GTA IV sex video gives Jerk Thompson, other critics fresh ammo

[Noja87]

Grand Theft Auto IV is one day away from release, and already Jack Thompson has begun to step up his war on the title. The embattled Florida attorney has written a letter to the US Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, R. Alexander Acosta, demanding that legal action be taken against Take Two and retailers for selling the game. This time, Thompson appears to have an unlikely ally thanks to video gaming news site IGN.

# Ars Technica - The News Desk pson-targets-gta-iv-with-an-unlikely-ally-ign.html

Thomp on sent a copy of the letter to Ars Technica, and his demands are far-reaching. "Indictments should be returned against Take Two corporately and its Chairman, Strauss Zelnick, along with other Take Two officers. Indictment should also be against Sony and Microsoft which are making this pornographic game available to minors, and openly so, on their PS3 and Xbox systems," Thompson wrote. "Further, indictments should be handed down against Wal-Mart, Best Buy, GameStop, and all other retailers distributing this game to minors at their retail stores, openly, to kids who are only seventeen."

He then compares the game to, of all things, polio. "Grand Theft Auto IV is the gravest assault upon children in this country since polio. We now have vaccines for that virus... The 'vaccine' that must be administered by the United States government to deal with this virtual virus of violence and sexual depravity is criminal prosecutions of those who have conspired to do this. If you doubt me, look at the aforementioned streaming audio/video. It will make you sick."

This is where the story takes a turn, because Jack Thompson provides a link to a video, put together by the gaming news site IGN, called "Ladies of Liberty City." Be careful clicking on that link; there is absolutely nothing there that is safe for work.

The video strips the game of all context and merely shows scenes of sexual content and violence, one after the other. In fact, it can be hard to watch for that reason, and it's a rather numbing experience. The game's lead character, Niko, drives up to prostitutes, honks the horn, then shoots them. You see a simulated sex act, only to have Niko run the hooker over afterwards with his car. The video shows graphic lap dances featuring one, and then two, girls. The language is even worse, including—and excuse the stars, "F*** the s*** out of it, you nasty f******."

"This is clearly an Adults Only game. It's not even close," Thompson wrote. The sexual content shown in the IGN video is only a very small part of the game, and it can be avoided by players. The shootings are all random and, as far as we know, play no part in the actual play of Grand Theft Auto IV. We'll be sure to update the story if there's a prostitute-hunting mission, but the video seems designed to show just how depraved the game can be, and it has given Jack Thompson his best ammunition yet to fight the game.

The video is over the top, and since the acts are shown one after the other, the game can be portrayed as a nonstop sexual experience. When critics slammed Fox News over the coverage of the sexual content in Mass Effect, it was clear that no one involved had actually played the game or even watched a video of the content. With "Ladies of Liberty City," IGN has provided Jack Thompson and the mainstream media the perfect weapon to attack the game: a smörgåsbord of sex and violence that can be shown to anyone who doubts the game needs to be stopped.

It's doubtful any meaningful action will be taken, as Jack Thompson has recently been sanctioned and has so far racked up little apart from personal fame, but it's clear that the controversy surrounding the game is far from over.

---

He just wont give up

[ready2rumbelX]

....wow. Jack doesn't really know when to back down, does he?

He focuses so much on how minors are affected by this, completely disregarding that mature adults are the main market for this title...not to mention, kids who are interested in pr0n will definitely find alternative sources much more satisfactory than the content/material in GTA4.

It's a flippin' game!! Not the most kosher, in regards to sex and violence, but it's a long shot away from being anything close to "persuasive" material in harming others.

....sheesh.

r2rX

[jonc2006]

lol you think thats bad? read this.

[Zack]

That Jack Thompson guy is a *** and a *******.

He has nothing better to do with his time than to portray video games as something that can lead to someone replicating its actions in real life.

The two are totally unrelated.

That guys inbox should be flooded with hate mail, he should be scared out of opening his stupid mouth ever again.

I for one am sick of hearing his bull****

[skoreanime]

Hillary made the right move by not appearing in public with him while campaigning. He's an idiot.

[jonc2006]

"idiot" is an understatement.

[PCXL-Fan]

Crap, if this gets on Oprah...


Imagine if Thompson and this GTA IV video went on Oprah and she rasied a big hulla-balloo about the sexism in the game. Women/women's lobby groups around north america would rise up and rally together and get the game removed from store shelves (particualrily because of the prositution in the game & stripper lap dancing in the game)(not that there's anything wrong with womens lobby groups, they are a good thing in this current day and age 75% of the time) . It would spark a whole new crusade this time with immense clout and power to get rid of mature games, just like the censoreship laws in Germany only this time towards sex and not violence, and be the beginning of the end of mature games in north america.

On a side note note, this may not matter. If Hillary Clinton gets into office, it will be the end of these risque games anyways, as she has said many times throughout her campaign removing these games from mainstream store shelves is one of her objectives.

[jonc2006]

once thompson gets disbarred his credibility will go down the crapper. not that it already hasnt.

[emwearz]

Jack Thompson and people like him annoy me, the games have ratings, and generally you can find movies that are much more messed up compared to there video game counterparts (when looking at ratings).

[jonc2006]

its a textbook double-standard. movies like hostel and such can get away with it, nobody seems to care about that. but nooooo, not video games. jack thompson is nothing but a modern day fred wertham.

[imlost]

Either JT is screw up in the head or he is just an attention *****.

[jonc2006]

hes both.

[cottonvibes]

guys i know the guy is a ****er, but its true that the GTA series has gone a bit overboard.

the whole game is violence, sex, and drugs.

and its a very popular game... i think it shows how corrupt our society is.

what jack thompson is doing isn't going to help the problem, but i agree with him that its overly Mature, since lots of kids play that game...


i for one, can't stand the GTA series.

[jonc2006]

its overly mature because its intended for mature audiences. if kids get a hold of it is that rockstars fault? no. unless the kid steals the thing they have to get the money to buy it from somewhere and that somewhere 99% of the time is going to be from a parent. jack thompson isnt my nanny and he isnt going to tell me what i can and cannot play for the sake of teh children. teh children can go **** themselves for all i care, the thing is nothing but an excuse to harness control over people and remove things from existence that conflict with their so-called "morals" for the greater good and quite frankly, im sick of it.

edit- and just so you know, im not into the GTA series myself either, but i am into our seeing our 1st amendment rights which people like thompson feel they can use like toilet paper remain OUR 1st amendment rights, not his.

[cottonvibes]

Originally Posted by jonc2006

its overly mature because its intended for mature audiences. if kids get a hold of it is that rockstars fault? no. unless the kid steals the thing they have to get the money to buy it from somewhere and that somewhere 99% of the time is going to be from a parent. jack thompson isnt my nanny and he isnt going to tell me what i can and cannot play for the sake of teh children. teh children can go **** themselves for all i care, its nothing but an excuse to harness control over people and im sick of it.

edit- and just so you know, im not into the GTA series myself either, but i am into our 1st amendment rights.

its true that the kids have to get it from their parents. but usually the parent dosn't even know that the game has such vulgar material.

the parents buying the games know games like pacman, pong, and mario; and they think games are still like that today.
so they buy the game thinking its just a regular videogame.

its still their fault. but perhaps laws should be made stricter for buying mature content games.
perhaps only selling them at Adult stores and stuff like that.
that way, its very clear that the game has Adult content.

the only way something like that is going to happen though, is if the problem has been made aware.
and Thompson is definitely making it into a big problem.

the problem is that hes attacking the game developers, when he should be attacking the Laws regarding mature content in videogames.
Because hes only attacking the developers, its pretty obvious that Thompson is a fraud, who just wants to make money from this deal. He's happy these games are made, so he can sue the developers.

[jonc2006]

i went back an worded my pervious post a bit better in case you havnt noticed

anyway, stricter laws are not going to make up for stupid or incompetent parenting. and from what i know thompson doesnt seek money from lawsuits for himself, he does it in the name of these so-called victims of violent video game crimes and to help push his little moral crusade. personally i think it has more to do with his fundamentalist viewpoint of things but thats just my opinion, honestly i dont know what the hell goes on in his head.

[cottonvibes]

Originally Posted by jonc2006

edit- and just so you know, im not into the GTA series myself either, but i am into our seeing our 1st amendment rights which people like thompson feel they can use like toilet paper remain OUR 1st amendment rights, not his.

yeah i agree with you there.

i'm all for freedom, and i hate when people try and limit our freedom.

but its really a double-edged sword. More freedom means bad people can do bad things in the world and get away with it.

anyway, stricter laws are not going to make up for stupid or incompetent parenting.

thats true as well.

sadly though, we have incompetent parents, and its hard finding a solution to fix that.


anyways,
to me Thompson seems like a guy that has been brought up with Christian beliefs, and is imposing his beliefs on others. I hate it when people do that...
But i also agree that some games have gone a bit overboard with mature content.
And its a bit sad that a game like GTA has become so popular in America... It just shows the condition the country is in...

[jonc2006]

part of its popularity is due to the enormous amount of controversy and attention the series gets from people, especially when the controversy and attention is coming from people (politicians) that can not only directly influence the and control certain aspects of the game, but the player as well.

[John Aiton]

I posted this in the bin a while back

[Thanakil]

Originally Posted by cottonvibes

its true that the kids have to get it from their parents. but usually the parent dosn't even know that the game has such vulgar material.

the parents buying the games know games like pacman, pong, and mario; and they think games are still like that today.
so they buy the game thinking its just a regular videogame.

its still their fault. but perhaps laws should be made stricter for buying mature content games.
perhaps only selling them at Adult stores and stuff like that.
that way, its very clear that the game has Adult content.

Only if they do the same thing for movies, books, and ect.
If a M game has to be sold in a adult store, then so should movies, at the very least.

But still, that would be hella stupid.
Those games are NOT adult games, so why should they be sold in ADULT stores?
Those are 17+ games. Not 18+ games. 18+ games are banned from every single countries AND from every single stores AND from every single consoles...

If we force 17+ games to be sold in adult stores, not only doesn't it make senses because we're using a double-standard, but we're hindering sales for those games, effectively censoring games ANYWAY by reducing the sales.

Reducing the number of stores in which a game is sold is bound to reduce the sales. Not a lot, that's for sure, but it would still be a hindrance.
Which would be, quite simply, a way to censor mature (17+) games.
Especially if we're talking about games that aren't as popular as GTA.



Games shouldn't have to pay and be punished for peoples being moron. They shouldn't be censored because people can't look at the FREAKIN LETTER on the box of the game.
Games shouldn't have to pay either for stores not warning that the game is Mature, as they should.
And if the parents are WARNED by the box AND the store AND STILL BUY IT FOR THEIR KIDS...

Then it doesn't matter anymore where you sell the game, it's simply peoples being stupid.
There is already 10 times more protection