It all comes down to two things. The reason children don't use violence in a video game as an example of how to act in life is because they realise the difference between reality and fiction. The government doesn't want to acknowledge that fact because otherwise the barbaric and down right distasteful way video games are treated wouldn't look like righteous crusade to save our youth.

Gran Theft Childhood did an entire study on this and its effects. All children were asked what would happen if they replicated the violence in video games, and they all acknowledged the real world consequences of doing this stuff. You can't point the finger at someone else and go "oh well it's not us but you know, it's for their sake we're doing this so don't get mad. Look we're protecting children what we're doing is good".

And secondly despite all the evidence it doesn't change a thing, they need something to fear monger us into needing them. For the next two decades it'll continue to be video games.

While the average adolescent is not going to think that it is okay to run around blowing things up, do we really want to be giving children the idea that massive amounts of violence is fun? A lot can be gained from violent games, or any mature game for that matter, if that content is designed to communicate some kind of larger theme about life.

Grand Theft Auto 4, for example, had tons of sex and violence, but did it is a way that was designed to show how far people are willing to go for money and expose some of the pitfalls of the contemporary American Dream. Games like this really can be great for people who are mature enough to handle the content properly. But should we ever really encourage the violence and mature content solely for the purpose of fun? Aren't there better ways to get the adrenaline rush and excitement of these games? Maybe I'm being a bit too Puritan on this, but while games should never be censored by the govt., people do need to sometime censor themselves.

It goes back to the parents kids want Call of Duty for Xmas the parents buy it not knowing about the ESRB rating they buy the game and wonder why the game is to violent. You censor games North America will end up like Australia where they ban just about every violent game out there. If you censor videogames whats next comic books. The guy in the article mentions his friend father sat him down and made him watch every war movie out there. Well that works both ways it will either scare the kid or the kid see's it as something cool making him want to run to the nearest recruiter. The ESRB needs to educate parents better about the ratings and what you can expect in a game.

At least in the U.S.

We have federal standard for content that is dangerous for children and others as well as promoting violent and sexual acts against children. These laws, much like they are for movies and books, are being upheld and games are otherwise being rated at an appropriate level for the intended audience.

As always, the problem isn't censorship, it's parenting.

censorship went out the door with the internet

No we do not need to censor video games anymore.

In fact, video games are probably one of the most censored forms of media ever. It's only in this generation lately that we are getting to the level of violence we are seeing in M for MATURE games.

What we need is more competent parents who realize that they shouldn't get every single M game for their children. What we also need is those same parents to explain to them that what they're doing isn't real and shouldn't be replicated in real life.

No need for anymore of this censoring bullsht.

No Game, Movie, Book or Music should ever be censored I don't have a problem with them having warnings or the rating system from the ESRB but It's up to the parents to decided not only what the children play or watch but they should also be telling them that almost everything you see is fake and should never be duplicated.

say no to censorship, Let the people see what they want.

The Government back in 1640 was probably protecting themselves not the public,
and any new laws are to control our will.

Look at the republic of Ireland over 1 year ago they have a referendum (public vote) on Lisbon treaty (Unification of the European Union), the public said No!!!, then this year again they had another referendum of the Lisbon treaty where the government of Ireland spend millions on advertisement to promote Europe (vote yes) and had propaganda again Vote no.

Now the 2 main parties in the UK Labour and Conservatives will not allow the public to have a referendum on the Lisbon treaty, In 50 years everyone will be slaves.