"Gaming the System" at NRO

I've got a piece on a proposal to regulate the video game industry's rating system over at NRO today. Not surprisingly, I'm skeptical:

Video gamers everywhere get a thrill out of manipulating imaginary characters with their game controllers. Sometimes, though, it seems as if politicians are just as thrilled to get their hands on the video-game industry’s regulatory controls. Since 1993, when the game Mortal Kombat was denounced in Congress by Joe Lieberman, the industry has been subject to repeated political attacks. In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings, then, it’s hardly surprising that, as pundits and ideologues of all stripes shifted blame to their favorite targets in order to support their pet policy initiatives, video games made the list. On MSNBC’s Hardball recently, longtime video-game opponent Jack Thompson insisted that, despite roommates claiming never to have seen the killer playing games, the killings must have motivated by game playing.

But, like an in-game damage meter during a blistering video-game attack, the pressure was already building. Just a few days before the Virginia Tech rampage, the FTC released a report noting that the game industry’s rating system is increasingly effective, but still recommended a universal rating system and more prominent display of ratings information. And at least one congressman already had a bill dealing with game ratings in the works.

Earlier this spring, Rep. Fred Upton (R., Mich.) introduced the Video Game Decency Act, a law which would give the FTC the power to oversee privately run video-game ratings systems. The law would make it illegal for video-game companies to mislead private ratings boards — specifically the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB), which currently rates most major video-game releases — in order to obtain a less restrictive rating. Anyone who’s ever seen a legislator put on his Serious Face and talk about video games before can guess that the underlying reasoning had something to with, yep, “For The Children.” The Children, of course, can’t vote, so “For The Children” usually means “For The Parents,” and in this case, Upton made that explicit. “Parents across the country will be able to breathe a sigh of relief,” he said in a statement, “as this legislation goes hand in hand with the mission of the industry’s own ratings system.”

Whole thing here.