dagblog - Comments for "Should Free Speech Protect the Japanese Video Game RapeLay?"

And then lets ban everything

zergo — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 11:17:06 +0000

And then lets ban everything else that bothers us. Why don't you move to Iran or Saudi if you're worried about seeing something that offends you - or, in this case, someone else seeing it without you even being aware of its existence. Ban the thought pigs who think they should determine what constitutes morality.

Yes, I totally agree with you

Just a woman — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 11:37:43 +0000

In reply to Good. I want people to know

Yes, I totally agree with you Orlando, I wish also to have known about it earlier, this kind of shameful behavior in the game industry needs to be addressed.

Does anyone here know where I

Anonymous — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:42:08 +0000

In reply to It was only only officially

Does anyone here know where I can get a copy of Rapelay?

I was sexually assaulted and would like to desensitize myself.

I have watched rape themed movies..but I think playing a game will give me more of a feeling of control

thanks bunches

Good. I want people to know

Orlando — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:13:47 +0000

In reply to just something to consider

Good. I want people to know about it. I wish I would have known about it three years ago. We need to shine light into all the dark corners.

just something to consider

Deadman — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 20:00:00 +0000

In reply to It was only only officially

just something to consider - the chart above is for Google search trends for RapeLay. i think we can all agree that the attention focused on the software has revived attention on a product that probably would have quietly disappeared. not saying that negates the need to discuss the issues, i'm just saying it is a consequence.

It was only only officially

Michael Wolraich — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:36:18 +0000

In reply to I was pondering the

It was only only officially released in Japan, so if anyone sold it here, it would have been only small shops that specialize in imports. It wasn't Amazon itself that sold it in the UK but one of the small retailers in its umbrella.

I've been thinking about the negative publicity question too. The question is what you're aiming for. If reducing sales of an odious game is your object, the publicity has to be counterproductive. What's the point of banning a game that no one even sells in this country and is unlikely to ever sell? The hoopla accomplishes little other than free PR for a game that can at best hope for a cult following here.

But if your goal is to raise awareness about rape, it might be of more value. Still, I'm not sure that what is accomplished by American politicians denouncing a rape game that no Americans play, other than to marginalize the influential Pro-Rape Lobby.

The best value that I can see is to shame the citizens of the one place where such a game is actually considered acceptable. Japanese tend to care about what Americans think them, and if we can get their attention, it may raise rape awareness there.

I was pondering the

DF — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 17:06:38 +0000

In reply to I was debating about whether

I was pondering the promotional nature of the negative press last night. This game was released in 2006. Though I was aware of the existence of Japanese H-games, as they're called, and even aware that some of them catered to the more perverse, I had never heard of it. Apparently, it was reviewed by SomethingAwful a couple of years ago, a site that I read semi-regularly, but don't I recall reading about it. Near as I can tell, the Amazon ban seems to have brought it swiftly into the public eye. Unfortunately, the Slate article that I linked is correct in that it takes no more effort than a Google search to find a source for it.

This seems to raise the question: Is it better to not talk about it? Somehow this doesn't seem right to me. The way this appears to have unfolded, as described by this article, seems perfectly reasonable to me. The product found its way onto Amazon's UK offering, people complained and Amazon removed it. The recent rash of articles to be found by searching Google News seem to indicate that what brought the topic into the US press was a New York City Council member calling for retailers to boycott the game.

One thing that I can't seem to validate is whether or not the game was ever on US retail shelves. If it was, then I can understand the call to arms. OTOH, if the game wasn't on retail shelves and major online sources like Amazon and eBay had already canned it, which appears to be the case, then I have to wonder whether the public ire has caused more harm than good in promoting an effectively unknown and unavailable product to a much wider audience.

Does NYC have an equivalent of SF's Japantown? Outside of some other asian specialty shops in the south bay, I can't think of any other place that might have something like this on a retail shelf. Were there retailers in NYC that were carrying the game?

Fair enough, and I look

Michael Wolraich — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 17:00:00 +0000

In reply to That's an exercise for A-man.

Fair enough, and I look forward to reading it.

But you see my point, I hope. It's one thing to say, "RapeLay is evil, ban it!" It's another thing legislate such a ban without running afoul of the Constitution. I sincerely suggested it as a useful philosophical exercise, so if you won't take the bait, I'll have to do it myself.

Suppose that Orlando's Law said something like, "It is illegal to sell interactive, electronic rape simulations." "Interactive" is the word that separates the videogames from film and video, but it's pretty hazy distinction. If a movie incorporates any user input at all, does it become interactive and subject to the ban? Most modern videogames have cinematic sequences that play when you reach certain goals. If a game incorporated simulated rape in one of those sequences, could it be banned?

And what is rape in this context? In the real world, rape involves non-consensual sex, but what counts as consent in virtual reality? You can't subpoena a virtual woman. It's certainly not illegal for a consenting couple to simulate rape in their home. Couldn't the game developer just argue that the game doesn't simulate rape per se but rather that it simulates consensual simulations of rape?

And then, you can't ban interactive, electronic rape simulations that have scientific or artistic merit. I can imagine such a simulation being used for psychological testing and treatment (shades of Clockwork Orange.) So you need some exception such that the law only applies to simulations wtihout scientific, artistic, or even therapeutic value. But while I haven't seen RapeLay, most videogames these days certainly have artistic merit, and the measure of such value is likely to be highly subjective.

Finally, to get a First Amendment exception in the first place, you would have to prove that participating in interactive, simulated rape actually causes harm. While that may be the case, it would be very difficult to prove reliably in a court of law and certainly hasn't been proven yet.

So it's not that I think that banning RapeLay is intrinsically wrong, it's just that you can't really get it done without running smack into the First Amendment. While the First Amendment protects many things that would be better off banned, I'm glad that it's there and really f-ing difficult to circumvent.

That's an exercise for A-man.

Orlando — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:31:52 +0000

In reply to I wasn't taking an ethical

That's an exercise for A-man. I'd rather write a short story about a pathetic loser who plays RapeLay and his motivations for doing so.

I wasn't taking an ethical

Michael Wolraich — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 14:59:30 +0000

In reply to I almost didn't post it at

I wasn't taking an ethical stand on whether the game should be banned, and I'm not sure how I feel about it. My point was that I don't think that it Constitutionally can be banned. Weed, travel to Cuba, and theft are not protected by the First Amendment. Causing panic is a long-recognized exception to the First Amendment. Child pornography has also been ruled to be an exception on the grounds that it harms the children depicted. But the Supreme Court has ruled in Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition and upheld in United States v. Williams that virtual child pornography, which would seem to be comparable to virtual rape, is protected.

So here's an exercise for you: draft a hypothetical law that would ban this videogame without violating the First Amendment.