I find that for all the unique snowflake stuff you hear, people tend to have similar baselines. If I find the level of violence in something disturbing, it's not a big jump to say that, in general, people should find it disturbing. And this seems to check out when I test it - people will react similarly to me most of the time, and when they don't, they are always people who watch horror movies and play violent games(always is not an exaggeration here, which is why I'm so confident of this). Similarly, from experience I know that repeated viewings make me stop reacting, but if I then show it to non-horror viewers, they will react.
And what about acting in movies like that? What about directing them?
Succintly - sucks to be you, then. There are actually trivia on a lot of the gorier movies about an actress fainting during filming, or there being child abuse complaints because of what the kids were exposed to. It depends, of course, on if the scene looked authetic, or looked authentic from one camera angle, so it's impossible to say absolutely.
Meaning you do think that playing the game is "certain" to?
Yep. Up for debate is how much it takes before you actually become sociopathic, but playing the game moves you in that direction, while it's at least possible that just watching it might not.
Who gets to draw that line, and how do we make sure that it stays where it's initially drawn and doesn't start moving backwards?
I think movement is healthy in this case. We don't have all the answers, but we're learning more over time. Start at the point where it seems certain there is harm, and at least ban that. Maybe there's other stuff that's also damaging, but at least you've removed a chunk, and we can always revise things later. I think that starting with what's certain and changing is better than trying to get it right from the start, and risking locking in a too restrictive/not restrictive enough line, even if it does leave open the possibility that later change might go in a direction I/we/you don't want.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-22 06:58 pm (UTC)I find that for all the unique snowflake stuff you hear, people tend to have similar baselines. If I find the level of violence in something disturbing, it's not a big jump to say that, in general, people should find it disturbing. And this seems to check out when I test it - people will react similarly to me most of the time, and when they don't, they are always people who watch horror movies and play violent games(always is not an exaggeration here, which is why I'm so confident of this). Similarly, from experience I know that repeated viewings make me stop reacting, but if I then show it to non-horror viewers, they will react.
And what about acting in movies like that? What about directing them?
Succintly - sucks to be you, then. There are actually trivia on a lot of the gorier movies about an actress fainting during filming, or there being child abuse complaints because of what the kids were exposed to. It depends, of course, on if the scene looked authetic, or looked authentic from one camera angle, so it's impossible to say absolutely.
Meaning you do think that playing the game is "certain" to?
Yep. Up for debate is how much it takes before you actually become sociopathic, but playing the game moves you in that direction, while it's at least possible that just watching it might not.
Who gets to draw that line, and how do we make sure that it stays where it's initially drawn and doesn't start moving backwards?
I think movement is healthy in this case. We don't have all the answers, but we're learning more over time. Start at the point where it seems certain there is harm, and at least ban that. Maybe there's other stuff that's also damaging, but at least you've removed a chunk, and we can always revise things later. I think that starting with what's certain and changing is better than trying to get it right from the start, and risking locking in a too restrictive/not restrictive enough line, even if it does leave open the possibility that later change might go in a direction I/we/you don't want.