Australia's Rating System Remains Unchanged

Fortunately, this has nothing to do with the recent Byron's review. However, this could be considered some sort of bad news for those who hoped that the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General meeting will actually change the Australian rating system and it will have as a result a slightly more permissive one. Nope... that's not going to happen – at least for now, since there is still a possibility for a change later this year.

Even though Victorian Deputy Premier/Attorney-General Rob Hulls supported the idea of a change, an agreement was not reached but hopefully he gave the other participants a reason or two to think about. He said that he believes "censorship laws should strike an appropriate balance between freedom of expression and community concerns about depictions that condone or incite violence, as well as the principle that minors should be protected from material likely to harm or disturb them."

He also argued that the parental controls in latest generation consoles allowed parents to limit their children's access to harmful materials, while he outlined the fact that "it seems inconsistent that in Australia, adults are allowed to view 'adult only' films which have been classified R18+ by the Classification Board, but not computer games with an equivalent high level content."

However, even though no change was made regarding the rating system, we can't consider this meeting unsuccessful – another one will be held later this year and the matter will be discussed then, and that's the time when a final decision is accepted. However, not everybody agrees to a change. Unlike Rob Hulls, Michael Atkinson, Attorney-General for South Australia, was against the proposed changes. He thinks that children should be protected against potentially harmful material in video games – and I doubt there are people who would disagree with him. Still, banning games or cutting them just doesn't seem the right thing to do. Oh, well... we'll see exactly what's the final decision whenever the next meeting takes place. We'll keep you updated on the matter.