Beware: there’s an evil presence lurking nearby, ready to steal your children away and turn them into vile monsters.
Lurking deep within the dark recesses of the popular video game “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas,” this soul-stealing force threatens the moral integrity of our youth and our nation. It is of such grave importance that senator and presidential hopeful Hilary Clinton has taken a personal interest-for the children, of course.
Admittedly, our nation’s defenses haven’t completely failed the children. “San Andreas” has an M rating for mature, meaning that the game is intended for 17-year-olds and up. While the ratings are set up by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, some states have laws preventing the sale of games to people below the intended age. So of our children, it is only the 17-year-olds who are in danger. But even though the impact is limited, what Rockstar Games-the producers of the “Grand Theft Auto” series-has done is unthinkable.
What parent would expect that hidden within the innocent playground named “Grand Theft Auto,” there might be a great danger to his 17-year-old’s delicate and susceptible mind?
After all, the game has multiple educational aspects. In addition to the game’s clear references to traffic law and road ethics, the game teaches players how to work with the police, as several hits, er, missions are assigned by cops. Other issues, such as women’s rights and drug use, are covered with similar candor.
Beneath this patina of healthy dehumanizing violence lies the greatest sin known to man. By using third party software, a user can unlock the so-called “Hot Coffee” mini-game. The character’s girlfriend will ask if he wants some hot coffee. If he accepts, they retire inside for clothed sex.
Clearly, the reaction to the “Hot Coffee” modification for “San Andreas” has been overblown. The game is packed with excessive violence and sexual references. The differences between the ESRB’s mature and adults only ratings are miniscule. While mature games “contain intense violence and … sexual content,” adults only games (ages 18 and up) have “prolonged intense violence and/or graphic sexual content and nudity.”
“Prolonged” must mean weeks in duration, as games that have hour upon hour of intense violence like “Doom 3” are still rated mature. I know of no game that is rated adults only for violence. Instead, the rating exists only to allay the fears of a society suffering from the mass delusion that 17-year-olds don’t know how sex is performed.
The adults only rating should be broken down into two categories: pornographic, for games with pornography, not the bizarre comedy of the “Hot Coffee” mod, and scapegoat, for games sacrificed on the altar of moral hypocrisy.
Retailers like Wal-Mart have stopped selling the game since the ESRB changed its rating to adults only. Killing a prostitute after she gets out of your car doesn’t justify it, nor does taking your girlfriend on a drive-by. But these clearly aren’t as derogatory or sick as clothed sex. Wal-Mart cares about the children, or does so when doing otherwise cuts into its profits. Since “Hot Coffee” became public knowledge, the National Institute on the Media and the Family released a “nationwide parental alert” about “San Andreas”-because while deadly violence is natural, sex with your clothes on is inhuman.
Doomsaying lawyer Jack Thompson has extended the “we’re so afraid of sex hopefully we’ll never reproduce” crusade to other computer games as well, including the vastly popular “The Sims.” Modders, who write programs to change the content in computer games, have inevitably inserted nudity into these games. Nevermind that the nature of software guarantees that ability, regardless of the game. Think of it as blaming the author of a picture book because somebody taped Playboy centerfolds into the book.
The evil hidden away in “Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas” is not the comical nodding and belly bumping of the “Hot Coffee” mod, but the fact that parents continue to absolve themselves of responsibility for their children.