Australia: WTF Mate?

[Soushi]

We all know that Australia is horrible when it comes to banning video games. Okay but... why are we surprised any more. I mean, Australia does this all the time, yet people get all surprised. Lets face it, until Australia begins to show a little faith in its youth (aka: the gaming population), this is going to continue. In fact, our getting riled about it is just feeding them more and more attention, And for every gamer who rails against them, they probably get some boring or clueless person who agrees with them. Still, ignoring someone and waiting for them to change is no fun.

Why Australia? Why? What happened? Why does the sight of pixelated blood and guns make you cry? Can anyone shed some light on this? Anyone?

I know that everyone and their dog has done an Australia thread, but i have had it up to here with this crap.

What is wrong? How do we fix it? Where does it end? And why does Australia act like this? (Lets try to keep this conversation civil and reasonab- oh who am i kidding, knock yourselves out)

Okay.... GO!

(note: I should clarify. I am not trying to bash Australia, I am trying to understand. It may seem backwards to me, but that is hardly relevant is it. After all, i live in Canada where we are free to play and watch what we want. As for the Australian people, i have no issue with you (save for some nasty history but we'll leave that aside for now) in fact i would even go as far as to say that i find your country to be quite nice. And i know i don;t know to much about the topic, thus why i asked the question. I have an opinion, you may not like it or may think it is uneducated, but insulting me for it just makes you seem like as much (or more) of a jerk than i am. Thank you.)

 

[Julianking93]

Who knows? I've never been to Australia but from all I've heard, I can only assume its run by a bunch of right wing pussies.

Why are we surprised when any game sparks controversy? We all know what games will spark some sort of controversy, so why are we surprised when someone gets pissed?

Sorry, I seem to have answered your question with another question.

 

[zen5887]

As an Aussie gamer I have to say.

I don't really care. Yes, an R18 rating will make things run smoother and I'll sign, rally and march whenever I can bit I'm really not losing sleep over it. With the exception of L4D2 (and maybe a few more I can't really remember), all the games that have been banned or censored are rubbish. I mean, I don't really care that BMX XXX was banned.

The problem lies with the Politicians having their facts wrong, as they still believe that games are for kids (when the average aussie gaming age is 29). And they believe it is their job to protect the children from things that they shouldn't be seeing, which is in fact the parents job.

Also - Its already been brought up but I feel its quite important. Gamers arn't showing their maturity by attacking Michael Atkinson, they are actually helping his case. The same thing happened when Jack Thompson was all the rage. Prove your maturity gamers of Australia by not being dicks.

 

[Fire Daemon]

You know what I'm fucking tired of? People assuming they know what this R18+ rating is all about and then spewing complete and utter ignorance all over the subject.

The reason that games are refused classification is because they have been damned worthy of an R18+ rating or higher however no R18+ rating exists so those games can not be legally sold here. However you may want to take note that very few games are actually banned (refused classification actually) and get given lower ratings than those of their American and Canadian brothers. If anything it's you lot that are right wing pussies afraid of violence and blood, not us.

And please, if you don't know about the situation don't fucking talk about it and don't get involved. If you want to help, fine help, but educate yourself on the matter before trying. I see a ton of people complaining about this issue but very few fully get it or even try to, they just complain and ***** and feel that they've made the world a better place.

The reason that there isn't an R18+ rating... aw hell go and look it up yourself. I've explained this shit too many times, it's like trying to hold back the fucking tides with an angry face.

I am in favour of their not being an R18+ rating though. Try to guess why.

 

[cheese_wizington]

Just wait till that guy in charge of all these shenanigans dies.

 

[Dusty Donuts]

As an Aussie gamer I have to say.

I don't really care. Yes, an R18 rating will make things run smoother and I'll sign, rally and march whenever I can bit I'm really not losing sleep over it. With the exception of L4D2 (and maybe a few more I can't really remember), all the games that have been banned or censored are rubbish. I mean, I don't really care that BMX XXX was banned.

The problem lies with the Politicians having their facts wrong, as they still believe that games are for kids (when the average aussie gaming age is 29). And they believe it is their job to protect the children from things that they shouldn't be seeing, which is in fact the parents job.

Also - Its already been brought up but I feel its quite important. Gamers arn't showing their maturity by attacking Michael Atkinson, they are actually helping his case. The same thing happened when Jack Thompson was all the rage. Prove your maturity gamers of Australia by not being dicks.

This.
Oh, by the way, it's not really Australian gamers attacking Michael Atkinson, it's overseas gamers attacking the entire Australian government. I've never complained about Atkinson, but I've directed attackers to the fact that it's just one.

 

[Shaoken]

Who knows? I've never been to Australia but from all I've heard, I can only assume its run by a bunch of right wing pussies.

That assumption would be incorrect. The federal government doesn't have anything to do with the lack of an R18+ rating, it's not important to them at all.

 

[Nicolai]

-applauds Khitten-

Oh, you couldn't be more wrong. Faith in the youth of Australia is completely irrelevant, since the average gamer in Australia is 29, we don't need any. Anyone who objects to any sort of censorship in Australia is clearly a paedophile and a terrorist, since those are the only sorts of people who could possibly want that kind of filth.

Okay, enough Dropbearing.

Australia acts like this because we have political failure. Our current choices of government are a right-wing government who want to implement censorship or a right-wing government who like the idea of censorship and are also climate-change denialists.

The first group are called the Labor Party and ostensibly represent the Unions, workers' rights and the common people. In the US they'd be seen as the Democrats, in the UK, they'd be, well the Labour Party. Once upon a time they had values akin to Socialism and are still accused of it to this day. What they actually have in Australia is a party split where about half the party is composed of people with consciences who want to do the right thing (Socialist Left) and the other half is composed of morally righteous people with some reasonably fundamentalist Christian beliefs and the conservatism which comes with that (Labor Unity). Atkinson is from Labor Unity, so is Prime Minster Rudd, the Treasurer and Senator Conroy (the Communications Minister backing the Great Firewall of Australia). Atkinson is a State Attorney General, everyone else I've mentioned is Federal, but legislation for changing ratings requires all the states to agree, hence he can stonewall it. The Labor Party makes all its decisions in party meetings (caucus) to set policy then votes as a block. Labor Unity currently has the majority in the party and is unlikely to ever lose it, which means socially conservative decisions. Voting against the party line is grounds for ejection from the party. Incidentally, this inability to accurately represent their constituents is in direct violation of our Constitution, but somehow it never gets called out as it would result in massive upheaval of the political system. Also, the Labor party is spelled incorrectly by modern standards in the American manner despite being a British Colony as there was a movement at the time it was established to simplify spelling which never caught on.

The Liberal party as a whole are not liberal at all, being closer to the Republicans in the US and the Tories in the UK. They are currently led by a far-right wing arch-conservative Tony Abbott, who is known as the Mad Monk for some of his more Fundamentalist beliefs. Up until recently, they were led by a centre right pro-green businessman Malcolm Turnbull, which ironically made their leadership more left wing than the supposed Socialists. They stand for big business, selling off national assets and getting the Budget into as much surplus as they can while attempting to ignore things like 1/10 of the second largest city in the country turning up in the same place at the same time to protest against abusing Workers' Rights. This is probably the faction all the Labor Unity people SHOULD belong to.

TL;DR: Australian politicians in positions of power are all conservatives afraid of getting shot by gamers influenced by violence or finding paedophiles who've been on an unfiltered internet near their children.

 

[Nicolai]

Well, yes, we can choose from Right Wing Labor or Right Wing Liberal as our only two major parties. It's been an interesting insight learning how Australian politics work such that the Labor party is controlled by a majority from the Right-Wing Labor Unity faction, with the agreement some portfolios are allocated to the Socialist Left Faction.

 

[Nicolai]

This.
Oh, by the way, it's not really Australian gamers attacking Michael Atkinson, it's overseas gamers attacking the entire Australian government. I've never complained about Atkinson, but I've directed attackers to the fact that it's just one.

It's not just one. R18+ game information will be locked by Stephen Conroy's Federal Legislation for a compulsory Internet Filter, dubbed "The Great Firewall of Australia" in many places. That legislation gives the government power to lock out any website containing any information relating to content which is refused classification in Australia. If that doesn't concern you, a rise in latency from 30-90% for the extra layer of information bouncing probably will.

 

[Shaoken]

Who knows? I've never been to Australia but from all I've heard, I can only assume its run by a bunch of right wing pussies.

That assumption would be incorrect. The federal government doesn't have anything to do with the lack of an R18+ rating, it's not important to them at all.

Nonetheless, he's right. We do have a thoroughly right-wing government.

Thankly nowhere near as right-wing as the Republicans in the US. Because even evil has standards.

 

[Shaoken]

Thankly nowhere near as right-wing as the Republicans in the US. Because even evil has standards.

You think?

I dunno, they seem like they're on a par to me.

Well, no party here would try and oppose universal health care. At least, none that has a decent chance of winning anything.

Plus we don't have one party backed by morons with barely-concealed threats of armed violence. 'Course we don't have as many guns as they do....

 

[zen5887]

how many games have been banned?
manhunt
that soldier of fortune game
L4D2

oooh.
wow.
such a loss, i mean i have L4D2 (thanks playasia.com!) but seriously... who gives a shit.

Actually

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games#Australia

As you can see, a large number of them are censored then re released. Also, a lot of them are crap.

Also - It brings into to question what the gov can and can't do.

 

[S.R.S.]

AVP was allowed to be uncensored in it's final release but L4D2 was censored. The board really need to look at themselves and get a life. Although judging games for bannable content would be a kick-ass job.

Wait... I think I know why they ban games now! If they didn't they wouldn't recieve as much publicity or money for the (crap) job they're doing.

 

[Kortney]

God. This has been done to death. I've spent a lot of time in Australia and this isn't an issue. It's funny, the only people I see or hear complaining about this aren't Australian. Australian's still get all the quality games American's do. It's not a fucking huge issue in Australia, and in the lengthy periods of time I've spent there my gaming life hasn't been affected in a negative way at all.

Australian's have more civil liberties than people here in America. It's also a better country to live in. Stop acting like it's the end of the world.

You know what I'm fucking tired of? People assuming they know what this R18+ rating is all about and then spewing complete and utter ignorance all over the subject.

QFT.

In particular, the Americans/Canadians/British who are spouting this nonsense.