A Video Game Victory

According to the Washington Post, the Supreme Court’s ruling is finally in on California’s law preventing the sale of violent games to minors: it’s out! The law was deemed unconstitutional, with the Supreme Court ruling that “Video games deserve the same constitutional protections as books and movies.”

A major victory for video gamers everywhere, (as well as avid readers–books being as interactive as video games is law now!) the burden is now back on the parents to regulate their child’s entertainment.

Here’s the article as Washington Post’s Hayley Tsukayama sees it:

Odysseus and Snow White had a hand in striking down a California law banning the sale of violent video games to minors on Monday.

In a 7-2 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled to strike the California law, finding that the law violates minors’ first-amendment rights as the state can’t prove violent games directly harm children and are no different from other media such as literature or comic books.

The law banned minors from purchasing games “in which the range of options available to a player includes killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being, if those acts are depicted.” Mortal Kombat and Grand Theft Autowere singled out as examples of games that met this criteria. And, the state argued, games such as these are different from other media because they are more “interactive.” Basically, the ability to act — by proxy — as the one punching, kicking or killing in a video game distinguishes it from other media, the state argued.

See the rest at www.washingtonpost.com.