News Germany considers banning violent games

I'm German and I just don't get it. In the last 5-10 years we've had a couple of politicians approaching the end of their political career trying to find a way to become invincible by being the ones who "saved our kids from becoming sociopaths". They tried to achieve that by banning violent computer games.
We all know (including them) that games are not the cause but merely a trigger if anything at all. But, as mentioned before, it is way easier to blame something like games or movies than to actually spend money on something so "useless" as schooling for parents of kids who show aggressive behaviour or who live in brutal environments.

And there's something else I don't understand:
How has that ANYTHING to do with Nazi Germany or the Holocaust?! I was born in 84, 39 years after the war and I still hear people ranting about "the Germans" being Nazis and what we did. ****ing hell, yes, it was bad! Most likely the worst thing anybody ever did since the settlers in America had their own genocide with the natives.
But please stop these amazingly stupid comments! The kids born today are 4th or 5th generation after the war! My father was born in 46, my mother in 52. What do I or my generation have to do with these Nazi pigs?

Sorry for the rant but it just makes me angry...

 

At least give us some credit lol, we have enough imagination to think about shooting people, we don't need games for that. If anything, such games make me feel less stressed out, a good innocent few mouse clicks to move some pixels. Grow up Mr. Government.

 

+1

Bringing something like the holocaust as a politicians reason for their decision (Even if it a incredibly mis-informed one) isn't appropriate.

 

They have just tried to ban paintball, airsoft and laser tag as they simulated killing. They have relented on the paintballing front for now. I dont think the germans will try to raise the Forth Reich. Never forget what has happened in the near past but put faith in your people to have learned from their past mistakes.

 

Please don't get me wrong.

@perplekks45 I love and respect Germany, Germans and German culture and I meant no offence. I am sorry if it was taken like that. My vitriol is at the politicians not the German people who I have more respect for than the British, thats for sure. The politicians in Germany and the UK for that matter need to stop with this blaming of video games. It is a cheap shot and I am sure Germany would rather have the taxes on games than not? I reckon Gordon Brown will try to follow suit.. that is if he still has a job by the end of the week

 

lmfao,just typical blame video games for everything
did this guy never do anything else in his life .if somebody is a boxer or mma fighter and he shoots a guy is it because of his hobby

i think not its just away to blame something or somebody for someone else`s problems .there must be apart of them that wants to kill and nothing to do with his hobby (ie gaming)

i game and i`m not looking to shoot anybody does that make me wrong (i hope not)

 

oh dear hopefully this does not pass .. poor Germans

 

Germans should know better than to ban the "wrong" stuff.

Surely there are a couple more people playing Far Cry and CS in a country of some 80 M people, how come there isn't a school shooting every day? Because the games don't make people go nuts!

Now if only the politicians didn't have their heads too high up their arses to see the fact. Too much asked, I'm afraid.

 

Ridiculous!

If they go too far with these bans, then who will join their army and protect their country and the freedom they live in, if their population become over sensitised to any violence? Their army will become softer than the futuristic film Demolition Man. That's IF it will have an effect on the population and people's mentallity.

On a serious note, who are they trying to kid? Are they really saying that the video game made the person commit the crime? Don't they think the crime would have been commited regardless. If a natural born psychopath is found with a game on his PC, such as, Left 4 Dead, you can easily argue that the game vented his frustration on a daily basis and saved lives. What these politicians should do is focus on the real job of dealing with certain persons mental or social problems etc instead of looking for scapegoats and fooling the public to oversimplistic ways of analysing problems.

When the live action TV series of Batman and, later, Spiderman first ran on TV, people tried to ban them after certain 'copycats' decided to jump out of tall buildings, convinced they were said superheroes. Nobody in their RIGHT MIND would ban a TV show for this kind of reason. The route problem needs to be dealt with rather than trying to spoil the 'show' for the majority audience that know the consequences of putting on a cape and jumping out of a 12th floor building. What are they teaching people by banning the show? They would be teaching them that the show is the evil thing and that 'responsible' and intelligent humans should pass their responsibility for their own actions onto the makers of a TV show.

A video game is the same. You're unlikely to see a natural psychopath with 'My Little Pony' game insttalled on his PC. Instead he will have violent games. So will 'normal' people have violent games. Normal people don't walk outside and kill people because a videogame made them do it.

 

We should ban anyone with a bad thought. I motion for the inquisition to be recreated to determine that everyone thinks purely. Anyone with an evil thought can then be reeducated or put to sleep for the preservation of the nation!!!!!11111111

 

We all know this is scapegoat-ism so I won't preach to the choir.
We all know that usually there are deeper psychological issues when something unfortunate like this occurs (mental illness, loneliness coupled with being bullied, horrid home life, etc/et all).

My question is-- what are the gun laws in Germany? How did the shooter obtain their weapon? Per chance the authorities should be pursuing that question?

 

It's pretty strict, The gunmans farther was a member of a gun club and therefore he had a pistol, unfortunately not properly secured. I don't know the specific weapon used, but I doubt it was bought for competition shooting as those mostly are a low calibre 22.

 

Hey Germany heads up! studies show that violence games doesn't provoke us, but studies does show that out stress level decrease if we play violent game.... were not here to cause violence we just want a way to be out of the wear and tear in our everyday life. also IMO germany can try to limit as much as possible but we as people will rebel and us rebelling are far more superior than your laws ;D so get ready one hell of a fight Germany.... (even though i live in US i know how they feel)

p.s there also trying to get rid of Paintball another supposedly violent game that were protesting for the same reason... it's just people link violence game to guns and crimes... if your trying to limit the violence restrict the gun laws....

 

Ban violent games? Seriously, the news on TV are more violent than what you see in most games.

 

I do, especially when Mario keeps falling into the hole in the same spot! Oh well, that's Mario Bros.. sorry, wrong game!

 

What exactly do they define as a violent video game?
all the usual shooters yes, but then there are others that could be included as violent like, boxing games, ultimate fighter games, wresteling games, driving games like burnout (rewarded for causing huge accidents), even games like World of Warcraft can be viewed as violent and how exactly would they plan to ban that?
The banning of violent games could easily see 50% of games being taken of their shelfs, I cant see manufecturers being too happy about that.
I'm not sure it's something that will ever happen, it's just too absurd, even for politicians

 

Simple, any game that is not approved by the government is violent.

 

they immedatly blamed one of the shootings in america on a video game until they went through his room and didnt find so much as tetris there (there have been so many i forget which one it was)

 

maybe they just have their panties in a twist over the 1.7 million FPS shooter games where the object of the game is to kill as many germans as possible

wolfenstein, medal of honor, call of duty, etc...

 

Boo! I have no idea why Germany is like this on computer games, very odd.