftops. Granted, they were "bad guys", but still. If kids' parents are too stupid to think "hey, maybe it's a bad idea to let my kids play this game", then I have no problem with the rest of us (as expressed through the will of our elected representatives) doing it for 'em.
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You must be 18 to rent Warner Bros Cartoons (Score:5)
Rant was way off topic. (Score:4)
Re:Cultural Differences (Score:2)
Between 1805 and 1808, it was known as New Caledonia (New Scotland, Caledonia being the Roman's name for Scotland). This name was given it by Simon Fraser.
In 1858, legislation was introduced to make the area a crown colony under British law. Since the French already had a colony in the South Pacific of that name, New Caledonia's name was changed to British Columbia on August 2, 1858.
Carding (Score:2)
<O
( \
Re:Canadian gaming+porno (Score:2)
Those laws about arcades are basically trying to keep drug dealers from pushing to young kids, and only applies to Downtown Vancouver. You can go to Chuck E. Cheese and play video games like Street Fighter etc, however old you are... but they look at you funny when you're 20 and asking for more tokens.
Games (Score:2)
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:5)
This story had good SlashDot irony.
Big (anything = corporations/government/etc) doing anything that may bother SlashDot but that also has a certain ironic angle that SlashDotters can stand around and look smug and say "See! Once again Big (Fill in Blank) has done it again!"
It does not matter if it is offtopic, relevant or even interesting. Just that it has that certain, ironic twist to it and allows like-minded participants to scream their standard answers.
Standard answers posted below for those who left theirs at home
1) Pure corporate greed!
2) Lars sucks!
3) Pure corporate BS!
4) Mod this up!
5) I would like to see a Beowulf cluster of these
6) Who cares?
7) Off topic
8} Where's Jon Katz?
9) Republicans
10) Democrats
18 to rent OR BUY (Score:2)
As an (ashamed) citizen of British Columbia, I think this is just another step down the road to a Nerf world (name stolen from PJ O'Rourke) where the government tries to protect us from everything. Next thing you know, ID Software will find itself facing 20 wrongful death suits for Columbine...
British Columbia is an absolutely beautiful province (we have coast, mountains, rain forest, desert, you name it), but the political climate here sucks even worse than Vancouver winter weather. May a hail of cluesticks fall upon us...
Remarkable (Score:2)
One, that so many people are so rational about it. A lot of people really do seem to appreciate that the restriction enables parents to gain more control over their ability to effectively parent their children. It makes the purchase/rental decision an adult's decision, not a child's.
Two, that there seem to be a fair number of people who simply can not have had much interaction with children. Anyone who says that "hey, you can teach them the difference" isn't talking about very young children! Up to a moderate age (I'd say about 9ish), kids are simply incapable of completely differentiating between reality and fantasy. I don't believe any child under the age of ten-ish should be experiencing extremely violent, abusive or sexual material.
Three: I'm completely astounded that someone thought BC is in Britain. My god.
Four: Look up "Temple Grandin" on the web. She designs the enclosures and systems that lead cattle to death in the slaughter yard. Take note that she very carefully designs these structures to keep the cows relaxed and happy as they meet their doom. Frightened meat isn't very good meat.
Five: Plants are what food eat.
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I agree on the duality of society (Score:2)
This is, alas, nothing new. "Don't play violent games", "but eat chickens" - which are processed and handled like bottles or any other non-living things in huge factories, being grabbed by mechanical devices and manipulated towards death...
Or, more generally and succinctly, in America, "porn is bad!", but, "prejudice is good!"..."don't judge people by how they look!", but, "make fun of fat people, and be sure to vote for your local prom King and Queen!"
'Big Brother' is us. Politicians go with public sentiment. Educate people, and bring day-to-day atrocities to the forefront; after all, it worked for the environmental groups.
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:2)
Other examples:
Thanks for sharing... (Score:5)
I choose to be an omnivore because evolution (or God, whichever makes you happy) made me that way. I also happen to think that animals are quite tasty, so I generally tend to eat bits of one every day.
Seriously, I don't think that this piece of editorial tripe belongs in this story. Sure, animal suffering is a bad thing, but if you want to highlight the plight of animals, don't be sneaky about it...stand up and write an editorial and give it its own title!
=h=
Not to belittle your point... (Score:2)
This isn't about killing animals. Maybe it should be, but it isn't. Sorry.
Pixel tricks (Score:4)
Every thing I have read dances around the real issue: <b>Do pixels have a different meaning than video?</b>
If as much blood and guts and animal cruelty was portrayed in a fictional film it would probably get a similar rating. Even Rambo and Saving Private Ryan didn't have as much gore.
So why are pixels so precious? The game is fictional, just like film, yet we cry fowl when ratings are imposed on games and don't make a peep for movies.
It can't be that we control the game but videos are passive. If anything it makes it worse. Think like Beavis and Butthead ("heh heh, he's grabbin' his groin! heh Stab him again! heh heh ).
I personally think a "R" rating may be more appropriate as an advisory for parents, but that doesn't change the fact are hypocrites when we treat pixels different than video.
It's going to happen in the U.S. too (Score:3)
I don't understand the objection (Score:5)
So then you can argue "but kids can get around the rules with older siblings/friends or less restrictive parents". Yes, but which rule is a child more likely to follow "Don't play video games with excessive violence" or "Don't play video games that are rated R"? Since they can rationalize the first one away, the second one is a better rule.
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Re:Cultural Differences (Score:2)
Having not spent any amount of time in Britain, and only knowing a few people from there myself, I cannot say how exactly they feel about violence, but probably more strongly than the American people do, who are somewhat self-righteous about sex.
Dude, British Columbia is in Canada, not Britain. Canadian attitudes to these things are close to American ones (said as someone who has lived in all three countries).
It's Bloodier Than Quake (Score:5)
"I've never played 'Soldier of Fortune,' but the screenshots are roughly as bloody as Q3A's giblets of flesh when a rocket hits a dead body"
For those of you who haven't seen the game in action... SOF is probably the most violent game I've ever played, because they went to great lengths to simulate the effects of weapons on various areas of the body. In Quake, a bullet hit is a bullet hit. In SOF, the enemy will react according to the part of his body you shot... grabbing his throat, losing an arm, grabbing his crotch and moaning in pain, etc.
There's probably more blood in other games, but trust me- SOF has brought a wince to the face of many a jaded gamer who wouldn't bat an eye at a Quake3 gibfest as they see an SOF enemy have both his arms blown off with a shotgun and then sink to the ground with a knife in his groin.
Still though, it's not much more BLOODY than other games, it's just a little more realistic-feeling...
Also, I really liked Jaime's point about the animal violence... if they're REALLY concerned about the animals, why do they kill so darn many of them up there? :)
How many of you have seen this game? (Score:2)
I live in Vancouver, and I disagree with the mentality that some people have towards video game violence.
But from the descriptions of the game, it sounds like it is extremely violent to the point of being too realistic. Quake III isn't realistic, it's cartoony.
What I do like in BC is the fact that everyone is allowed to go topless at beaches and other public places if they want (women included). Wreck Beach is the local nude beach near the University of British Columbia, and everyone accepts that.
The attitude toward hemp is also much more relaxed here. While the police bust the larger grow ops, they're not going to arrest you for possessing marijuana.
Plus the drinking age is 19
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:2)
And silly it is.
Too violent? A *war* game? Bah. (Score:2)
If anything, probably not violent and sickening enough to get the point across. I want combat sim games to get at least as realistic-looking as the special-effects sequences in Starship Troopers, where hapless troops were impaled, dismembered and decapitated by the aliens.
If we had live-video-quality images generated in real time, we could start seeing what kind of horror white phosphorus, napalm, and Claymore mines perpetrate on flesh. Maybe if, in a first-person shoot-'em-up, it were possible to get wounded by shrapnel that turns out the be the bone fragments of the guy next to you -- as happens sometimes in real-world combat -- it might make a few would-be Sgt. Rock types stop and think a little.
Re:Slightly off topic but no more than the article (Score:2)
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This is stupid (Score:2)
and then (Score:3)
...and then eaten.
FWIW, I had to ask the guy behind the counter at Toys R Us for a copy of "Perfect Dark" because it's rated M. I'm sure that's We Be Toys' corporate policy.
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
Re:Rant was way off topic. (Score:5)
"When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood."
this is sad. (Score:2)
Re:Moderate this mothergrabber up! (Score:2)
As far as being a "fat loser." You are wrong. I am six feet tall and weigh 185 pounds. I am not fat, although it is obvious that I do not go without eating a couple of good meals every day. As far as the loser side, you can judge that based on whatever criteria yoo use to make yourself feel more important or worthy of others. Since I feel that even the guy on the street begging for a cigarette is worth something, I tend not to peg people as "winners" and "losers." - However, I do not make slanderous statements about other people and their children while hiding behind anonynmity, and that would place me outside of the "loser" category in a lot of people's books.
Have a nice day.
Re:it's on-topic (Score:2)
Censorship is bad, restrictions not necessarily so (Score:3)
First of all don't flail me to death, because I didn't read many of the replys to the article. In fact, I just searched for "Germany" and "Bloodpatch". This post isn't going to be read by anyone anyway, because it's already "old" and I am poster number 50034567.
Here in Germany ultra violent movies and computer games are put on an so called "index" when they become too violent. Just like pornography you have to be 18 or older to buy that stuff.
No commercials and no ads allowed. But it is not as bad as being x-rated is for an American movie. Fight Club was 18 or older in Germany and many people saw it. Quake sells well. And anybody of legal age can get the stuff, even in "normal" shops, no guilty feeling of visiting a seedy sex shop is involved ;-).
(The violence is gauged on the psychological impact it causes. This is very subjective, but helps you to distinguish between Tomm and Jerry and some kind of Blood and Gore Flick which glorifies violence. America has that, too. South Park the movie, would have been x-rated if it weren't a cartoon.)
On the negative side, some vendors "censor" their games for release in Germany. Blood is green. Soldiers in Half-Life are robots, body's can't be mutilated, etc. But than there are so called "Bloodpatches" available on the internet that turn everything gory again.I can live with that. It's just restrictions and not censorship. You do not have to buy the tamed German version of a Game, you can get an import. I think Quake is on the "index", no cutie German Version, and everybody plays it. A well known computer magazine uses it as a kind of standard for real world graphics perfomance for video cards.
Restricting pornography and violence, so that kids don't get too disturbed (parents are not always a big help) seems quite OK to me. Americans might Ask themselves why is pornography restricted while violence is not ? That' strange, too. Or swear words and blasphemy, there seems to be a taboo on those while in most European countries nobody gets exited.
Or take something like the American Nazi Party. Something like this (left or right) is forbidden in Germany, because it "acts against the basic concepts of our democratic society"(TM). We had our experience with a totalitarian organization that ursurped a democracy and we do not want it to happen again. Too much government, you might reply and you might be right. But isn't it a basic principle that government and society should reflect each other, be two sides of a medal ? Maybe that truism is why we accept that kind of rules, even though it comes close to censorship.
So on the one hand we trust our government more than Americans do and on the other hand we keep a close look at it so it doesn't get out of hand. (One example of that "closer look" is the number of people participating in elections. Not a 100 percent are voting, but it is a lot more than in the US).
Aaaaaah, that rant felt good. And maybe I clarified one or two things that make America and Europe (Germany) so very different even though we share so many similarities in our belives and goals.
Marcus (mmkhd are all of my initials, I laugh at a single middle initial :-)
So it's wrong to show what guns really do? (Score:2)
I grew up with guns, and I knew from an early age that what they did was *nasty*. Shooting something doesn't make it "fade out", and shooting a limb doesn't make a living thing die.
This isn't to say that kids should be allowed to play SoF (not my kids, none of my business), but if it was *my* kids, I wouldn't let them play a game that downplays the consequences of weapon use either.
Oh, and just because plants can't run away doesn't mean they want you to eat them. I'm an equal opportunity predator.
How would you know? (Score:2)
Does this sentence not scare anyone else?
Re:Jamie is a Liberal Pansy (Score:2)
Police officers outpushed, unable to stop murderous rage
Nah.
That for me is the difference. Killing 25,000 people with a gun requires 25,000 pissed off people twitching their fingers. Pushing 25,000 people out a window requires much more effort, and is a lot easier to stop. Remember when bank robbers in California held off cops for hours with body armor and automatic weapons? I'd like to have seen them try and do it with pen knives or upper body strength. Probably have been fewer funerals.
"Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
Bloodiest Game I have ever played (Score:4)
Now, while I do not condone censorship of any type, I must say that this is not something I would let my children (if I had any) play. I don't think government should be playing the parents role in situations such as this. But on the other hand, I can see why this game was given this rating.
Eric
Re:arrgh. let's all send some polite e-mails (Score:2)
Perhaps you didn't read about the fact that most BC politicians do NOT read and/or send email! (I think the article is a Vancouver Sun article titled "noreply@gov.bc.ca") While this came about for another reason (email-aliases to bypass Freedom of Information act), it's important to note that very few politicians actually use email. Even the Premier of BC (Mr. Ujjal Dosanjh) doesn't use email. So phoning might be a better idea.
Oh, go ahead and make noise in Victoria. It's not that we don't have enough at this point in time }}:-) [We could use something to distract us from all the strikes and other general non-business business that goes on around here].
BTW, I was startled by this decision as everyone else is (I live in BC). I don't play FPS (hate 'em, and they're quite boring, but that's another comment), but from what I've seen of SoF (reviews, etc), it does look quite violent. At least it wasn't banned like some other countries have with lesser games... like Mortal Kombat (true!), just 'restricted'. But you'd really thing, with a game selling for $60, that parents wouldn't stop and think about that huge stop label? I'm assuming, of course, that parents do most of the purchasing, and that teens who have jobs and can afford it are mature enough to buy it (at least the overwhelming majority here, it seems).
Re:Method of killing (Score:2)
Canadian gaming+porno (Score:3)
Personally I like the Amsterdam model: lots of sex and drugs and almost no violence. (And now that I think of it, few or no video arcades, either!)
Ben Chadwick - Editor, Zero Future/Post-Collegiate Malaise
Re:Cultural Differences (wayyy OT) (film@11) (Score:2)
In an attempt to avoid "embarrassing" various of the Dictators who would be showing up for the conference, the Canadian government attempted to place all sorts of operational restrictions on protest at the conference. This was rather problematic given that the main leaders' conference was going to be at the University of British Columbia.
Despite some questions in RCMP ranks, about the legality of these restrictions, some very constitutionaly questionable actions were taken. Among the most questionable were the pepper-spraying of protestors, and the MOST questionable of those was when staff seargent Stewart walked up to a group of protesters in an area which, up until then, they had been allowed and -- on about 9 seconds warning -- sprayed the whole group [cbc.ca] including a CBC reporter.
In response to complaints about RCMP overreaction at the event, Cretien made a couple of comments, including one that "At least it was better than using Baseball Bats". At a later protest, when Cretien returned to Vancouver, police DID use baseball bats on protestors.
Numerous CBC articles on apec here. [cbc.ca] and Here [cbc.ca].
Some comments from the protestors' point of view [cs.ubc.ca]
OH, and while I'm at it: some video on the Soldier of Fortune [cbc.ca] story. (to stay on topic).
it's on-topic (Score:2)
You've completely missed the point... (Score:3)
They law of B.C. apparently prohibits minors from seeing that type of carnage... so be it.
If you want minors to be able to see that kind of carnage, well protest. However, you shouldn't use it as an excuse to push your ideals about animal rights - that's not what this is about.
I'm not saying that I agree or disagree with your stand-point, or even the POV of the submitter or even the B.C. Government... I'm just saying that this is not the appropriate place (or topic) to discuss animal rights.
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Eighteen (Score:2)
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Well, as long as we're off-topic... (Score:5)
I'm not an inherently cruel person. I don't torture animals for fun. However, I would like to make it very clear that animals have no inherent rights. A "right" is a human construct: in the wild, "rights" simply do not exist. Therefore to talk about "Animal Rights" is to ascribe rights to animals that society has not yet given them.
I do not torture kittens because society has decided to give those particular animals the right of humane treatment. If we, as a society, come to believe at some point that killing animals for food is wrong, then we will have given them the right to life. Until then, they are ours to do with as we please, simply because we are the most powerful creature on the food chain.
Free people of the world! Don't emulate Canada! (Score:2)
Basically, it states that the government can disregard section 2 (labeled "fundamental freedoms"), sections 7-14 (labeled "legal rights"), and section 15 (labeled "equality before the law"), under slightly irregular terms (but not requiring any special justification).
Furthermore, section 1 says: "The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society."
This sounds nice, but our supreme court only seems to read "subject to...reasonable limits", meaning that if the law infringes on your rights, but the judges think it it's "reasonable", the law stands and the rights are ignored.
So, between these two sections, we Canadians have no rights over whatever laws our current government sees fit to pass.
We screwed up bigtime. Watch your government so it doesn't happen to you.
Re:Thanks for sharing... (Score:2)
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
Re:it's on-topic (Score:2)
Linux Version Began Shipping Yesterday (Score:3)
Reminds me of this morning's "Twilight Zone" (Score:3)
Anyway, that's how everything will keep going as long as people who are not directly parenting their children decide what should and shouldn't be censored
The coolest thing about that episode is that "The state has PROVEN that God does NOT exist." Sounds like something the liberal end of the US government would do to any non-christian deity one of these days