This is your normal every day story about controversial themes in video games, a baying mob placing pressure on a company with claims that are economic with the truth, a baying mob not grasping that there are serious concerns about said content and trolls emerging from beneath the bridge to spread heinous vitriol.
Target Australia have announced : Target Removes Grand Theft Auto 5 From Shelves. The announcement says :
Target General Manager Corporate Affairs Jim Cooper said the decision was made following extensive community and customer concern about the game.
“We’ve been speaking to many customers over recent days about the game, and there is a significant level of concern about the game’s content,” Mr Cooper said.
“We’ve also had customer feedback in support of us selling the game, and we respect their perspective on the issue.
“However, we feel the decision to stop selling GTA5 is in line with the majority view of our customers.”
GTA is of course a controversial game and has extremely adult themes. However it’s rated as an 18 rated game, although parents all too often haven’t grasped that 18 rated games mean it’s only suitable for people 18 and over and in extreme cases like GTA, it’s questionable whether it’s suitable for all people as young as 18. However this isn’t helped when a company such as Target Australia advertise a game like GTA V next to Peppa Pig and Barbie in the toys and games section of an advertising brochure.
However it’s disappointing to see Target Australia bow down to the baying mob, just as it was disappointing when Intel bowed down to the baying mob over advertising on Gamasutra. However both companies have every right to take business decisions they consider to be suitable. Target Australia feel they are a family friendly store but in the case of the latest hoo-ha, one can’t help but feel Target Australia are missing the target by a country mile. when you look at the next part of the announcement, it all gets a bit baffling :
Mr Cooper said Target would continue to sell other R-rated DVDs and games.
“While these products often contain imagery that some customers find offensive, in the vast majority of cases, we believe they are appropriate products for us to sell to adult customers.
“However, in the case of GTA5, we have listened to the strong feedback from customers that this is not a product they want us to sell.”
The Warehouse in New Zealand consider themselves to be a family friendly store, in November they took the decision to remove all R18 rated games and DVD’s off the shelves. GTA V was also at the heart of this decision, but The Warehouse took a consistent approach to these issues, as The Warehouse chief executive Mark Powell explained :
The recently released Grand Theft Auto V, which contains graphic sex scenes and violence towards women from a first person perspective, has acted as a catalyst for our decision to totally exit the R18 games and DVD market.
We considered simply ‘de-ranging’ this product, however that would require us to judge the merits of every R18 product on an ongoing basis, which we are not in a position to do, nor do we see as our role.
The arguments that follow over Target Australia’s decision will rage on about The Warehouse’s decision too but at least The Warehouse displayed a fine degree of consistency in their approach, the same cannot be said for Target Australia. I’m not quite sure why they think it’s fine to sell other content that contains sex and graphic violence but have decided to single out GTA V as not being suitable. The cynical side of me suspects a marketing gimmick to get eyes on the prize. They did indeed get a lot of eyes on their Facebook page and are still getting a lot of eyes on the prize, they are also busily deleting thousands of dissenting voices, many of which are polite and to the point rather than vitriolic and rude.
However a post on IGN might explain some of the thinking behind Target Australia’s decision : Target’s GTA 5 Snub Is Misinformed And Achieves Nothing. Luke Reilly, Games Editor at IGN explains how a petition with over 40,000 signatories would have been a matter of concern for Target Australia :
the petition encouraged its supporters to contact Wesfarmers managing director Richard Goyder personally via his Twitter account. Target Australia is a subsidiary of Wesfarmers and Goyder is an ambassador for White Ribbon (active in more than 60 countries White Ribbon is the world’s largest male-led movement to end men’s violence against women).
Luke also points out the realities of violence against females outside the video game environment :
I should stress that Australia’s statistics concerning violence against women are as startling as they are abhorrent. Over 12 months, on average, one woman is killed every week in Australia as a result of intimate partner violence and one in three women have suffered physical and/or sexual violence at the hands of someone known to them. As someone who grew up surrounded by twice as many women than men, and with a daughter of my own, these figures are frighteningly unacceptable.
Men are also of course victims of violence, including domestic violence. Around 40% of domestic violence reports in the UK are for violence against men. This is of course not all female on male domestic abuse but domestic violence against men in the UK does seem to be on the rise.
These statistics show why it’s really not surprising that people will object to violence in video games, and in the GTA V case, violence aimed at females. Ok yes the petition to get GTA V banned did contain untruths, such as getting health points for killing prostitutes and it does seem to imply that a primary motive in GTA V is to enact violence against females. However there’s no getting away from the reality of real physical violence against females, it really is understandable that people find this content objectionable. The problem is, that by only setting their sights on one game, rather than violent themes in general, the process starts to get counter productive.
There have long been campaigns to bring suitable ratings to games and GTA V was rated in Australia as R18, that’s the most adult rating a game can get in Australia, meaning it really is for adults, if GTA had not met that rating it would not be on sale anywhere in Australia. Target Australia are undermining the rating system by only refusing to sell this game. As Mary Hamilton points out in an article in The Guardian : Games aren’t just for kids any more. By pulling Grand Theft Auto from stores Target sets the medium back :
It’s hypocritical to stop selling GTAV while still selling NERF guns, unless video games are more likely to result in real-world behavioural changes than real-world games. The same logic applies to violent films and literature.
Target’s decision also reinforces the concept that games are for kids and that adult depictions of violence and adult themes aren’t appropriate in a medium that is rapidly growing to encompass all ages. If young boys are playing GTAV and deciding that killing sex workers is hilarious, that’s not the fault of the developers or of the stores that sell it; the game’s already rated R-18 in Australia. A long list of games are banned or censored for the Australian market, as a result of more stringent classifications.
Both Leigh and Mary also touch upon the controversial topic of whether or not players are forced to enact violent acts against females in the game. Leigh in his article states :
the outbursts of violence that appear to have been the catalyst for this petition are player-created. They’re certainly not related to the progression of the game or, indeed, “health points”. To suggest otherwise only contributes to the false impressions non-gamers regularly harbour about video games and is unhelpful. It should be noted the law enforcement response for violent acts a player chooses to perform in GTA V is the same regardless of the sex, ethnicity, or weight of any non-player character a player takes it upon his- or herself to harm. As one of the biggest entertainment brands in history I think the discussion around how the series could look to introduce more interesting and powerful female characters is a valid one that ought to continue, but I’d also firmly argue that claiming GTA V “encourages” players to “kill women” is outright hyperbole.
Mary in her article states :
GTAV is part of a franchise devoted to pushing the boundaries of what’s considered acceptable in adult entertainment. Yes, it depicts women terribly; there’s little argument about that. It also depicts men terribly, though at least there are a few complex and well-realised male characters in the game. At no point does it force you to interact with sex workers, positively or otherwise, though the fact that you can is obviously a cause of great concern for these women which deserves to be seriously heard.
The rebuttal of course that comes back largely centres around Mary’s last sentence, yes the players can interact violently with sex workers in the game, even if they don’t have to and many are happy to post their exploits on platforms such as YouTube, although rather bizarrely, not many people seem to be concerned that content on YouTube that depicts this sort of violence is freely available to people under the age of 18. Personally, I think that’s something that YouTube should address.
GTA is an adult game that should only be enjoyed by adults. Parents and stores need to get it into their heads that the gaming industry, like the film and publishing industries, appeals to people well over the age of 18 and content suitable to that age group is not going to disappear.
However as content gets more interactive and more immersive, it’s likely that these concerns over sex and violence will get raised over and over again. There’s certainly room for sensible and informed debate over these issues. However, as predictably as night follows day, some people simply can’t engage in sensible debate and the group behind the original petition to get GTA V taken off the shelves in Target Australia. Collective Shout, have received vile and heinous abusive. This is completely counter productive. People may not agree with their views but there’s no need to resort to vitriol. That goes for both sides but in particular those who think it’s funny to threaten people they disagree with with sexual or physical violence.
It should also be noted that Target Australia are not affiliated with other brands that carry the name Target in other parts of the world.
Sexual violence is no laughing matter, nor is real physical violence. Let’s get away from an abusive and toxic debate over these issues and try and find sensible ways of going forward, because these issues are not going to go away.