China Tackles MMO addiction

H

Homicidal Cherry53

ugh
OMG :lol Look at this article on gamespot. http://www.gamespot.com/news/6168877.html?action=convert&om_clk=latestnews&tag=latestnews;title;1
China is really starting to scare me. What makes them think that MMO's cause crime. They just cause an utter :lol lose of any social life.
 
I think it's a good idea. Kids need to spend time doing other things while they can. And it's like the Rep. said, most of the players are adults anyway.

~Jack
 
Jack said:
I think it's a good idea. Kids need to spend time doing other things while they can. And it's like the Rep. said, most of the players are adults anyway.

~Jack
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I don't know, I think its kinda ridiculous that they are trying to limit how long you play a video game for. Anyways, what do MMO's have to do with crime?
 
While it sucks for people who can only play a few days a week, if one really plays 3 hours a day anyway, that's an addiction, IMO. :P
 
kirbyrockz said:
While it sucks for people who can only play a few days a week, if one really plays 3 hours a day anyway, that's an addiction, IMO. :P
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Don't most people watch at least 3 hours of tv a day?
 
To me, this doesn't look like a "nice" thing the country is doing for their youth.

We all know sitting and playing WoW for 8 hours a day isn't good for your health, but I think that the option to play or not, should be for the person playing.

They are aiming this at the youth under 18 years, which means they are still in school -
They only have so many hours after school to play a game.

It shouldn't be the governments duty to restrict time limits, that is for the guardians and the person themself.
Of course, China doesn't exactly represent free choices so..

The health factor, you can play quite a lot of games and still stay healthy. I know I do.
It's the decision of, "I want to have a snack while I play" or, "I'll eat after I'm done." -
You can always take some time to exercise at some point during your day. It's whether or not you choose to.
That's not to say you should starve yourself if you want to play for 8 hours straight.
That's where the human brain comes into play, and if you don't realize what is bad for your health, maybe you should have a limit set. By your parents or by yourself - But not by your country.
 
Caedicae said:
To me, this doesn't look like a "nice" thing the country is doing for their youth.

We all know sitting and playing WoW for 8 hours a day isn't good for your health, but I think that the option to play or not, should be for the person playing.

They are aiming this at the youth under 18 years, which means they are still in school -
They only have so many hours after school to play a game.

It shouldn't be the governments duty to restrict time limits, that is for the guardians and the person themself.
Of course, China doesn't exactly represent free choices so..

The health factor, you can play quite a lot of games and still stay healthy. I know I do.
It's the decision of, "I want to have a snack while I play" or, "I'll eat after I'm done." -
You can always take some time to exercise at some point during your day. It's whether or not you choose to.
That's not to say you should starve yourself if you want to play for 8 hours straight.
That's where the human brain comes into play, and if you don't realize what is bad for your health, maybe you should have a limit set. By your parents or by yourself - But not by your country.
Click to expand...

Don't ya just love communism?
 
Caedicae said:
To me, this doesn't look like a "nice" thing the country is doing for their youth.

We all know sitting and playing WoW for 8 hours a day isn't good for your health, but I think that the option to play or not, should be for the person playing.

They are aiming this at the youth under 18 years, which means they are still in school -
They only have so many hours after school to play a game.

It shouldn't be the governments duty to restrict time limits, that is for the guardians and the person themself.
Of course, China doesn't exactly represent free choices so..

The health factor, you can play quite a lot of games and still stay healthy. I know I do.
It's the decision of, "I want to have a snack while I play" or, "I'll eat after I'm done." -
You can always take some time to exercise at some point during your day. It's whether or not you choose to.
That's not to say you should starve yourself if you want to play for 8 hours straight.
That's where the human brain comes into play, and if you don't realize what is bad for your health, maybe you should have a limit set. By your parents or by yourself - But not by your country.
Click to expand...

The problem lies here:

That's where the human brain comes into play, and if you don't realize what is bad for your health, maybe you should have a limit set. By your parents or by yourself - But not by your country.
Click to expand...

Not everyone has had the opportunity to learn the skills needed to recognize what is good and bad for their health. In all likelihood the very parents, or individuals, who have gaming addiction problems probably do not realize they have a problem, or that such a problem exists. Because they are effectively unable to make the responsible choice for themselves, someone who does have ability needs to do it for them (ideally, you would educate the person on the matter, but the article pointed to some 31 million people who will be affected by this, and the problem is growing, so education is an impractical option in the short term).

In Canada (I'm not sure about the states) nearly every province in the past 7 years has upheld legislation to ban cigarette smoking from all public places, including a certain area outside entrances and exits of buildings, due to the harmful effects of second hand smoke (although further study on the subject is needed). A lot of opposition to this legislation stems from the idea that it is in some way a turn towards fascism, and that the government is infringing on the inherit rights of the people it represents. But it's all a bunch of bull. Second hand smoking is a public health concern, the government of nearly every province passed the legislation because of that. People that oppose the ban, and fight for the right to smoke anywhere they want to, are simply ignorant.

If MMO's, or videogames in general, have become a public health concern (I know in my current province child obesity and the popularity of videogames are both increasing rapidly, no conclusion can be drawn from these two possible coincidences, but there's a good chance China is not the only country dealing with this issue) I would actually back the government up if they passed legislation to regulate it. To ignore it completely would, in my opinion, be irresponsible.

Kids can still play these games from 3-5 hours a day, the rest of their free time can and should be better spent pursuing other interests in the real world.
 
Caedicae said:
To me, this doesn't look like a "nice" thing the country is doing for their youth.

We all know sitting and playing WoW for 8 hours a day isn't good for your health, but I think that the option to play or not, should be for the person playing.

They are aiming this at the youth under 18 years, which means they are still in school -
They only have so many hours after school to play a game.

It shouldn't be the governments duty to restrict time limits, that is for the guardians and the person themself.
Of course, China doesn't exactly represent free choices so..

The health factor, you can play quite a lot of games and still stay healthy. I know I do.
It's the decision of, "I want to have a snack while I play" or, "I'll eat after I'm done." -
You can always take some time to exercise at some point during your day. It's whether or not you choose to.
That's not to say you should starve yourself if you want to play for 8 hours straight.
That's where the human brain comes into play, and if you don't realize what is bad for your health, maybe you should have a limit set. By your parents or by yourself - But not by your country.
Click to expand...

You have no idea what communism is do you? This is basically the DEFINITION of communism. The government controls and regulates EVERYTHING.
 
Communism or not, I would support a bill limiting MMO gaming time for people under 18. It isn't healthy socially, mentally, or physically.
 
Heh, no, I know what communism is.
Would saying, "Well, they are Communists. That's why." do much for the topic? ;P

And, to the points you stated Stealth, I can understand where you are coming from.
But honestly, whether you are told or are not told that playing games that excessively is bad for you,
I think people can see the change when they either become obese from it or are completely starved.
The problem is getting them to care.

Not allowing them that time isn't getting them to care, or understand. That's simply saying ,"No."
If the government of China is doing this solely out of trying to help the youth, they would also being going to the people and explaining to them what is wrong.
Yeah, I know, you can't go to millions of people. However, simply saying "sitting all day is bad for your health" isn't doing much.

I myself on average play more than three hours of games a day - My health is quite well, and I still have other activities in my life.
"Kids can still play these games from 3-5 hours a day, the rest of their free time can and should be better spent pursuing other interests in the real world."
Yes, kids should have other interests that can fill that space. But if gaming is a kid's main interest, and he's told to do something else, that's kind of like telling a very athletic-interested person to go play video games.

Anyway, 3-5 hours a day isn't so bad. It's just the lack of say they have in it.
My goal would be to educate them thoroughly, and incourage them to continue what they like to do, but try other things to even their time spent.

It's difficult for me to back up the idea of blocking someone off of doing something they really enjoy.
For me, if I'm on my computer for say, 6+ hours in a day - If I'm playing a game, I don't just play it continuously.
I take breaks, I read up things on the internet, I educate myself all throughout the day.
If this could be encouraged, playing games wouldn't be such a bad thing.

So - If this is a temporary law to educate their people and try to get them to understand, it wouldn't be so bad.
But you don't see control rise and then let go on purpose often.
 
SpartanEvolved said:
Communism or not, I would support a bill limiting MMO gaming time for people under 18. It isn't healthy socially, mentally, or physically.
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I have to disagree with you there. Its up to the parent, not the government, to decide how long their child can play a video game for. This is just the government trying to control its citizens. It would be like someone trying to make smoking illegal in this country. Now I'm not for smoking, (in fact I think its one of the most disgusting things you can do) but it should be up to the individual person to decide if they should do it. It falls upon the person to take care of themselves, not the government.
 
Homicidal Cherry53 said:
I have to disagree with you there. Its up to the parent, not the government, to decide how long their child can play a video game for. This is just the government trying to control its citizens. It would be like someone trying to make smoking illegal in this country. Now I'm not for smoking, (in fact I think its one of the most disgusting things you can do) but it should be up to the individual person to decide if they should do it. It falls upon the person to take care of themselves, not the government.
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Why don't you write the Chinese Government a big fat complaint letter on how fatuous their new law is. I'm sure they'd love to hear from you.
 
3 hours of any video game in one day is still a substantial amount. 21 hours of video games per week is almost one day a week. This is roughly 42 full days of video game play per year.....


Don't most people watch at least 3 hours of tv a day?
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I watch near zero hours of TV ^_^
 
There in my opinion can only be two reasons why the Chinese government is doing this. One is they actually care about the health of the children of China, which I don't buy, being that they enact laws restricting families to one child. And even go so far as turn a blind eye to the parents who abandon their babies when they have girls. And of course there is the issue of human rights violations. Condemning people to long sentences in labor camps that are set up much like the Soviet Union's GULAG system. So again, looking out for their peoples' health is something I simply cannot believe.

Reason number two has to do with the promotion of free thought and the severe limitations of Western thought and ideology. Music has been restricted heavily for fear that Western music will put thoughts of revolution in the minds of the younger generations. Television has recently been restricted to domestic programing. Even Barney has been seen as an enemy to their communist regime. What is next? If videogames can provoke a Chinese man to hop a train and ride many miles into a city he has never been to in order to commit murder as revenge for someone stealing an item in an MMO, then the government has to worry. Communism survives on a cult of personality. And if videogames give people ideas, then that means the government has the potential to fail.

Take your pick on this one. Either way communism seeks to restrict one's rights no matter if the right in question has harmful side effects.
 
Dart said:
There in my opinion can only be two reasons why the Chinese government is doing this. One is they actually care about the health of the children of China, which I don't buy, being that they enact laws restricting families to one child. And even go so far as turn a blind eye to the parents who abandon their babies when they have girls. And of course there is the issue of human rights violations. Condemning people to long sentences in labor camps that are set up much like the Soviet Union's GULAG system. So again, looking out for their peoples' health is something I simply cannot believe.

Reason number two has to do with the promotion of free thought and the severe limitations of Western thought and ideology. Music has been restricted heavily for fear that Western music will put thoughts of revolution in the minds of the younger generations. Television has recently been restricted to domestic programing. Even Barney has been seen as an enemy to their communist regime. What is next? If videogames can provoke a Chinese man to hop a train and ride many miles into a city he has never been to in order to commit murder as revenge for someone stealing an item in an MMO, then the government has to worry. Communism survives on a cult of personality. And if videogames give people ideas, then that means the government has the potential to fail.

Take your pick on this one. Either way communism seeks to restrict one's rights no matter if the right in question has harmful side effects.
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It doesn't matter what they try to restrict. They will eventually fail to compete and collapse. The main problem with communism has always been that there is no incentive to come up with new ideas because the government tries to keep everyone on a level playing field. So, inevitably, China will not come up with the new ideas necessary to keep up economically and will just do what it does now, take the technology through non-existent patent laws and make it at an inferior quality. They can't keep doing that forever.
 
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