Umm yes..

Lets face it, the whole country is afraid of a single nipple, so anything more than that could insight mass panic throughout the whole population... </sarcasm>

America lost what was left of it's mind a *long* time ago..

Jack Thompson and his pals are, to be polite, insanely ultra-conservative gits.

As you pointed out, in both cases, you have to modify the code of the game, thereby altering it from it's original intent. In the case of GTA, yes, it does unlock the ability to have simulated sex. To damn the game for that is mental considering the rest of the game's content.

But to say that EA is collaborating with the mod community to create a porn offering that can be used by paedophiles is incredible stupid and I think the american institutions considering these issues will probably see that. I hope they do.

It's a sad fact that America is much more conservative when it comes to sex and nudity than it is when it comes to violence, which always seems backwards to me. The naked human body is perfectly natural. Violence in the magnitude we see in films/play in games is a purely Human creation.

As Wobag put it in chat, when we get american content, we edit out the violence, when america gets our content, they edit out the sex.

Rockstar did themselves no favours in their defence by claiming the minigame was created by the hackers rather than something that was illegally accessed. In this case I'd be pretty surprised if this was a part of the original code. Either way EA should shoot this down like the lame duck issue it is.

hia im just new on this and im called aimee will u go on line please

Hey Aimee,

I've just sent you an email with some information to clarify some things on how the site works. Hopefully this will help you join the discussions

Just a reminder: "America" is not a monolith. Your comments apply to some of it, but not all.

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by Sandia
Just a reminder: "America" is not a monolith. Your comments apply to some of it, but not all.

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True enough, we should take more care not to generalise. Sorry

Thanks, Maffrew. I appreciate it. I realize the "yahoo" quotient is pretty high in some places around here. Just like to remind people that the yahoos may be loud, but there's a lot more of us out here than them.

Don't worry, we're well aware that America isn't completely full of idiots - every nation in the world is full of complete morons of a shameful caliber, it's just that American ones get all the best press!

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by Alan
...every nation in the world is full of complete morons of a shameful caliber, it's just that American ones get all the best press!

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Is that ever the truth. If I lived outside of the U.S. and saw most of the media on the U.S., I'd probably be afraid to set foot in the place.

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by Sandia
If I lived outside of the U.S. and saw most of the media on the U.S., I'd probably be afraid to set foot in the place.

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Well, I do, I have, and I am!

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by Sandia
(quotes)

Is that ever the truth. If I lived outside of the U.S. and saw most of the media on the U.S., I'd probably be afraid to set foot in the place.

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Fortunately, those of us Brits who aren't moronic idiots who just write the States off and go there discover it's a wonderful place, full of great people.

And damnit, if i ever get enough money, I will buy myself an apartment in the upper westside of manhattan and move there.

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by Maffrew
Fortunately, those of us Brits who aren't moronic idiots who just write the States off and go there discover it's a wonderful place, full of great people.

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You do know I was joking, right?

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by Alan
(quotes)You do know I was joking, right?

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Yes. What i said wasn't a response to you, it was a response to the moronic brits who think america and all americans are fat, militaristic hicks.

Maffrew and Alan, you crack me up.

I think--from my very unbiased position here in North America--that the U.S. is a great place in many ways, but often a very peculiar place as well. It's just that the peculiar tends to make for better newspaper and TV copy, even if it's not the dominant thing.

I tend to seek out the unusual myself--or at least what's different than what I'm used to just because it's more interesting and because it helps me understand why some people in this country have such a different worldview than I do.

I've taken all my vacations in the western U.S. recently. A couple of years ago, I drove out to Wyoming and talked one of my friends into meeting me there. I was curious about Wyoming because it's one of those places in the U.S. that people don't talk very much about. So I drove 2,000 miles out there, and I had never experienced anything quite like it. First of all, it's just vast and empty. I come from the most densely populated part of the U.S., right outside New York City. On every street where I live, every nationality and race is represented. In Wyoming, I drove for hours and hours for hundreds and hundreds of miles over rolling plains where there was nothing but short grass and sagebrush out to the horizon. No people. No buildings. Maybe an occasional group of cows or horses on pastureland, or a windmill groaning in the constant wind. Every once in a while there would be a cluster of houses just sitting there on the bare plains exposed to the elements. (I could just imagine living here during the blizzards of winter.) The biggest city, Cheyenne, has only 30,000 people. Everyone you see is white. A lot of them have never been very far from home. The people who live here live in a very closed and isolated world--very different from where I live.

My friend (she was from California, which is similar to the northeast politically and very ethnically diverse)and I went to a rodeo in a small town--just cause we wanted to see what it was like. There were a couple hundred folks there, including high school kids who rope cattle and ride as school activities, like some kids in New Jersey might play basketball. It was clear that everyone spotted us as out-of-towners. THEY all knew each other, and aside from the cowboys in the rodeo, I don't think people came from outside of town very often. And as I was sitting there in the stands, I realized that I probably haven't got a lot in common with these people at all, except we were all "Americans". And going to a place like Wyoming, I started to understand why people where I live and people where they live are so socially and politically different--shaped by very different environments. And the more I travel around the U.S., the more I understand how hard it is to generalize about people who live here.

I would imagine it's that way in Britain, too, although maybe a little less so because the distances aren't as vast. But maybe I'm wrong about that.

Cool story

There certainly is a wide variety of folks in Britain, but the differences, as you said, are much narrower than in the states because everyone is so close together.

It's very hard for people here to even imagine the wide open spaces like you describe in Wyoming. Britain is such a tiny little spot on the globe when you think about the size of other countries.

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by Sandia
Maffrew and Alan, you crack me up.

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Uh... thanks?

But yes, America has been a place I've long wanted to visit. Maybe one day when I rule the planet (from the comfort of the most expensive and luxurious armchair ever made, natch) and money is no object...

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by Maffrew
It's very hard for people here to even imagine the wide open spaces like you describe in Wyoming. Britain is such a tiny little spot on the globe when you think about the size of other countries.

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A real defining characteristic of the American West is its vast and empty spaces. I've driven through some of the most empty parts of it by myself--northern Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, eastern Colorado, the Mojave Desert of California, and so on. Although there's a certain desolate feeling to some of it, there's also incredible beauty to it as well.

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by Alan
America has been a place I've long wanted to visit. Maybe one day when I rule the planet (from the comfort of the most luxurious and expensive armchair ever made, natch), and money is no object...

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You should definitely visit. (Is it that expensive for a plane ticket?) If you avoid spending a lot of time in the most expensive cities (New York, San Francisco, and so on), travel cheaply by train (I've gone across the U.S. by train several times, and it's pretty cheap), and stay in inexpensive places, you could probably plan a really great trip and not spend a fortune. I mean, I think you could. And, of course, you should stay away from anything that has "Disney" in front of it, because it's my own personal agenda to fight evil.

Perhaps when you rule the planet, you could just ban Disney. I'd like to put in for that now, please.

Unortunately for Alan I already rule the planet, my palace is in Vladivostok (don't ask). As far as Dispney goes, well let's just say when all the idiots get in one plae there'll be a little surprise for them