Michael Atkinson Resigns

Sunday, March 21st, 2010

Adelaidenow.com.au is reporting that controversial Attorney-General Michael Atkinson is to resign his position on the front bench following this weekend’s Adelaide elections. While he will remain in parliament until the next election in 2014, he will resign his position as Attorney-General.

As Australia’s most outspoken critic of a proposed R18+ rating for games, Michael Atkinson’s departure from the position, combined with a record 55,000 submissions to the recent discussion paper, could pave the way for this much-needed change to the ratings system to happen sooner rather than later.

Local Retailers Put to the Test

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

According to an article in The Age, a sting involving a 14-year-old boy named Peter was carried out to determine whether local retailers actually enforce game ratings. Peter visited six Sydney retailers and attempted to get a game rated MA15+. The result: At least one store declined to sell the game, while the rest allowed him to purchase games with murder, mass shootings, stabbings, drug dealing, sexual violence, and child abduction. At the end of the day, Peter was shocked to see how easy it is for minors to obtain games, especially the ones unsuitable for them.

It is an offence to sell games rated MA15+ to anyone under 15 years old; so instead of the five retailers abiding to the law, they now face a $11,000 fine. If an R18+ rating for games was implemented, let’s see if retailers would be willing to ask anyone for identification if the law requires them to.

55,000+ responses to Discussion Paper

Sunday, March 7th, 2010

According to a report in The Australian, the Federal Government has received over 55,000 submissions on whether an R18+ rating should be introduced for video games. The government will now prepare a report for the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General based on these submissions, with the next SCAG meeting to be held sometime in April.

An introduction to an R18+ rating still requires the unanimous support between the Commonwealth, states, and territories, and the high number of submissions might or might not convince those that are against the rating to change their stance. So we can only sit back and hope that come April an R18+ rating for games will be added so that children are better protected from inappropriate material and that the Classification Board can rate games on a consistent basis.

Ex-Classification Board Member slams Atkinson in submission

Monday, March 1st, 2010

The deadline for making a submission to the Discussion Paper has now passed and, according to GamePolitics, one of the submissions was made by Paul J. Hunt, former Deputy Director of the Classification Board, who has written a 17-page response on the issue. Hunt begins his argument by providing readers with first-hand knowledge about his past experiences working for the Board.

“When I made a decision, or participated in a decision, that a computer game was unsuitable for minors, I was forced to refuse classification for that game. It was not because I thought that the game depicted, expressed or otherwise dealt with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that it would offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults. It was simply because the game was not OK for kids.

Not being able to restrict computer games to adults was an impediment to my ability to reflect Australian community standards.”

Most of his response is directly targeted at Michael Atkinson’s ridiculous arguments on why an R18+ rating for games should not be introduced in Australia.

“In February 2010, Mr. Atkinson told gamespot.com.au that ‘I think the majority of the population are unfamiliar with these games, and without images, they won’t be able to imagine them in their mind’s eye. They’ll have no idea how violent or sexually depraved they are, and what kind of torture, drug use, and blood spatter they include.’ He also reported to have said that ‘R18+ was an issue that most Australians didn’t care enough about.’ Once again he is exaggerating the level of content that is permissible under the guidelines at the R18+ classification.

“Of even greater concern is the fact that Mr. Atkinson does not understand that most Australians are gamers, and therefore the majority of the population is familiar with game content. (As noted above, 68% of Australians play games and 88% of all Australian households have gaming equipment.) All responses, including those from gamers, are responses from the Australian community. Whilst Mr. Atkinson may wish to marginalise gamers, and put down the knowledge of all Australians, I trust the Government will accept all submissions at face value as representative of the Australian community’s feelings on this issue.”

You can read Hunt’s full response here.