Over at GamePolitics, the watchdogs of the rights of video game players everywhere, they have been tracking the progress of HB2660, a measure before the Arizona State Senate which would hold creators of violent media responsible for the violent acts of anyone who consumed said violent media.
The original article over at the Arizona Republic outlines the senate’s response to the measure. According to the sponsors of the bill, the original target of the measure was violent pornography:
The bill’s sponsor said the proposal was designed to punish those who publish, produce or disseminate underground pornography that depicts actual rape.
The broad implications of the bill were unsettling to the legislature:
Lawmakers wrestled with what they described as the bill’s gray areas: Would novelist Tom Clancy’s The Sum of All Fears, in which terrorists use a nuclear device to try to blow up the Super Bowl, be protected under the proposal? How about the publisher of Hitler’s manifesto Mein Kampf, in which the Nazi leader espoused his anti-Semitism?
Or The Turner Diaries, a 1978 novel which some believe served as the inspiration for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing?
As a result of the ambiguities and potentially far-reaching scope of the bill, the legislature rejected the measure by a vote of 4-2 against. Although gamers are often quick to worry that their medium is being unfairly targeted, it appears clear that the lawmakers have the First Amendment in mind. Stay strong, lawmakers, stay strong!
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