Truth in Advertising Bill Passed in Utah

Jack Thompson, the craziest ex-lawyer this side of the globe, helped push House Bill 353 into amendment status ratifying content targeting video game retailers and movie theaters and selling M or R rated material to underage kids.

83 (u) (i) advertises that the person will not sell a good or service labeled with an age
84 restriction or recommendation to a person under the age restriction or recommendation; and
85 (ii) sells that good or service to a person under the age restriction or recommendation.

With a new child of my own, I completely understand having some sort of measurement in place to help stop retailers from pushing pornography and murder onto kids who don't know better. But scaring politicians with lies is just wrong.

Jack, again, pushed that the game Grand Theft Auto IV is a murder/sex simulator, "rewarding" players for killing cops and shooting hookers. He references Devin Moore, a murderer who killed three police workers in 2005, stating to the police that "life is like a video game, everyone dies sometime" and that he shot the police because he didn't want to go to jail. At the time of the shooting, Moore was 20 years old.

My issue is that no where in the bill does it say anything about parental punishment for parents who let their kids play violent games or see violent movies. And I don't see how selling games to underage kids has anything to do with truth in advertising.

Personally, I've played through all of GTA4 and never once had relations with a prostitute. I did however run a car 80mph down a street in the middle of the city and whipe out score of pedestrians. When the cops chased me, I ran outside of their red circle of awareness, at which point they completely forgot about me and I went along my merry way.

Ahh, the realism of video games.