Banning stuff is a bad idea. Unless it is given to a popular vote (with 95% plus required to pass, not 51% "majority crap")

Letting the gov't do anything other than fix the roads and possibly find a decent presidential candidate will lead to major issues (see our current economic situation for examples of this).

As far as violent vid games , well, if you are dumb enough to think that real life and video games are one- the same you need to be left out on a cold night... I doubt they really do much more than give kids carpal tunnel and help with the obesity problem. They fall under the parental control umbrella and who am I to tell parents how to raise their kids. I just do not swerve when the kids play in the street. And I love to elbow kids in the head when they walk towards me and are not paying attention. HAHAHAHA.

No of this (save for the not swerving part) should go in your paper. Anyone with any sort of higher education will immediately know that this came from me, the pimp, and will likely have you burned at the stake for plagarism, or whatever punishments schools use these days.

Could care less about the guy with no wife.

Asscociating with drug dealers in any way is a bad idea... Unless you really need the drugs.

As for the 4yr old smoking, well he is polluting the air and that does affect others. Personally I would like to see him eat the 4 packs a day, and then be sealed into a small box (pot-o-gold?) and pushed down a mountain, like everest. Now that would be a good you-tube vid. I suggest we get organised to do this. I will have the pot-o-gold people deliver a porta-john to the smokers house, then arrange to have it air lifted to everest. All we have to do is force the kid to eat all of the smokes, nom,nom...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

HAHA.
Looks like James is having a fun night...
I did immediately think about you when I mentioned "weaponry", I was gonna say "and turn out like James... what a horrific man, anyways..."; but felt bad for you..

Anyways, good thing you brought up obesity (like me), and carpal tunnel...
I completely forgot about carpal tunnel and obesity, and will make as a great counterexample :yes:

Just saying
 

The point you made about video games not having anything to do with what happens in real life really doesn't work either James. Well that only works for those people who may see things from the perspective of having some level of intelligence. that only covers about 40% of the entire population(maybe less). This is the root of the problem, because the other 60% (majority rules) see things somewhat differntly than you or I do, hence the Culombine shootings.

These idiots played video games most of their pathetic lives unsupervised, and somehow transfered that level of thinking into real life society killing off the people who did not agree with their way of thinking. We are seeing this more & more as time marches on and these video games become extremely violent. Its the pathetic nerds, freaks, and weirdos who are being picked on throughout their school lives for being different that are getting fed up with being treated like farm animals and are now acting out in the same manor that they get to do in these video games. But the problem is not the video games. It is the two parents who knew they should not have been together in the first place, but wanted to piss off their parents so the got hitched and created Jonny who now is some kind of inbreded freakshow who just cannot go to the bathroom without peeing all over his own feet that becomes our problem. So yes the two are connected in some way even if we fail to see it.:na:

Wow, what an image you can create Jerry!

I think you have a valid point, however, you never know if the games are the prime cause of the violent shootings.
I believe I may have read some shooters were simply ill, (mentally), and had not taken their meds, nor were supervised properly (parents..) which could have led to their shooting. In which case, the games they play could have simply been a coincidence..

Just an observation about this thread. It seems to be revolving around parental control. I don't know what shootings have been linked to gaming but it sounds like the ban is being considered as a result of youth irrationality.

:lol: That's great!

The ban won't stop violence. There has always been violent crime and there always will be. The ban could also make more violence,, Instead of Mexican drug cartels we'll have Blizzard, DICE, Infinity Ward, and Treyarch start an illegal violent game trade here in America causing substantial killings and deaths. That'll show the politicians who's boss. :mdr:

Just a few random (rambling)thoughs:

1) Desensitization: Its real, and its been happening since the advent of media. In some regards its been an important part of our society, in others not so much. Do we as a society need to draw the line somewhere?

2) Parenting: Back in the 70's and 80's we heard the same things in regards to music and TV "Need better parenting, not more control". Now in 2010, I can see partial nudity on prime time TV, discussion of sexual acts that my parents would have no idea existed, and quite a few words that I would be appaled if my grand children used them (not that I'm an angel...). Children look at adults and watch what we do more than they listen to what we say (this is a lesson I learned firsthand, too late, from my own kids). Example: Our 18 yr old recently started dropping the F-Bomb with great frequency, while conversing with me. I told her to stop talking like that in front of us. Her response was why doesnt it bother me if her mother talks like that (wifey darling can talk like a trucker at times...).

3) It takes a village to raise a child. Yes, it does. The standards of society greatly influence how effective a parent can be. If underage drinking were considered an acceptible activity where you live, how hard would it be for you to keep you kids from doing it... Every different area has its own little "standards of living" that children/young adults quickly adapt to, and it is extremely difficult as a parent to guide them away from things you deem undesireable in that environment. I'd also like to know how many of you that state that "its bad parenting" have actually raised a child or two through their teenage years??? I'd bet I'm one of two on this forum. What I hear there (and in other instances where that is said) is that its not my responsibility to do anything here, somebody else fix this problem. I dont disagree with this in general, but at some point, we as a "village" must put our foot down and say enough is enough.

4) Censorship: Bad, Bad, Bad. But....Age restrictions do work in general. Generally speaking, you dont find many 12 year olds with an adult video library, or a beer fridge in the closet. So to say that age bans arent effective is short sighted.

5) I agree with Jerry on games being a general waste of time. We didn't have them in the house until I bought the PS3 for playing bluerays. I'll raise my hand when asked if I have also spent too much time on them. Its waaaayyyy to easy to find yourself sitting in the same chair after 5 hours straight (or more). I really like the approach the Wii brought to the gaming front - hopefully more family interaction and activity will help.

6) What did you all think of the recent bans on that "Loco" energy drink saturated with alcohol? Dont really care? Is that because it wasnt something you didn't care for anyway? Hmmmmm......food for thought there........
(ps. I have a personal connection to that recent situation)...

The problem in the end is you can't ban stupidity which is what leads to the issues in the first place.

People have been finding ways to be stupid and useless since the beginning of time, long before Johnny Knoxville, Marilyn Manson, and Video Games were around to corrupt our children.

It comes down to parenting. Parents who spend time with their children teaching and playing produce productive children. Parents who don't and let "others" do that for them turn out useless humans.

I don't think there is anything wrong with violent video games and neither do any of my victims, after I hose a room down with fully automatic machine gun fire I always shout out "If you think violent games should be banned put your hand up now" and so far 0.000% have raised their hand as a negative response towards video games.















Normally they just LOL and spawn at the other end of the map.

About the FourLoco ban, I find that as kind of ridiculous myself. I have never drunken it but I doubt it can be as bad as Absinthe or a host of other beverages. If people want to be stupid and drink too much liquor they will, regardless if it's Fourloco or not. The redbull and vodka drinks are popular and are pretty much the same thing. In fact, alcohol is lethal in general and is responsible for about 75,000 deaths per year, 40,933 of those being car crashes that killed innocent people. How many people do shootings kill per year? Don't get me started on Tobacco, that's 440,000 deaths per year with about 3,000 deaths from secondhand.

Sorry, I know it is a bit off topic, but you could maybe use that as an argument

You can find tons of sources on this stuff too.
Source
Source 2

Oh, and this was written in 2007, but is states 323 students have died from 1992-2007. This is hardly even a problem. People just get riled up and it's good for the news networks so they play the hell out of this stuff.
Source 3

Agreed. Let's ban bad parenting. I seriously wish there was a parenting test you had to take before having a child to verify that you weren't stupid. But, that sort of thing will not happen anytime soon, and probably shouldn't.

FourLoco; I can kinda see where people are coming from about these malt beverages, they are very diceiving about the amount of punch they have !

Not for a second am I bragging but I'm a big guy and I looove my beer, I can drink a 18pack of Budweisers with no problem and function normally(very buzzed) but still pass for sober. I drank 2 of those Loco's one afternoon shortly after a lunch and I was TANKED.
They will do a number on the lesser trained alcoholic or a partying young adult.

Their is such thing as video game addiction and if parents don`t pay attention they may wish they had.
Here in Canada their was young man(in his teens) who ran away and died(exposure to cold).He was playing xbox live for atleast 8 hour or more a day and when his parents actual caught on it was to late.
I myself like World of warcraft,but I don`t think i could play it if I had children because of all negative talk about drugs,sex and racial s and homophobic slurs that are used on the global chat channels.
Also rating to have effect if stores like Walmart enforce their policy to not sell to minors if the E.S.R.B rating is mature.

no, they should not be banned.


and to all the parents who think the video games are ruining their kids minds...umm yea please stop relying on letting the video games be the babysitter and assert yourself and learn to say NO