people should have more faith in parents

[evirus]

whats going on today, people are again up GTA's "craw" with FTC investigations i beleave, from what i heard

i feel that anyone who thinks there should be a law agenst video games because they could influince kids dont beleave that parents should be able to use the word no. have faith in parents people, they are perfectly within there rights to say "no hunny you cant get that game"

also the fact that the new hot coffie mod is compleatly volentary and is only displayed if the games player choses it too also shows that, much like porn, it only appears if someone wants it too

[Eric J in MN]

1. Visit the blog "SpeakSpeak News"

you'll probably like it:

www.speakspeak.org

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. spell check

Step away from the video game. Read a book. School starts in a few weeks and you don't want to fall behind.

[evirus]

4. hay now

hay now, i hail from oakland university in michigan, i just happen to have a slight spelling problem. ive played GTA in my spare time and right now, i still got a month of spare time. instead of ragging on me, how about commenting on something a little more on topic

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. Your spelling makes it hard

to understand what you are saying. There is a spell checker on DU. There are also many good online dictionaries. I have this one on my desktop and use it daily:
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary.htm

It's all about credibility. Poor spelling on a discussion forum is like dressing inappropriately for a job interview, IMO.

[classof56]

15. Hey, thanks for this link!

I am scheduled to be part of a panel at my writers' group soon, talking about my favorite writers' resources, and I sort of spaced on the dictionary website I wanted to add to my list. Then you posted it! Makes it sound like I don't use it that often, huh? Well, I have done and I will do so from now on. Amazes me how young people nowadays seem to have lost the importance of proper spelling, grammar and all those things I learned in junior high back in the dark ages (1950s)! You nailed it on poor spelling--and when I was a supervisor, I used to wonder if younger applicants were learning anything at all about dressing appropriately for a job interview!

Tired Old Cynic

[proud2BlibKansan]

21. Thank you

One of my favorite things about DU is the level of literacy displayed here. Go to any RW dominated board and the spelling and grammar mistakes overwhelm the actual topics of discussion. And most other discussion boards do NOT have built in spell checkers, as we have here.

Life is all about appearances. We old cynics have learned that (some the hard way) and are just trying to share our wisdom with the youngsters. But alas, not all are willing to listen (kind of like many of us weren't listeners when we were young :) )

[evirus]

17. sorry

I am sort of like the product of education, I was taken out of my main class during elementary school to attend a special ed class for like an hour because they thought I had a reading problem (I didn't understand the concept of homework so I never did it) the only time I notice my awkward spelling is when the word doesn't look right after I spell it.

From now on I'll try to run my posts through word beforehand (I don't like using forums to spell-check)

[proud2BlibKansan]

24. I am a special ed teacher

Too bad you weren't in my class. :)

And you use the same strategy good spellers use - if the word doesn't look right, it probably isn't. Just reread it before you click 'Post message'. I am a good speller but a lousy typist so I have learned to not trust anything I type. When I was in school, they didn't teach us to type. It was an elective and my parents made me take more academic classes instead. Of course, that was way before anyone had dreamed of home computers.

[donco6]

10. You don't have a slight spelling problem.

You have a horrible spelling problem. Why should I spend my time trying to translate whatever it is you're trying to say?

[classof56]

3. Now, I'm just an aging grandparent, but I must confess...

I haven't got a clue what this post is about. I also have to wonder about the quality of education you have been exposed to. Don't get me wrong--I know PhDs who can't spell worth a damn, but your post really has me wondering. You did spell "investigations" correctly--that's a good sign!

Hope I'm not being too hard on you, but in light of what appears to be Bush's goal of dumbing down America, I really have to wonder.

Tired Old Cynic

[wli]

5. a "mod" is not part of what is sold in the game

It's a third-party modification.

Unless they're talking about the girlfriend cutscenes in general, but there's no nudity or anything in them, just some sound effects.

[evirus]

6. correct

your right on mostly, there was some code left in the game relating to the mini game found in the hot coffie mod, but there was no nudity and rockstar locked off the code so it wouldnt run normally in the game, thats why i say its compleatly, 100% volentary that a player uses this mod

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. LOL

Please no, FR is ugly enough on its own site.

[annabanana]

11. Hi kid... Welcome to DU

(in spite of the spelling gnomes, it's a pretty fun place to hang out. Us old folks are sometimes not too good at the ee cummings free form punctuation, either....)

:toast:

[DIKB]

8. The "Hot Coffee" mod

Is a third party addition, you can't even access these things unless you download the addition. Being the crusader for censorship and repression that she is Hillary Clinton spearheaded a movement to have the ESRB change the rating for GTA: San Andreas from M (similar to an R rating for movies) to an AO - "Adults Only" rating (the equivalent of X or pornographic).

The main character stays clothed the entire time and simulates sex with his girlfriend. Regardless of the fact that this is a game not meant for children, I think that things are going too far when you give this game an unprecedented rating.

The Democrats were FINALLY not the ones pushing for censorship, that became the terrain of the Repukes and the fundamentalist christian wing of their party, then Hillary has to go and become a lightning rod for criticism once again. Why couldn't she just leave this ALONE ?!?!?!?!?

[evirus]

12. slight update

there are "improved nudity" versions of the hot coffee mod that have been released, I wont post links because I like to practice SELF-CENSORSHIP unlike some of the R people who practice forced censorship, like the people who started this issue as you mentioned

[proud2BlibKansan]

13. Well if I was a gamer,

I would rather see Hillary on this than the let's ban everything we don't like because it upsets our family values repuke crowd. Just sayin. . .

[DIKB]

16. Being opposed to the reich wing

I disagree. This will be disastrous among the young libertarian minded. Hillary is enough of a lightning rod among the repukes already. To give them traction in an area that they previously had been failing. . . This could be disastrous, especially if she decides to run in 08. I don't support her for Prez, but ANYONE but a repuke.

[evirus]

18. yah i pray the D party finds someone better

i mean as much as voting for the first woman president sounds like a good thing, i just cant agree with what she has been doing

I guess I'm just getting caught up in my ideas of civil rights, consumer rights and my massive respect for her husband.

[proud2BlibKansan]

27. I love Hillary but

I am not in favor of her as a presidential candidate. The right hates her so much. Their hate campaign against Kerry will look like nothing compared to how they will come after Hillary.

[proud2BlibKansan]

25. After they freaked out over Janet Jackson's boob

do you really expect them to stay silent on this video game sex issue? This story was all over my local news and in our local paper here in red state hell.

I also don't think they are failing. Not even close. In case you hadn't noticed, the fundies think they have a mandate and are in charge of our values now :)

So if some action results from this controversy, I would rather see Hillary take the lead than someone like Santorum. I also appreciate her approach. The RW fundies would advocate banning. Hillary has NOT recommended that.

[evirus]

30. the problem is

The problem is that GTA being re-rated as AO has caused several stores to pull the game from their shelves making it much harder for even a person of the recommended age (AO=+18, I'm 19) to find

[proud2BlibKansan]

32. But you can still buy it right?

And sorry, but having grown up in the pre-video game era, it's hard to muster up sympathy for video game shoppers. There are worse problems, IMO.

[Tux]

19. Faith in parents?

We're in trouble now. Parents see their kids as tax reductions and nothing else. Kids have no discipline at all anymore. I was in a restaurant a few days ago with 3 families that had kids:Japanese, Italian, and American. The one American kid caused more noise and chaos than 5 Italian kids and 2 Japanese kids combined. Having faith in parents is like having faith in the Easter bunny. Best thing we can do is to remove the nanny state and let parents deal with the consequences of their non-involvement with their own kids. If they don't like it, there are plenty of other nations that can babysit the kids and parents.

[evirus]

20. well....

I myself have faith that those people you saw aren't the exact representation of every parent nowadays. Though I have been witnessing a lot of… unsavory parents at both ends of the spectrum, my girlfriend's mother yelled at her for not knowing her work schedule for the week, which she picked up not more then an hour before being rushed out the door for a visit at a relative's house

[Tux]

22. Exactly

unsavory parents at both ends of the spectrum

It's more than politics. It's laziness. Most parents can't organize a thought let along organize a child's day. It's sad and scary. Once those kids run for office, I'm leaving. They'll ruin America faster than BushInc.

[evirus]

23. i ment

Just to make it clear what I was saying by both ends of the spectrum was on one side parents who don't control their kids and the other side being parents that try to overly control their kids

[proud2BlibKansan]

26. Amen

And we teachers are getting tired of cleaning up the messes left by incapable parents.

[Tux]

28. I understand

But there are parents on both sides that do that. What I see is a lack of parental responsiblity. If Jr. shoots someone, it must be rap or video games or MTV or pagans or Harry Potter but never the parents lack parenting.

[evirus]

29. funny

It's funny how they notice that AFTER IT BECOMES A PROBLEM instead of before. I think they have lost foresight

[Lightning Bug]

31. I have no faith in parents

But I'm biased. I used to work with emotionally disturbed kids. They had very few limits imposed on them by their parents. Left the taxpayers to try to fix them to the tune of thousands of dollars per kid per month for therapy, etc. Total nightmare.

[pitohui]

33. eh people had parents

we all know what we got away with, this is why no faith in parents

i don't agree with the law against video games, i'm just sayin

[evirus]

34. mod community strikes back

strikes back so to speak theres two bits, the first e-mailed to those involved (clinton yee thompson and the ESRB) the secound one is a press release style statement put together, both by one of the larger fan made GTA sites www.gtasanandreas.net (warning: link contains 3 ingame screenshots that might be considered nudity, suprisingly GTA is the least nude of the three)

heres the links, no warnings needed i dont think

http://www.gtagarage.com/letters/index.php
http://illspirit.com/press_release.html