Founded in 1996, The National Institute on Media and the Family (NIMF) will close its doors at the end of the 2009 calendar year.

In a statement, the group said “that more work remains to be done,” and that NIMF’s board is in discussions with other non-profits organizations to see if its programs and research can be carried on.

NIMF’s most prominent work was its annual Video Game Report Card, which graded the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), game publishers, retailers and parents annually on the enforcement and education of videogame ratings. While the rated groups were knocked early and often by NIMF, the 13th annual Report Card gave grades that would have made any parent proud, except for the “Incomplete” for the Parental Involvement category.

Game groups eventually even cozied up to NIMF, culminating in a grant of $50,000 bestowed upon NIMF in 2008 by The Entertainment Software Association (ESA).

President and founder Dr. David Walsh (picutred), who indicated that he is not ready for retirement, and will continue to speak and write on parenting topics, had this to say:

The current challenging economic environment accelerated those discussions making this the right time to begin transitioning the programs to other organizations who share our mission and values. I look forward to transitioning the Institute’s programs to worthy organizations that I am confident will continue to educate parents and caregivers on our rapidly changing digital culture.

NIMF credits its annual Report Card with the adoption of a ratings system, additional scrutiny over age appropriate game purchases at retail and parental controls being incorporated into console systems.

In a blog post, Dr. Walsh added:

We’ve accomplished a lot of amazing things in the last thirteen years.  And in that same amount of time there has been unprecedented technological innovation and an ever-increasing number of screens in young people’s lives, making the Institute’s mission just as relevant today as when we started.  So while this chapter of the Institute’s work is coming to a close, I am excited to transition the Institute’s programs to organizations that will continue to foster the same important conversations and bring relevant solutions to parents.

Update: Via an article on the WCCO CBS affiliate website, comes definitive word that a lack of funding was the culprit behind NIMF’s closure. NIMF was funded by Fairview Health Services with an annual commitment of some $750,000, a figure that Fairview could no longer justify in the current economic climate.

The President of Fairview’s North Region stated, “It was back in the summer of this year that we really said, 'We can't continue. Fairview can't continue.’”

A prominent school safety speaker has advocated the imposition of a 10-day moratorium on video game play and television viewing by students, reports the Grand Forks Herald.

Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, author, retired military man and longtime critic of video game violence, made the remarks during a keynote presentation to North Dakota school officials yesterday.

As he typically does in his speeches, Grossman linked violent video games with school shootings:

[Grossman] described, in chilling detail, school massacres at Columbine High... the Red Lake Indian Reservation in Minnesota and Virginia Tech. Just as graphically, he conjured the brutality of video games such as “Grand Theft Auto” and “Manhunt.”

Grossman, an expert on school violence, went on to trace a connection between the two, complete with brain scans and a study of juvenile murderers. And he pitched a singular idea to gathered educators – a 10-day television, movie and video game “detox”... 

“This is not business as usual,” he said. “This is our world coming unglued. This is our society coming unhinged.”

It was 15 years ago today that the video game industry introduced the ESRB rating system to Congress, reports Wired's This Day in Tech blog.

The move came in the wake of Congressional criticism of game violence, particularly the original Mortal Kombat, which seems laughably tame by today's standards. Wired's Chris Kohler writes:

The [Congressional] hearings were largely a response to the popularity of... Mortal Kombat...

Nintendo chairman Howard Lincoln and Sega vice president Bill White took potshots at each other during the hearing. Lincoln said that the Sega CD game Night Trap, another photorealistic, occasionally violent game that the company had rated MA-17, “simply has no place in our society” and testified that “small children” had bought it.

Meanwhile, White’s position was that Sega was more responsible than Nintendo, because his company had [its own] rating system in place...  [Connecticut Sen. Joe] Lieberman would later express his shock that the two executives went after each other with such ferocity.

Lieberman's threat to regulate game content via legislation persuaded the game biz to get its act together. The IDSA (now known as the ESA) was formed and quickly set up the ESRB, which went into operation on September 1st, 1994.

Labour MP Keith Vaz (left), a longstanding critic of the video game industry, is apparently lending his support to the use of PEGI as the UK's sole rating system.

At least, that's the word from ELSPA. A press release issued today by the UK game publishers group reports on a "quick meeting" between ELSPA boss Michael Rawlinson and Vaz:

London, United Kingdom – 24 July, 2009: ELSPA’s Director General, Michael Rawlinson, met with Keith Vaz MP this week. During the meeting the Home Affairs Select Committee Chairman made it clear he supports the single rating system being introduced for videogames and also commended the improvements to PEGI.
 
“We had a quick meeting with Mr Vaz and he made it apparent that he believes it is important to have a single, rather than a confusing dual, rating system in the UK,” said Michael Rawlinson. “Mr Vaz added that he was keen to see the changes being made to the PEGI system and acknowledged the UK games industry’s commitment to an advertising and education campaign around the new age symbols and content descriptors when they are introduced to further protect players.”

"Quick meeting" leaves a lot to the imagination: Hallway? Elevator? Men's room? We've asked ELSPA for clarification and whether we can expect any type of announcement in which Vaz states his position for himself.

As GamePolitics indicated yesterday, an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief has been filed in support of California's petition requesting that the U.S. Supreme Court review the constitutionality of the state's 2005 violent video game law. To date, two lower federal courts have deemed the measure unconstitutional.

The brief was filed today on behalf of State Sen. Leland Yee (D), the sponsor of the contested statute as well as the California Psychiatric and California Psychological Associations. Yee himself is a child psychologist by profession. He also notes in the brief that he has authored several bills protecting free speech rights in circumstances other than violent games.

In seeking to explain to the Supreme Court why it should approve California's petition for a full hearing, the 15-page document maintains that the state has a compelling interest in restricting children's access to such games. The oft-heard argument about the interactivity of video games is among the theories put forth:

The interactive nature of video games is vastly different than passively listening to music, watching a movie, or reading a book. With interactive video games, the child becomes a part of the action which serves as a potent agent to facilitate violence and over time learns the destructive behavior.

 

This immersion results in a more powerful experience and potentially dangerous learned behavior in children and youth...

The brief also suggests that video games present a new type of challenge for parents in their efforts to monitor their children's media diet:

Parents can read a book, watch a movie or listen to a CD to discern if it is appropriate for their child. These violent video games, on the other hand, can contain up to 800 hours of footage with the most atrocious content often reserved for the highest levels and can be accessed only by advanced players after hours upon hours of progressive mastery.

And, while federal courts have not to date been swayed by research suggesting that violent video games lead to real-world violence, the brief points to such studies in support of its position:

Just as the technology of video games improves at astonishing rates, so to does the body of research consistently demonstrate the harmful effects these violent interactive games have on minors. Over three thousand peer-reviewed studies, produced over a period of 30 years documenting the effects of screen violence (including violent video games), have now been published...

 

These data suggest very strongly that participating in the playing of violent video games by children and youth increase aggressive thought and behavior; increase antisocial behavior and delinquency; engender poor school performance; desensitize the game player to violence...

Surprisingly, GamePolitics comes in for a mention in the brief. GP's Legislation Tracker feature is referenced as a means of pointing out the wide variety of legislation aimed at video games around the United States.

Sen. Yee's office has issued a press release on the filing of the amicus brief, including a link to the brief (15-page PDF). The Supreme Court is expected to consider California's petition in the fall.

Via press release, GamePolitics has learned that California State Sen. Leland Yee (D) will be joined by a pair of mental health organizations in filing an amicus curiae (friend of the Court) brief with the United States Supreme Court tomorrow in support of the state's petition to overturn a 9th Circuit Court ruling that California's 2005 violent video game law - drafted by Yee - is unconstitutional.

The official announcement will be made at 10:00 A.M. Pacific Time by Yee and representatives of the California Psychiatric and California Psychological Associations. Sen. Yee is a child psychologist by trade.

GamePolitics will have more - including a copy of the brief - in our Wednesday coverage.

In Parliament yesterday, longtime video game industry critic Keith Vaz (Labour) quizzed Siôn Simon (left), Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Culture, Media & Sport about PEGI ratings and the controversial Japanese game RapeLay.

Conservative Mark Field jumped in on the topic, appearing to suggest the pursuit of a global content rating system for video games. Surprisingly, Simon said that the UK's recent adoption of the European PEGI system was viewed by the Gordon Brown government as "the building block to moving towards a global regulatory future."

The conversation went something like this:

Keith Vaz: What recent discussions has [Simon] had with pan-European game information on the age classification of video games?

Siôn Simon: I have spoken to the Video Standards Council—the current UK agents for the PEGI system—about the classification of video games and have another meeting scheduled with it very soon. I have also had discussions with the British Board of Film Classification. Both organisations are working hard to ensure the success of the new system.

Keith Vaz: I thank the Minister for his answer and welcome the steps that the Government are taking on this issue. However, it is still a matter of concern that a game such as "RapeLay", which shows extreme violence against women, can be downloaded from the internet. What steps are the Government taking to ensure that such games are not accessed from the internet, so that children and young people are properly protected?

Siôn Simon: We should be clear that [RapeLay] was not classified, but was briefly available on Amazon and then was banned. The point that my right hon. Friend is making is about games that, like other brutal, unpleasant, illegal content, can be available on the internet. All steps that apply to any other content on the internet will apply to games. Specifically, as part of the Byron review we set up the UK Council for Child Internet Safety to work with content providers, internet service providers and all aspects of Government to make sure that such content cannot be accessed, particularly by children.

Mark Field: The Minister will know that Britain is a great leader in video and computer games, and while I take on board many of the concerns expressed by Keith Vaz, will the Minister recognise that this is a global industry, not simply a European one, and in so far as we are going to have the safeguards to which the right hon. Gentleman refers, we will clearly also need to have global regulation along those lines?

Siôn Simon: The system of regulation for which we have opted—the PEGI system—is pan-European, and as such, we see it as the building block to moving towards a global regulatory future. The key principle is that the markings on games should make it clear to parents which games are suitable for adults and which are suitable and unsuitable for children and young children. Adults should be allowed to access adult content; children most certainly should not.

GP: Readers, what do you think of the idea of a global content rating system? Is it even possible? If so, is it desirable?

Source: They Work For You

The video game violence episode of Penn & Teller: Bullshit! which originally aired last week is currently posted on YouTube in three parts.

Given the title of the series, need I say that the videos may be NSFW?

UPDATE: The videos have been removed from YouTube.

Never mind imposing tougher safety standards on imports from China, writes South Carolina attorney and activist Tom Turnipseed (left).

In an op-ed for The State, Turnipseed urges Inez Tenenbaum, the new chair of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, to make her first priority a ban on war toys and war games:

It’s easier for children to play with war toys than to learn how to read or play the piano. War toys teach children aggression. Aggression needs an outlet, but aggression can be played out in a non-violent manner with peaceful games.

Children should know what really happens in a war. People are hurt, maimed and killed. War toys, games, television shows and movies using guns seldom show the real effect of what violence does to people...

 

Studies indicate a direct correlation between exposure to media violence, especially interactive video games, and increased childhood aggression...

Better alternatives to children enjoying shooting at people and blowing up buildings are games that encourage the use of their minds, skills and physical dexterity in activities promoting the sanctity of life and peace.

Turnipseed served as a South Carolina state senator (D) from 1976 to1980. He made unsuccessful runs for Congress (1980) and South Carolina Attorney General (1998).

Tonight's Penn & Teller: Bullshit! is the much-anticipated episode on video game violence.

The program airs at 10:00 p.m. Eastern/Pacific on Showtime. From the P&T:BS! website:

In episode 703, the duo debunks the theory of politicians and other alarmists that playing video games leads to teen violence by handing over a real semiautomatic weapon to a nine-year-old video game player to see if he becomes a human killing machine.

The promo video at left features a guy who is apparently an anti-game violence campaigner named Chris Cooney. I'll 'fess up that - in nearly five years of editing GamePolitics - I can't remember hearing of the guy, so I'm curious to see what he's all about. This is also the episode in which disbarred attorney Jack Thompson makes an appearance.

If you miss tonight's show, the program will be repeated several times over the next few days.

Last week, GamePolitics broke the news that the ultra-conservative Eagle Forum had filed a "friend of the court" brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in support of Calfornia's bid to have its 2005 violent video game law reviewed by the justices.

The rambling brief sought to link video games with everything from school shootings to poor grades to sudden death.

The group, founded by conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly, wades back into gamer space tomorrow when video game critic Arthur Ally appears as a guest on Eagle Forum Live, a radio show hosted by Schlafly.

Ally bills himself as a morally-responsible fund manager. In December his Timothy Plan investment fund issued a list of 30 "most offensive" video games, including the likes of World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online and Halo 3.

Ally also rather famously criticized Army of Two for "somewhat homo-erotic undertones between the two main characters."

Ironically, the conversation between this pair of would-be censors airs at 11:00 a.m. Central Time on Independence Day.

Watchdog group the Parents Television Council lashed out at Target this week during the retailer's annual shareholder meeting in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

According to a PTC press release, Bob Sherman, director of the organization's Chicago grassroots chapter, called out Target executives over a 2008 secret shopper sting. In that operation the PTC says that minors were able to purchase M-rated games 41% of the time at Target stores. Sherman told the execs and assembled shareholders:

On average our volunteers, all between the ages of 11 and 16, were able to purchase video games rated ‘M’ by the ESRB for mature content 36% of the time.  Target stores fared worse than the average – underage children were able to purchase M-rated video games at Target stores a stunning 41% of the time.  Parents have the right to expect that age restrictions for adult entertainment products will be enforced at the retail level...

Target represents families to so many consumers.  Your advertising and community good works reflect how Target is embedded in our lives.  The Parents Television Council is eager and ready to work with you to address this industry-wide dilemma.

Sherman and the PTC also slammed Target for selling mature-themed DVDs to underage buyers.

In contrast to the PTC's numbers, the most recent secret shopper survey conducted by the Federal Trade Commission found that underage buyers of M-rated games were successful only 29% of the time at Target.

He has been one of the video game industry's most aggressive critics in the past, but GamePolitics has learned that Boston Mayor Thomas Menino (D) will partner with the ESRB on a public service ad campaign designed to raise parental awareness of the video game rating system.

The campaign, unveiled in Boston by Menino and ESRB President Patricia Vance, will feature T.V. and radio ads as well as outdoor print ads. Of the media blitz, Menino said:

Parents want control of the media that comes into their homes, and the entertainment that their children enjoy. That’s why it’s so imperative that we educate parents about useful and informative tools like the ESRB ratings and rating summaries, so they’ll be empowered to make informed choices about which games they deem appropriate.  I’m proud to be educating parents in our city about the tools at their disposal.

With today's news, Menino joins a number of high-profile elected officials around the country who have partnered with the ESRB on game ratings awareness campaigns over the past several years. Given Menino's track record as a video game industry critic, the turnabout is especially significant.

In 2006 Menino led a campaign to have Grand Theft Auto ads removed from public transit. In 2007 his office flirted with video game legislation authored by Jack Thompson. The Boston Mayor's video game bill was eventually submitted to the legislature in 2008, but died in committee.

Menino, who earlier this year touted Boston as a game industry-friendly city in an effort to attract jobs, is running for an unpredecented fifth term as mayor.

Media watchdog group the Parents Television Council has applauded Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's decision to petition the U.S. Supreme Court to review a federal court decision striking down California's 2005 violent video game law as unconstitutional.

While video game industry lobbyists and video game consumer group the Entertainment Consumers Association criticized Schwarzenegger's decision, PTC President Tim Winter (left) praised the California appeal in a press release:

There should be no question that unaccompanied minors should be kept from purchasing adult video games that research has shown can be harmful to them, just like there are reasonable restrictions on other products that can cause them harm. This California law was designed to enforce the video game industry’s own voluntary retail guidelines... Our own research found that video game retailers sell M-rated video games to minors 36% of the time.  Clearly, this law is needed...

The [video game] industry doesn’t follow its own rules, and they don’t want a consequence for violating them.  Video game retailers, developers and publishers actually profit when their age restriction policy is ignored.  This creates an inherent and unworkable conflict of interest.

We hope that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear the case and rule in favor of the families and children that this California law was intended to protect.

Winter is referring to the PTC's 2008 secret shopper survey, which found that underage buyers were successful at purchasing M-rated games 36% of the time. A survey released by the Federal Trade Commission earlier in 2008 found only a 20% success rate for underage buyers.

FULL DISCLOSURE DEPT: The ECA is the parent company of GamePolitics.

A pair of German researchers claim that violent video games are a creation of the U.S. military.

Writing in the latest issue of Current Concerns, Renate and Rudi Hänsel call for a ban on violent game and echo the military conspiracy theme espoused in the U.S. by followers of fringe political figure Lyndon Larouche:

During the nineties the killing simulators, employed for hand to hand combat in the US army and police, were released by the Pentagon to be sold for private use on the public markets. As a consequence the computer and video game industry that had co-operated with the Pentagon from the very beginning, boomed. Since then the so-called killer games have wreaked havoc among children and youths.

The US army’s electronic training programs for killing people must be taken back to the US barracks, where they came from. They have to disappear from civil society altogether. They may be appropriate for the purpose of national defense or fight against crime; they have no place, however, in children’s rooms or in living rooms.

In addition, the Hänsels relate violent games to school shootings and quote German and Swiss political figures who have called for a ban on such products.

Oddly enough, they also harken back to a post-World War II German ban on war-themed toys.

GP: Thanks to longtime European reader Soldat Louis for the tip!

Via Spong comes word that video games are not especially well thought of in the British House of Lords. In a recent debate on age verification, Liberal Democrat Baroness Walmsley (left) commented:

Knives, guns, certain games and DVDs, alcohol, solvents and gambling are all very harmful and can destroy young minds and young lives.

To be fair, the Baroness qualified her remarks somewhat:

While the illegal sale of all these products concerns me... I believe that the sale of weapons is the most dangerous.

With the national debate over the use of torture raging on, could a steady diet of violent entertainment color some Americans' view of what has euphemistically been dubbed "enhanced interrogation"?
 
Writing for the liberal-leaning Huffington Post, Kari Henley opines:

If we are going to truly come to terms with abiding by moral codes against extreme acts of violence, we first have to start in our own living rooms... We say we "don't f**#$ torture," yet Grand Theft Auto is our favorite video game.
 
Let's face it: Americans are repeatedly exposed to serious scenes of violence when we go out to the movies, watch nightly TV shows, or unwind with video games, all of which drastically decrease overall sensitivity to violence.

To be fair, Henley’s views on the supposed desensitizing effects of violent entertainment appear to come primarily from the claims of longtime video game critic Dave Grossman. After spending a few paragraphs on violent TV and movies, Henley returns to video games:

What about these modern X-Box and online video games? While I happen to enjoy the "G" rated Wii, over 11 million people are spending their time engrossed in the World of Warcraft or Grand Theft Auto where the point is to go around and kill people in a calculated way. Tell me again why this is supposed to be fun and relaxing?
 
It's time to put torture in its place as unacceptable, period, both in our nation's military practices, and in our nation's entertainment standards.

-Reporting from San Diego, GamePolitics Correspondent Andrew Eisen...

When an arch-conservative chats up a guy who thinks he detected homo-erotic overtones in EA's action shooter Army of Two, you just know that video games are in for a beat-down.

Eagle Forum president Phyllis Schlafly (left) is scheduled to interview Arthur Ally, president of the Florida-based Timothy Plan, tomorrow at noon EST on the Eagle Forum Live radio program.

Schlafly is a longtime opponent of gay rights and Ally bills himself as a morally-responsible fund manager. In December Ally's Timothy Plan issued a list of 30 "most offensive" video games, including the likes of World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online and Halo 3.

A promo for the program on the Eagle Forum site reads:

Do you know detailed information about the content of the most popular video games? Join us as we talk with the president of an investing firm that has done extensive research into the video game industry.

Conservative T.V. talking head Glenn Beck has entertained the notion that video game violence leads to the real thing, but in the aftermath of Sunday's triple cop slaying in Pittsburgh, some critics are drawing a connection between Beck's on-air political rants and accused killer Richard Poplawski's horrific rampage.

The Daily Beast reports that the 22-year old Poplawski is a white supremacist and conspiracy theorist who harbored fears that President Obama will seek to establish some type of "new world order" and remove guns from private citizens.

Poplawski is also a Beck fan:

The alleged killer posted a YouTube clip to [white supremacist site] Stormfront of top-rated Fox News host Glenn Beck contemplating the existence of FEMA-managed concentration camps... Three weeks later, Poplawski posted another Youtube clip to Stormfront, this time of a video blogger advocating “Tea Parties,” or grassroots conservative protests organized by Beck and Fox News contributor Newt Gingrich against President Barack Obama’s bailout plan...

David Neiwert, a veteran reporter on right-wing militia movements... explained that by co-opting conspiratorial rhetoric from the farthest shores of the right, mainstream conservative talkers can inflame the passions of paranoiacs like Poplawski to a dangerous degree...

 

"What it does is unhinge fringe players from reality and dislodges them even further. When someone like Poplawski hears Glenn Beck touting One World Government and they’re gonna take your gun theories, they believe then that it must be true. And that’s when they really become crazy.”

In the aftermath of last month's horrific school shooting rampage in Winnenden, criticism of violent video games by German government officials has been on the rise.

In the latest political attack, Bavarian Minister of the Interior Joachim Herrmann (left), a frequent critic of violent games, upped the ante by likening such games to illegal drugs and child pornography.

Herrmann made the charge in a Tuesday press release (Google translation) which was issued to coincide with the government-sponsored German Games Award as well as a video game conference in Munich.

German GamePolitics reader David Ziegler provides this translation:

The statement contains the usual accusations that "such games are one of the causes for youth violence and also for school shootings, where images from killer games become reality",and that "more and more children are getting mired in this virtual world of violence", so that "they have no time left for school or job training,  and are lost to our society".

 

However, this time, he's taking it a bit further. The last sentence states: "In regards to their harmful effects, [violent video games] are on the same level as child pornography and illegal drugs, the ban on which rightly is unquestioned"

However, a second German official, Commissioner for the New Media Thomas Jarzombek, criticized Herrmann's remarks:

The comparison is completely inappropriate... anyone making such statements is unqualified to participate in any further debate [regarding the] protection of minors from harmful media.

GamePolitics reader tibuka, also German, adds:

[Herrmann's] statement was released on the same day as the first German Videogame Awards ceremony took place in Munich. In return, all important German game-associations (G.A.M.E., BIU, ESB) released statments of their own, demanding an apology.