Democrats Engage Videogame, Entertainment Industry on Violence

Vice President Joe Biden will meet with videogame and entertainment industry representatives this week to discuss policy proposals regarding violence, a White House official said. NAB CEO Gordon Smith and NCTA CEO Michael Powell will attend, spokesmen for those associations said. Spokesmen from the ESA and MPAA didn’t comment. Following the meetings, Biden will present his recommendations to President Barack Obama, who will then “announce a concrete package of proposals he intends to push without delay,” the White House official said.

"It has been a shame that it took 20 dead kids for people to start talking about this again,” said Dan Isett, Parents Television Council director of public policy. Details of the meetings with Biden have been “sketchy,” but the videogame and entertainment industry groups will likely seek to avoid culpability for the recent violence, Isett said. “They will tell the vice president that none of this is their fault, that their content has no impact on kids.” National Rife Association Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre criticized the “vicious, violent videogames” and “blood-soaked slasher films” for portraying “murder as a way of life,” in a speech following the Newtown massacre. The Entertainment Merchants Association told Biden in a letter sent this week that “blaming movies and video games is an attempt to distract the attention of the public and the media from meaningful action that will keep our children safer.” NAB has said it’s “appropriate” to study the link between gun violence and media (CD Dec 21 p15).

Those in the media industry “have always been convenient targets of Congress, because there is very little downside to criticizing violent content in popular media,” said Gabe Rottman, an ACLU legislative counsel who focuses on First Amendment issues. “A lot of attention and ink has already been spilled on media violence over the past 10 years, and there has never been any evidence that violence in videogames has any discernible effect on children,” he said. “This is an old story.” Industry groups representing the film, cable, broadcast-TV and videogame industries didn’t comment further. The Entertainment Software Association said last month that any study into the connection between the shootings and videogame violence must include extensive research, none of which so far has shown any connection between simulated and actual violence. The American Cable Association and NCTA said they would participate in discussions with lawmakers about their role in American culture, in separate statements last month.

Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., meanwhile plans to reintroduce legislation this year to authorize a study of the impact that violent videogames and video programming have on children, a committee spokesman said Tuesday. The legislation will reflect a proposal Rockefeller tried to get passed in December but which failed to advance before the last Congress ended (CD Dec 20 p15). The bill would direct the FTC and the FCC to work with the National Academy of Sciences to determine if violent programming and videogames have any harmful effects on children. The committee spokesman said the legislation is one of Rockefeller’s “major priorities.” The spokesman couldn’t say exactly when the bill will be reintroduced.

Even if Rockefeller’s legislation passes, it won’t change anything, said Isett. “We don’t necessarily need another study to know the impacts ... we know they are almost entirely negative.” Instead lawmakers like Rockefeller should hold public hearings to bring more visibility to the issue, Isett said. “I certainly hope we will have another round of hearings on this. We are not necessarily of a position that any further regulation or legislation needs to be had in this space. This problem could be mitigated enormously by responsible behavior on the part of the industry."

Rockefeller has long been an advocate for safeguarding children from programming with excessive violence. He last held a Commerce Committee hearing on media violence in 2009 with FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, and representatives from NAB and the Sesame Street Workshop (CD July 23/09 p1). No legislation resulted from that hearing.

What has changed since the last media violence hearing is the tremendous growth in revenue for the videogame industry, said a TV-industry lawyer. “The gaming industry has become an enormous industry worth billions of dollars,” he said. “It is far bigger than what it was years ago, and the violence and interactivity with the user is at a different level than the violence on the TV. That makes them an easier target for reform.” The U.S. video game industry generated $24.7 billion in revenue in 2011, versus $19.6 billion in 2009, said studies by NPD Group, a U.S.-based market researcher.

Regulating videogame violence will prove difficult, because the Supreme Court affirmed that videogames have First Amendment protections equal to that of books, newspapers and other forms of speech, said Rottman. The 2011 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association ruled unconstitutional a California state law that restricted the sale or rental of violent video games to minors (http://xrl.us/bkvtkf). The 7-2 opinion by Justice Antonin Scalia said video games qualify for First Amendment protections and that the government lacks the power to restrict expression because of its message, ideas, subject matter or content.