LOS ANGELES--The multi-billion-dollar videogame industry came
under scrutiny on Wednesday after Hollywood canceled, postponed or
played down a slew of movies and TV shows with violent content in the
wake of last week's shooting at a Connecticut elementary school.
In Washington, Senator John Rockefeller called for a national study of
the impact of violent videogames on children and a review of the rating
system.
Although investigators in Newtown,
Connecticut, have given no motive for Friday's shooting rampage, some
U.S. media have reported that the 20-year-old gunman played popular
videogame "Call of Duty"--in which players conduct simulated warfare
missions--in the basement of his home.
The gunman, Adam Lanza, killed himself at the scene after gunning down 20 young children, six school employees and his mother.
Rockefeller said he had long been concerned about the impact of violent games and videos on children.
"Major corporations, including the video game industry, make billions
on marketing and selling violent content to children. They have a
responsibility to protect our children," Rockefeller said in a
statement.
The Entertainment Software
Association, which represents the $78 billion U.S. videogame industry,
on Wednesday offered its "heartfelt prayers and condolences" to the
Newtown families.
But it said in a statement that "the search
for meaningful solutions must consider the broad range of actual
factors that may have contributed to this tragedy.
"Any such study needs to include the years of extensive research that
has shown no connection between entertainment and real-life violence,"
the association said.
Activision Blizzard's latest title in its "Call of Duty"
franchise--"Call of Duty: Black Ops II"--hit $1 billion in sales two
weeks after its launch last month.
Other popular
videogames include Microsoft's "Halo 4," in which players kill evil
aliens. The game racked up $220 million in global sales on its launch
day in November.
Mike Hickey, an analyst at
National Alliance Capital Markets, said backlashes against videogames
were not rare, but he was unaware of an instance of games being pulled
off store shelves in the past.
When the
Columbine school shooting happened in 1999, there was a similar outcry
because the two perpetrators were students who played the shooter game
"Doom," Hickey told Reuters.
Executives at Hollywood movie
studios and TV networks have mostly laid low this week as Americans seek
answers to the Newtown slaughter, and discuss how to prevent similar
gun violence.
However, content seen as sensitive
has been pulled from the airwaves, including an episode of the SyFy TV
series "Haven" that contained violent scenes in a high school setting,
and the premiere next week of a TLC show called "Best Funeral Ever."
Discovery Channel canceled a third season of its reality series
"American Guns" about a family of gun makers. Some radio stations
stopped playing pop star Ke$ha's bubbly new single "Die Young" to avoid
any potential offense.
Glitzy red carpet
premieres for violent upcoming new movies "Jack Reacher," starring Tom
Cruise, and "Django Unchained" starring Jamie Foxx, were canceled out of
respect for the Newtown victims, but both movies will open in theaters
as planned in the next seven days.
Insensitive today, OK tomorrow?
The Parents TV Council praised the response of the entertainment
industry this week, but said it shouldn't be confined to the immediate
aftermath of such tragedies.
"If a television
network changes its programming because of content that could be
insensitive today, why would that same content be appropriate at a later
time?," council president Tim Winter said in a statement.
"If producers and performers rightly question whether their industry is
complicit in creating a violent media culture that feeds real-life
tragedies, why would there be a later time to produce and distribute
more of it?," Winter added.
Most major Hollywood
stars have remained silent about the potential influence of violent
movies on U.S. society. But "Django Unchained" star Foxx was quoted as
saying the movie industry should not shirk its responsibility.
"We cannot turn our back and say that violence in films or anything
that we do doesn't have a sort of influence," Foxx was quoted as saying
while promoting the film in New York.
Director
Quentin Tarantino called the Newtown shootings "a horrible tragedy," but
in an interview with CNN on Monday he declined to link screen violence
with real life events.
"This has gone back all
the way down to Shakespeare's days...when there's violence in the
street, the cry becomes 'blame the playmaker.' And you know, I actually
think that's a very facile argument to pin on something that's a real
life tragedy," Tarantino said.--KDM, GMA News
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