Anyone have a guess as to why these companies don’t just cut off the country being used to spearhead these attempts? Like, half the popular games are blocked already. And setting this precedent will likely lead to further fuckery in the future. Is Australlia really that profitable that it’s worth the current and future hassle?

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Aren’t these the same people with links to Purity Ring ceremonies?

Collective Shout claim it’s about harm reduction, but then push an agenda that functionally amounts to moral panic.

Their approach is identical in logic to the “GTA causes school shootings” hysteria: loud, pearl-clutching, and utterly unmoored from data.

If Collective Shout want to argue these games cause harm, then show us the harm. Not correlation. Not outrage. Not hypothetical downstream consequences. Show causation. Peer-reviewed. Reproducible.

Otherwise, they’re just moralizing bullies using the banking system as a cudgel.

On top of this, they might actually be harming their own cause. The catharsis hypothesis poses that sexual fantasy enactment might reduce risk of real world harm.

The logic is simple: suppressing a compulsion doesn’t eliminate it. It just bottles up until it explodes. Redirect it into a safe outlet, and it becomes manageable.

The only reason this research isn’t cited more often is because it’s politically radioactive. Nobody wants to admit that it’s better to let a gooners jerk off, than to escalate under repression.

The burden of proof SHOULD be on Collective Shout to provide a reasonable argument which supports their claim that censorship will reduce real world harm.

Current working theory in psychology: it doesn’t. Emerging theory suggests: they’re shooting themselves (and potential rape victims) in the foot.

The real solution to real-world harm involves empathy, autonomy and education.

The best part is that for the article Valve supplied a picture of Blue Scout standing speechless in front of pornographic pictures of his mom, as the punch line of one of the best “your mom” jokes of all time.

Hold up, all this shit because of an extremist group, *in Australia, where half the M games on the market already can’t be sold, is driving global payment processor behavior?!?

I like how the language is ‘claims responsibility.’ You know. Like terrorist groups do after an attack

There’s a few groups like this in Australia, unfortunately.

Australia didn’t even have an R18+ rating for games until 2013 (R18+ is similar to AO or NC-17 in the USA). Before then, all games with a higher rating than MA15+ were illegal in Australia. Many games had an Australia-specific version with blood/gore reduced, some things edited out, etc. to reduce the rating. The original release of GTA4 in Australia was heavily censored.

Here’s something I’ve noticed. Whenever someone describes a group, individual, activity, or anything else with more than 2 negative adjectives in a row, they’re probably saying something deeply unstable. This is one of those times.

me watching clearly adult humans doing consentual sex things

some religious zealot chud: this makes you a pedo somehow

I expect this group is rife with paedos.

Someone should check this groups computer ls and closets because they are projecting and those fuckers should have no impact on what us Americans or any other country wants to buy. This needs to be reversed Asap.

This whole thing smacks of the “anyone who has a sexual proclivity I claim not to share must have all sexual proclivities I claim not to share” logic. i.e. the logic that got gay people flagged as child molesters back in the bad old days. And occasionally still today.

Such logic might actually be rooted in projection, which is a deeply disturbing thought. Deeply closeted people desperately clinging to heteronormativity and traditional gender roles because they think that if they don’t they they’ll do something abhorrent. Maybe even to someone who can’t consent. Or they already have and they desperately want to hide away from it.

Yes, for the love of all that’s holy and secular too, ban the games with apparent child sexual abuse. Children can’t consent. Leave everything else the hell alone.

I don’t even play video games with sexual themes, but I do play ones that contain 18+ violence. I assume those will be next on the chopping block.

Tbh, its only a matter of time before the entire organization gets doxxed and the internet does what it does.

I look forward to eating popcorn when it happens.