Australia and Video Game Censorship

[Commodore]

I just watched a video from the YouTube channel Pretty Good Gaming where they interviewed Australian Senator David Leyonhjelm about the issue of video game censorship in Australia. Senator Leyonhjelm has been advocating for either an elimination of or a drastic reduction in the level of censorship the Australian government engages in when it comes to video games.

In the interview he seems to think the biggest obstacle to progress on the issue is the fact that the gaming industry doesn't speak up in Australia and doesn't lobby the government to loosen restrictions on what games Australians can buy. I think the best point he made is no matter what the senator says on the issue, without industry representatives to back him up, no one will listen to him and things will never change.

Can some of our Australian members here shed some light on this issue and on what Senator Leyonhjelm is saying about it? Do you think progress is being made on reducing video game censorship in Australia? Or is Senator Leyonhjelm fighting a losing battle here?

Here's the video for anyone interested in watching the interview:

 

[Camikaze]

For political context, Leyonhjelm is essentially an accidental senator, voted in as the only Liberal Democrat (i.e. libertarian) member because on the 2013 NSW senate ballot the Liberal Democrats were placed first and approximately 7% of the population lacked the patience to realise that that's actually a different party to the Liberal Party. In 2016 he won 3% of the NSW vote, but given it was a double dissolution election, that was enough to take the 12th (and last) senate seat for NSW. He doesn't wield much power, because although his vote under particular circumstances can be important for the government, they generally have the numbers without him. He'll almost certainly be gone in two years. He is not a particularly well respected senator, as he's gone out of his way to offend people in the name of his weird conception of free speech. So he doesn't have much populist clout either.

The end result is that this is not a salient issue in Australia, and Leyonhjelm is not very capable of making it a salient issue. Frankly it's an issue I hardly know anything about, and don't really care about, although it does seem to be one of Leyonhjelm's most reasonable crusades, and I don't particularly disagree with most of what he said. It's worth noting, though, that it appears that although the classification process is dealt with federally, the consequences of classification are dealt with by state and territory governments. So even if Leyonhjelm managed to get some sort of change through the federal parliament, that wouldn't necessarily change much, as the system is reliant on referred powers. I suppose the federal government might find some constitutional basis for covering the field (I think the trade & commerce power used to be relied on to prevent the importation of seditious or immoral material (Lady Chatterly's Lover wasn't published in Australia until it was smuggled in during the 60s)), but that would require far more political capital.

The video though seemed to be trying to paint a picture of video gamers as being some maligned group treated differently in Australia to other media. That used to be true, but after the introduction of the R 18+ rating a few years ago, it's no longer particularly convincing. That youtube channel is just playing to its audience when it gets all persecution complex-y. If you compare the film guidelines to the video game guidelines, they're fairly similar, and the end results are the same (in most jurisdictions, it seems). For example, under the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Enforcement Act 1995 (NSW), you'll see that s 6 dealing with films and s 27 dealing with games are essentially identical - material refused classification or given an unclassified cannot be sold or publicly demonstrated/exhibited. There's a X 18+ rating for films as well, which appears to be for porn, and that's also prohibited from being sold or publicly exhibited.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Its called the Government is 40 years behind the technological developments and we just by-pass the laughable censorship laws using 8 year old HAXOR skills of order Different region versions over something called the internets
Its dumb laws pushed by our own conservative party

 

[Commodore]

The video though seemed to be trying to paint a picture of video gamers as being some maligned group treated differently in Australia to other media. That used to be true, but after the introduction of the R 18+ rating a few years ago, it's no longer particularly convincing. That youtube channel is just playing to its audience when it gets all persecution complex-y. If you compare the film guidelines to the video game guidelines, they're fairly similar, and the end results are the same (in most jurisdictions, it seems). For example, under the Classification (Publications, Films and Computer Games) Enforcement Act 1995 (NSW), you'll see that s 6 dealing with films and s 27 dealing with games are essentially identical - material refused classification or given an unclassified cannot be sold or publicly demonstrated/exhibited. There's a X 18+ rating for films as well, which appears to be for porn, and that's also prohibited from being sold or publicly exhibited.

Leyonhjelm does say that since the introduction of the R 18 rating things have gotten better, but there are still games being banned for sale that have comparable levels of violence and/or sex to some films that do not get banned. He believes this is because most government officials are still operating on the assumption that the majority of gamers are children no matter how much he tries to present evidence to the contrary. In fact, the video even quotes a line from those guidelines that says something to the effect of adults should be allowed to watch or listen to or play just about anything they choose, yet games are still being banned which kinda flies in the face of that statement. Of course all of this being prompted by the fact that Outlast 2 was banned in Australia until the developers made a more "tame" version for the Australian market.

He also raises a good point in that it is odd that the gaming industry doesn't really do much to fight the censorship laws in Australia. As far as I can see, Australia would be a huge market for game developers and publishers, so you'd think they'd try everything in their power to make it easier for their products to be sold there. I believe Leyonhjelm mentions that in his time as senator he has been approached by lobbyists for all sorts of entertainment and "vice" industries like film, gambling, porn, etc. but he has never been approached by video game lobbyists.

 

[Arwon]

This is an ongoing issue that basically falls out of the ongoing existence of an Office of Film and Literature Classification or at least its current membership. It's a long way from being the most serious digital freedom issue in Australia (those would be data retention and surveillance, copyright, internet filtering) but it's a mild irritant.

These days it's mostly sexual violence that falls afoul of the system, which, eh, I'm not gonna get up in arms about it and I don't think anyone in the industry in Australia is really gonna prioritise fighting for that.

However, Leyonhjelm is a gun nut lunatic and a racist who does stuff like argue for immigration restrictions because foreigners don't love freedom enough, and he has zero support or relevance in Australian politics. Gamers and the gaming industry would do well not to get too closely linked to him.

In terms of more serious advocacy for the interests of the industry and on digital rights as a whole, Scott Ludlam from the Greens tends to be the most effective (cf this sorta thing).

 

[GoodSarmatian]

How banned is banned in Australia ?
In Germany we have the "Index" for media that is harmful for minors. That's where uncensored versions of Mortal Kombat, Doom etc went in the past when games were still largely regarded as toys for children. If a game is on the index it doesn't techincally mean it's banned. It can still be sold legally "under the table" to adults who ask for it, but it can't be advertised or openly displayed in stores. In practice that's still a death sentence for any commercial product, but it's not technically banned as long as it's just violent or disturbing and not something like open Nazi propaganda.

 

[Arwon]

The term is "refused classification" which basically means it can't be sold.

 

[Commodore]

However, Leyonhjelm is a gun nut lunatic and a racist who does stuff like argue for immigration restrictions because foreigners don't love freedom enough, and he has zero support or relevance in Australian politics. Gamers and the gaming industry would do well not to get too closely linked to him.

So I gather that this, combined with what Camikaze said about him, means Leyonhjelm would actually do more harm than good on this issue due to him kinda being a political pariah?

 

[Arwon]

I'm not sure it'd do much of either, because nobody cares about Leyonhjelm.

But I think, having achieved the R18+ parity through patient broad-based engagement campaigning, the industry wouldn't be well served focusing its efforts on fighting the existence of the OFLC itself or on fighting for the right to sell games that depict sexual violence. It's just not a live issue, which is also why the film and television sectors never really engage in it either.