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Missing the Point: New York Senate Passes Mandatory Game Ratings Bill

A bill proposed by Senator Andrew Lanza was passed yesterday by a vote of 61-1. The bill requires that all videogames sold in New York State be rated by the ESRB. If signed by Governor David Patterson, the bill will become law by 2010. Lanza’s bill is not dissimilar to others passed and then overturned in Michigan, Oklahoma, and California after being deemed unconstitutional, in violation of the first amendment. GamePolitics.com printed this excerpt of Lanza’s closing argument for the bill:

If you look closely at this bill, [concerns expressed by Sen. Duane] are not valid. Let's start with speech. There's all kinds of speech. If we take an old-fashioned pinball machine and plunked it down here in the middle of the chamber, no one would call it speech. But when we put that up on a video screen, it does become speech and I acknowledge that. And it deserves protection under the Constitution... There is some confusion with respect to what this bill actually accomplishes... The word prohibition was talked about. I want to be clear. This bill does not prohibit the sale of any video to anyone...

This simply says that every video game sold in the state of New York simply should have a rating consistent with what the ESRB does presently in a voluntary way... it does work. But the problem with "voluntary" is that tomorrow someone can change their mind. Someone could decide tomorrow to no longer place ratings on these games. So this is not about prohibiting the sale, this is simply about providing information to parents...

Last year's version... that included a provision that would have made it an E-felony to sell these games, we all thought it was wrong. And we took that out. We worked with the [video game] industry. We worked with the Assembly and we do have an agreement here on a piece of legislation that I think will go a long way in allowing parents to make good decisions in regard to what is and what isn't appropriate for their chidlren...

As Illinois District Court judge Mathew Kennelly said, after knocking out a similar bill in Illinois, "In this country, the state lacks the authority to ban protected speech on the ground that it affects the listener's or observer's thoughts and attitudes.” Whether Senator Lanza likes it or not, his bill is in clear violation of the constitution.

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