Japan Bans Rape Games? Seriously?

Wow-- even amidst all the fuss by Equality Now and the like, I never for a moment imagine that Japan would actually ban a profitable product like rape games. But Canned Dogs reports that a ban is, in fact, going to be put in place, and apparently the article reporting it even credits Equality Now with the ban.

Great, Japan, thanks a lot. Now they're going to get a big ol' swelled-up head and come to the US and try to censor our stuff. Good job. That's sarcasm, by the way. Rape is bad, but censorship is worse than fictional rape. I would normally tack an “in my opinion” on that, but given that-- to my knowledge --there are no credible studies proving that playing a rape game leads to real life rape, just like there are no credible studies proving that playing a violent game leads directly to real-life, I feel comfortable saying that.

Canned Dogs notes that the companies who focus 100% on rape games will have to either find ways around the new judging criteria for games or move on to a different genre, at least until it gets banned too.

Seriously, guys, I know that plenty of you will find these games to be disgusting-- but they are a symptom, not a cause, nor the end of the problem. Banning games does not change the culture, it just pushes a piece of the puzzle down to the bottom of a heap where it can fester.

In other words, booooooo.