Egin:
Same with games. Let us decide which games to pass to our kids.
All those commissions prohibiting things like games, programs, etc, I see it as violation of my rights to choose.
If
all parents would make these decisions, are interested and informed, I would agree with you, Egin. But the majority doesn't even know what their kids are playing/watching - for various reasons.
And I gladly sacrifice rights for responsibility.
There is more than one violent game/movie necessary to violate - but I ask myself sometimes why do we adults need this? What kind of example (yes, boring old responsibility again) are we giving our youngsters?
And in my case again: I'm glad about rating, this helps me in my daily job to choose rather quickly which game/video/DVD can I buy and which can I leave out happily.
I see youngsters coming to us and wanting games that are on the index, I see youngsters coming with their totally uninformed grandparents and wanting to bribe them into borrowing unsuitable games/videos/DVD. Age rating helps me - I have a better argument in explaining, why I wouldn't recommend it.
Egin, not all adults are well-informed/responsible/interested - so, age-rating helps.
And it doesn't help the whole leisure industry if terrible incidents happen and the blame is then easily put on this industry - gamers are pressed into the violent corner again (Counterstrike e.g.)
Kiya
I do wish age-rating would be modified after some time though.
