Category Archives: Censorship

Columnist Ali Spies revealed last week in The Standard that her COM 115: Fundamentals of Public Speaking instructor, purportedly acting on instructions of the Department of Communication, rejected her proposal to research, compose and deliver a brief speech about Planned Parenthood in the United States. The instructor asserted that the topic has ... too much controversy ... and implied that, while some controversy might be acceptable, too much controversy is off-limits. Spiess Department of Communication instructor censored Spies. Dr. Shawn T. Wahl heads the MSU Department of Communication.

George Anastaplo, a professor of law at Loyola University in Chicago, wrote that censorship is ... the changing or the suppression or prohibition of speech or writing that is deemed subversive of the common good. In other words, our universitys Department of Communication determined before Spies had begun to research her topic that mere mention of the topic would subvert the well-being of our academic community. Without further explanation, we can only speculate in our collective bafflement how the history of Planned Parenthood could possibly subvert the moral or physical welfare of our academic community.

The Department of Communications intellectual tyranny is not unique. A member of the Department of English censored me several semesters ago. In a fiction writing class, I submitted a story that included horrific violence to be discussed and evaluated by my classmates and instructor during our next class.

The instructor inexplicably failed to read the entire piece until just before class, although all of my classmates had read it. Rather than proceed, the instructor blindsided me and told the class that my story was inappropriate for class discussion.

The instructors censorship struck me as particularly hypocritical, given not only the graphic sex and violence in some of the published short stories the instructor had assigned the class to read, but also the instructors reading aloud to the class a lengthy and particularly graphic episode of deviant sex excerpted from one of those assigned short stories. The smug instructors hypocrisy is now part of a successful, if mediocre, academic career.

Given the Department of Communications irrational fear of controversy, its rewriting of Emma Lazaruss sentiment on the plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty, might well read:

Give me your apathetic, your indolent,

Your texting masses yearning to shop,

The benighted spawn of your vacuous world.

Send these, the complacent, directionless to me,

I lift my middle finger to their delusive dreams!

Censorship at a university is an abuse of power and a corruption of authority; it is a tool of bullies and despots whose victims are never the same. This toxic silencing stunts the intellectual growth of students and abuses them to such a degree that, out of paranoia, they self-correct whenever they feel theyve entered uncharted territory. They fear rocking the boat; their souls are crippled and their respect for instructors of all ranks becomes wary and stressful.

If Einstein had been intimidated effectively by mediocre instructors, would it have delayed special relativity or general relativity? If incompetent, self-hating instructors had strong-armed Lincoln, would he have authored the Emancipation Proclamation? Is it unreasonable to hope that theres a special place in Hell for I darent eat a peach instructors who hog-tie youths exuberant and yeasty passions for learning?

Whether the above incidents of censorship are anomalies or part and parcel of university dry-rot and mediocrity needs to be investigated, but first, Missouri State President Clif Smart and Wahl each needs to apologize to Spies for permitting censorship to exist on their collective watch. Since Spiess experience is now quite public, both Smarts and Wahls apologies should also be public; our academic community demands redress.

Read the original here:
Censorship: Is it happening at MSU? - Standard Online

Two media associations have called on the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) to review its committee's order to black out Voice TV's broadcasts for seven days, saying it harms media freedom.

The call was made by the Thai Journalists Association (TJA) and the Thai Broadcast Journalists Association (TBJA), which released a joint statement Tuesday.

They made the call a day after the NBTC board decided to punish Voice TV, which belongs to the Shinawatra family, for airing content that violated the NCPO's announcements Nos.97 and 103, and Section 97 of the NBTC Act more than 10 times last year.

The NBTC said the content was inappropriate and could lead to social divisions.

The associations said they oppose the committee's decision to suspend the channel's licence for seven days.

They said the suspension order could affect media employees who may have nothing to do with the TV content or were unaware of the anchors' actions.

If the committee had suspended particular programmes, the impact would be felt only by those producing the programmes, but the suspension of the channel's licence would have a larger impact, they said.

The NBTC is an independent agency which provides licences to the TV operators and regulates them.

If it uses its power carelessly, media freedom could suffer, they said.

The committee cited complaints from the media monitoring panel of the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) in making its order, which suggested the committee was susceptible to allowing those in power to damage the agency's independence, they said.

The move will undermine the credibility of the NBTC and affect the freedom of its regulated media outlets, they said.

The committee's resolution also conflicts with both the 1997 and 2006 constitutions, which safeguard those in the media who deliver news or opinions in compliance with their career ethics.

The charters bar any orders which force the closure of media outlets to infringe on their freedom, according to the associations.

They said that in the case of Voice TV, any problematic programmes could be considered on a case-by-case basis and power should not have been used to suspend the TV licence.

Authorities also have the right to file police complaints against TV channels, if their broadcasts affect national security, infringe on people's privacy or defame them, they said.

Meanwhile, NCPO spokesman Winthai Suvaree insisted the temporary suspension of Voice TV's licence has nothing to do with the NCPO and the council did not request the NBTC to act on the matter.

"That is up to the NBTC to consider, which was made according to its own process," said Col Winthai, adding the suspension may have resulted because earlier warnings to the channel went unheeded.

Get full Bangkok Post printed newspaper experience on your digital devices with Bangkok Post e-newspaper. Try it out, it's totally free for 7 days.

Read this article:
Media groups rap Voice TV censorship - Bangkok Post

People in the Chinese megacity Chongqing could be fined for using VPNs to jump over the countrys Great Firewall that blocks access to forbidden websites from Google to Facebook.

The punishment would be meted out to people using virtual private networks to access banned sites for commercial purposes, but Amnesty International said the wording was vague enough that it could affect any business or individual.

Photo: Marc Oh.

Anyone who skirts censorship controls in the southwestern metropolis of 30 million people will receive a warning to disconnect from the internet, the Chongqing government said Monday.

Those who make a profit of more than 5,000 yuan ($730) while using VPNs will be fined 5,000-15,000 yuan, according to the updated internet security regulation which came into effect in July but only announced this week.

The move is a departure from authorities previous approach of reinforcing the governments Great Firewall to block VPN providers, who provide virtual tunnels that allow users to evade Chinas vast censorship system.

It looks like such practices might be extended to other parts of China if Chongqing police succeed in punishing people using VPNs, Amnesty Internationals China researcher Patrick Poon told AFP.

In January Beijing launched a campaign to crack down on such tools.

While China is home to the worlds largest number of internet users, a 2015 report by US think tank Freedom House found that the country had the most restrictive online use policies of 65 nations it studied, ranking below Iran and Syria.

But China has maintained that its various forms of web censorship are necessary for protecting its national security.

Sites blocked due to their content or sensitivity, among them Facebook, Twitter, Google Search and Gmail, cannot be accessed in China without VPNs.

The national VPN crackdown and Chongqing campaign come after the passing of a controversial cybersecurity bill last November that tightened restrictions on online freedom of speech and imposed new rules on service providers.

Earlier this month, Beijing said it would push a China solution to global cyber governance after releasing a strategy paper outlining a vision of the web where individual countries control the information that flows across their borders.

Comments

Go here to read the rest:
Chongqing citizens using VPNs to skirt censorship controls to face fines, govt says - Hong Kong Free Press

"Discipline and self-restraint when practiced by an individual, a family, or a company is an effective way to deal with this issue. The same thing when forced on a people by their government or, worse, by a self-appointed watchdog of public morals, is suppression and will not be tolerated in a democratic society."

John Denver said those words in September of 1985 during the infamous PMRC (Parents Music Resource Center) Senate hearings. Back then, Tipper Gore led the "Washington Wives" in a petition to have warning labels placed on music albums that contained potentially offensive content, like drugs, sex, and references to the occult. The end result was not only the addition of "Parental Advisory" stickers (and the fact that Denver is actually the founding father of the theory of the Streisand Effect), but also a statement that has maintained relevance far outside of its intended audience for decades.

In the most recent installment of "Wow, that sounds like something John Denver would say," Australian Senator David Leyonhjelm recently denounced the decision of the Australian Classification Board to refuse to classify Outlast 2 - which, effectively, resulted in the game being banned from sale in Australia.

In a ruling earlier this month, the Board concluded that Outlast 2 is guilty of the following: "depict, express or otherwise deal with matters of sex, drug misuse or addiction, crime, cruelty, violence or revolting or abhorrent phenomena in such a way that they offend against the standards of morality, decency and propriety generally accepted by reasonable adults to the extent that they should not be classified."

So Outlast 2 is offensive to the standards of morality, decency, and propriety that "reasonable adults" would accept, with the implication that any adult willing to accept such depictions is, by default, unreasonable. The Board then issued an ultimatum: remove the depiction of "implied sexual violence" in Outlast 2 and the game will be accommodated with an R18+ rating. So, if developer Red Barrels is willing to remove a scene that includes a depiction of "implied sexual violence," the game will likely have a chance of getting classified. To put it plainly: If the developer removes mature themes from a product intended for a mature audience, then they can possibly sell their product. To adults. And this is where the title of this post becomes more than just extremely clever word play (yes, I'm proud of that one) - Senator Leyonhjelm stood against the Board on the decision, urging them to "leave gamers alone."

Leyonhjelm began by pointing out that 68 percent of Australians play video games regularly - with the average age of those gamers being 33. Further, he stated that Australian laws regarding video games are made by people who have no understanding of the medium. Leyonhjelm stated that the decisions are based on the assumption that those playing games "are impressionable children who would play out anything they saw."

"Yet the internet is now awash with all manner of unpleasant images involving real people, not computer generated [characters], while violent crime around the world is in decline," he said. "It makes wonder how is it that adults are not trusted to make choices about video games, and yet they are allowed to vote?"

"Video games do not hurt anybody," Leyonhjelm said, "and the government Classification Board should leave gamers alone."

There is now a troubling decision to be made by Red Barrels - censor your product and remove that which we have personally deemed offensive, or our entire country will lose access to your product. There doesn't appear to be any reliable Australia-specific data on whether or not those 68 percent of Australian gamers would prefer a watered-down, altered version of a game intended for adults, or if they would, in fact, prefer that their standards of morality, decency and propriety remain unoffended.

There's also the unintended consequence of asserting that feeling offended by potentially offensive content is somehow a bad thing. Video games, as a medium, have evolved dramatically over the years, and the goal of each unique game is different. Much of the content in the award winning film 12 Years a Slave can easily be deemed offensive - but there is an understanding that the film is more than the sum of its parts. The same can easily be argued in favor of any film that features uncomfortable content. Like film, many video games expose the player to a range of situations and, consequently, a range of emotions. In truth, and at the risk of sounding breathlessly hyperbolic, the Board is not placing a ban on a video game, but rather on an emotion that the aforementioned video game is likely to evoke. It is also asserting that there is inherent shame in trusting yourself to react to that content and accompanying emotion. You wouldn't want to be *clutches chest* unreasonable.

It's worth noting, before I continue, that Outlast 2 is one of many video games refused classification in Australia. Postal and Postal 2 were both refused classification due to their "abhorrent and revolting content," while Saints Row IV was refused classification because of "illicit drug use related to incentives and rewards and visual depictions of implied sexual violence that are not justified by context," although an edited version of the game was later made available as an R18+ title with that content removed.

It's easy to assume that the Board's decision was made not because of the fact that "reasonable adults" are sure to be offended, nor was it solely based on their effort to play the role of diligent mother to grown adults, but rather is tied to the stigma that still surrounds the very idea of video games and those who play them. There is, still, the assumption that video games are designed for children and enjoyed primarily by children. The decision to restrict access based on archaic logic risks... well, I'll let John Denver tell you:

"In a mature, incredibly diverse society such as ours, the access to all perspectives of an issue becomes more and more important. Those things which in our experience are undesirable generally prove to be unfurthering and sooner or later become boring. That process cannot and should not be stifled. On the other hand...That which is denied becomes that which is most desired, and that which is hidden becomes that which is most interesting. Consequently, a great deal of time and energy is spent trying to get at what is being kept from you. Our children, our people, our society and the world cannot afford this waste."

Excerpt from:
The Classification and Censorship of Video Games in Australia ... - The Escapist

Deadline

French Biz Decries Censorship As Far Right Mayor Pulls Pic On Populism's Rise Deadline In what French film industry group l'ARP sees as a potential sign of what's to come should France's far right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen advance in May's local elections, a feature seen as critiquing her National Front (FN) party has been ...

Read more here:
French Biz Decries Censorship As Far Right Mayor Pulls Pic On Populism's Rise - Deadline

THE DAILY PIC (#1757Whitney Biennial edition): I guess my all-around favorite objects in this years Biennial were a suite of huge paintings by Frances Stark that simply reproduce whole pages from a book called Censorship Now!! by the cranky, radicalbut not dismissableIan Svenonius. His text, so painstakingly reproduced via Starks brushstrokes, argues for the censorship of many of the nastier bits of mainstream and establishment culture, in just the way that parts of the establishment have wanted to censor parts of the counterculture that it disapproves of.

The enlargement that Stark does is of course the direct opposite of censorship, and could be generalized as a defense of free speech in all cases. Theres clearly some kind of celebration of Svenonius in Starks paintings. But in their sheer, unavoidable legibility, they might also stand as a counterweight to Svenoniuss call for silencing voices he doesnt like.

One other thing I like about these pictures. The vast majority of contemporary paintings are hobbled by the weight of authority their ancient medium carries. (Worse, they dont even notice that they are.) Stark is using just that weight to make us consider the words of a radical anti-authoritywho seems to have an authoritarian streak. (Photo by Lucy Hogg)

For a full survey of past Daily Pics visit blakegopnik.com/archive.

Read the original post:
At the Whitney, Frances Stark's Giant Paintings Argue Against the Censorship They Promote - artnet News

IMBD homepage on March 22, 2017.

You would think the First Amendment is a bulletproof defense against censorship of the Internet. But then you are not reckoning with the awesome political power of the Screen Actors Guild.

The union representing Hollywood stars and role players somehow persuaded California lawmakers to enact a law that would bar the popular IMDb website from revealing the ages of actors. Its a law that sounds crazy even by California standards, yet Governor Jerry Brown signed it last fall.

Advertisement

Youve probably heard of the entertainment-focused IMDb. Owned by Amazon.com, it was founded by a British computer programmer and movie buff in 1990, when the Internet was in diapers. Today, its among the worlds most popular websites, with over 250 million visitors every month.

The basic IMDb service is free. Its content, like that of Wikipedia, is crowdsourced. Members love to post information about their favorite movies, directors, stars, and this is the important fact the actors ages.

Get Talking Points in your inbox:

An afternoon recap of the days most important business news, delivered weekdays.

Many stars arent happy about that. Its not just vanity, they say; Hollywood is rife with ageism, and older actors dont want directors to think theyve passed their sell-by dates.

IMDb has a paid version of its service called IMDbPro that has become the Hollywood equivalent of LinkedIn, the social network for business. Actors and others pay about $150 a year to see and be seen by the industry elite, and to hunt for jobs. And a role might be harder to come by if its known that a certain actor is on the far side of 50.

But you cant ban the whole Internet from publishing someones age. Or can you? California legislators figured out a way around that by framing their law as a defense against age discrimination. They wrote a publishing restriction that applies only to a commercial online entertainment employment service provider, allowing paying members to demand that his or her age be deleted from that site.

Advertisement

You wont be surprised to learn that IMDb and IMDbPro are virtually the only sites on earth that fit the criteria described in the law. Sure enough, as of Jan. 1, IMDb had received more than 2,300 takedown requests, including 10 from people whove won Oscars and another 71 whove been nominated for Oscars, Emmys, or Golden Globes.

IMDb hasnt honored a single one of these requests, insisting the law is flagrantly unconstitutional. Besides, it wont work. The same information is usually available elsewhere online, for the price of a quick Google search. And so IMDb argues the law harms its business by driving its users to other sites, without achieving its purpose.

IMDb filed suit against the law in federal court, and in February, US District Court Judge Vince Chhabria issued an injunction against it until the case can be heard.

There is an exceedingly strong likelihood that IMDb will prevail, the judge predicted. Thats putting it mildly.

The IMDb law is merely the nuttiest recent effort by governments here and abroad to censor unwelcome Internet content. Other examples are less ridiculous but equally pernicious.

Google, for instance, is headed to court in France, hoping to fend off a ruinous global expansion of the right to be forgotten. A 2014 ruling of the European Court of Justice held that citizens of the European Union can demand the deletion of embarrassing search results that are no longer relevant to a persons life. For instance, if a Frenchman went bankrupt 10 years ago, he could ask Google not to display this fact when someone ran a search of his name.

Google has complied with over a quarter-million such requests, but only in Europe. The Frenchmans bankruptcy would still come up if someone ran his name through Google in the United States. But in 2015, a French court ruled that Google must wipe embarrassing search results worldwide. Its a radical attempt to force the entire world to play by Europes censorious rules.

Some American lawmakers would be happy to comply. Last month, a couple of New York state legislators filed a bill that would require Internet search services to remove, on request, listings that hurt a persons reputation, and which are no longer material to current public debate or discourse.

Im sympathetic; weve all done things wed like the world to forget. But its no different from trying to block the publication of Brad Pitts age. Thats not the governments job.

Other ongoing disputes over online expression are more complex. Even now, European companies are pulling ads from Facebook and YouTube because users of those services sometimes post racist and anti-Semitic messages that are illegal overseas but protected here.

You cant blame advertisers for fleeing such stuff, even where its legal to publish it. And Internet companies arent bound by the First Amendment. They have every right to bar materials that dont meet their ethical standards, or those of their customers. Websites are also entitled to use their own judgment in flagging stories that might be considered fake news; I might disagree with their decisions, but I dont see it as censorship.

But governments cant ban the online publication of truth, at least not on this side of the Atlantic. Somebody tell the Screen Actors Guild.

See the original post here:
Hollywood puts its spin on censorship - The Boston Globe

Anurag Kashyap, who had multiple face-offs with the Central Board of Film Certification over several films such as Udta Punjab, Gulaal and Black Friday, says that if he doesnt like something, he never sees that.

Bollywood director Anurag Kashyap believes that in a world exposed to the internet, censorship doesnt hold any meaning. To have some kind of censorship in the age of YouTube and Internet is pointless. Its not even what I think is right or wrong. What are you trying to block people from? You have to start treating your audiences as adult people who can think for themselves, said Kashyap at the discussion panel at ongoing FICCI frames 2017 on Wednesday.

Read more

The Gangs of Wasseypur helmer who had multiple face-offs with the Central Board of Film Certification over several films such as Udta Punjab, Gulaal and Black Friday, says that if he doesnt like something, he never sees that. I dont see many things. If I want to watch something, I will go to the cinema hall, he said.

While the CBFC wanted to cut a large number of scenes in Kashyaps recent film Udta Punjab, claiming obscenity and defamation, the filmmaker had approached the courts, which ruled in his favour. The film was finally passed with one cut.

Honestly, I have a problem when I watch movies which have cuts. I wait for movies to come out on blue ray or watch them when I am travelling, said Kashyap.

Read this article:
Censorship pointless in the age of internet, says Anurag Kashyap - Hindustan Times

For-profit newspapers have been banned from the Bruce Township hall after action taken by the Board of Trustees March 15.

At the center of the action is The Record Newspaper, a Romeo-based publication that began publishing in January 2015.

The topic arose after Treasurer Debbie Obrecht accused Supervisor Richard Cory of throwing away copies on display at the township hall left there by Record Editor and Publisher Larry Sobczak.

The treasurer claimed that coverage critical of Clerk Susan Brockmann led to Corys action.

Brockmann was arrested on Sept. 11, 2015 at the township hall after setting off an alarm attempting to enter the building at 3 a.m. A Michigan State Police crash report from that night listed her blood alcohol content at .20, more than double the level of intoxication in Michigan and above the .17 super drunk standard.

I think it is censoring the press, Obrecht told the board. We may or may not like stories that appear, but the idea is that it does benefit the community overall.

Cory denied that he removed the newspapers.

I dont know of anyone throwing them out. This has turned into a political thing for you, Cory told Obrecht. There are articles in there that you want people to read.

Sobczak said that he has been leaving a few copies of The Record at the township hall since December 2015.

Cory said the treasurer gave away copies of The Record to residents coming into her office for them to read articles relating to Brockmanns arrest, which is being adjudicated through the 42-2 District Court in New Baltimore. Sobczak said that he never told Obrecht to personally distribute The Record, but stands by her right to do so.

It is her First Amendment right to pass out whatever she wants, he said.

Treasurer Paul Okoniewski backed up the supervisors claim.

Should we talk about the email I got from a resident citing you for handing them (newspapers) out while people were paying their taxes? Okoniewski asked Obrecht. The person sent an email to the board asking you to cease and desist.

That is absolutely untrue, Obrecht quickly responded.

Brockmann did not acknowledge articles written about her were the issue with The Record. Instead, it was the inaccurate reporting of other stories in the past, she said.

He (Sobczak) doesnt report the news, Brockmann said. I dont think that is the kind of journalism we want in this township.

Obrecht said that if Cory could be handing out materials advocating for Greater Romeo-Washington Chamber of Commerce businesses, then The Record should also be available to the public at the township hall along with publications such as Macomb Now.Magazine.

The Chamber and the Macomb Now are not causing the problems in this building, The Record is causing the problems, Cory told Obrecht. You are only doing this for one reason because you dont like somebody in this building.

You are wrong, Obrecht replied.

Okoniewski offered a motion not to provide any for-profit newspapers in the hallway at the township hall.

The motion passed 4-1 with Obrecht as the lone opposition vote.

They are stomping on the peoples right to free speech and freedom of the press, Sobczak said. I hope the board gains some wisdom and rescinds their motion.

The Record publisher said that he has spoken with Cory since the meeting, but the two did not come up with a solution to getting the newspaper back into the township hall.

Michigan State Police troopers responded to an alarm at the Bruce Township Hall at 3 a.m. Sept. 11 for a possible breaking and entering incident.

According to an MSP crash report from that night, Brockmann backed her Jeep Commander into the responding vehicle of Trooper Roger Haddad. The damage was listed in the report as minor.

Brockmann was then taken into custody and transported to the Chesterfield Police Department for booking and a chemical test on the charge of operating a motor vehicle while intoxicated with a high blood alcohol content. She was released on $100 bond.

Brockmann was due back in Chesterfield Township district court March 22.

Read this article:
Censorship allegation made as Bruce Township officials toss newspaper from hall - Shelby Township Source Newspapers

Share.

Australian Liberal Democratic Party Senator David Leyonhjelm has criticised the Government and the Australian Classification Board in a speech delivered to the Senate yesterday.

The Senate crossbencher highlighted the recent case of Outlast II, which was refused classification late last week due to a rape sequence during one of the games cut-scenes.

This video game takes place in a fantasy world involving all kinds of creatures both human and non-human, said Leyonhjelm. The mere suggestion of an out-of-screen encounter between a creature and a human character was enough to get it banned altogether by the Australian Classification Board.

All of this operates on the false assumption that people who play video games are impressionable children who would play out anything they saw.

Yet the internet is now awash with all manner of unpleasant images involving real people not computer generated images and violent crime around the world is in decline.

Leyonhjelms description of the problematic event in Outlast II differs with that of the Classification Board, which explained in a report provided to IGN that, while much of the contact between the creature and [the player character] is obscured, by it taking place below screen, the sexualised surroundings and aggressive behaviour of the creature suggest that it is an assault which is sexual in nature. When combined with the player's character's objections the Board found the sequence constituted a depiction of implied sexual violence.

Citing figures from Australias Interactive Games and Entertainment Association Digital Australia 16 report Leyonhjelm correctly notes the average age of gamers in Australia is 33.

Claiming that very few gamers are in a position to make or enforce the laws thanks to an unfortunate quirk of demographics Leyonhjelm also explained that politicians and public servants are blocked from accessing games websites like Polygon, IGN, PC Gamer or Gameplanet.

Leyonhjelm posits that [t]his is presumably because we might stumble across an image of something somebody disapproves of on a medium we dont understand. Its been confirmed to IGN that entertainment sites and Facebook, etc. are commonly blocked for public servants for productivity reasons and this is not an issue specific to games websites.

Prime Minister Turnbull claims to have an innovation agenda, but every signal we send to the gaming community in this country is of censorship, disapproval and discouragement, concluded Leyonhjelm.

Video games do not hurt anybody, and the Government and Classification Board should leave video gamers alone.

Australias current R18+ rating in the Australian Guidelines for the Classification of Computer Games prohibits visually depicted sexual violence, as well as the association of incentives or rewards for controlled drug use. Changes to classification laws in Australia require the approval of all state attorneys-general. For its part, the IGEA is still looking for wholesale reform regarding video game classification and believes an industry-led, self-regulated rating system is the answer.

Leyonhjelm was elected to the Senate at the 2013 federal election and became the Liberal Democratic Partys first senator on July 1, 2014. This is after the 2013 classification hurdles faced by Saints Row IV, State of Decay, andSouth Park: The Stick of Truthbut before the 2015 banning ofHotline Miami 2for visually depicted sexual violence. Hotline Miami 2 remains banned in Australia today. What placed Outlast II on Leyonhjelms agenda over Hotline Miami 2 is unclear. The transcipt of Leyonhjelm's speech was distributed by the IGEA upon request from Leyonhjelm's office.

Alongside The Greens, One Nation, the Nick Xenophon Team, Derryn Hinch, Bob Day, and Jacqui Lambie, David Leyonhjelm is one of a record 20 crossbenchers in the current Australian Senate. The 64-year-old is a controversial figure in Australian politics and has attracted criticism during his Senate stint for utilising events like the Sydneys Lindt Cafe siege and Melbournes Bourke Street vehicle attack to promote his calls for softer gun laws, and his claim that he would be happy for police to lie on the side of the road and bleed to death, amongst other examples.

Luke is Games Editor at IGN's Sydney office. You can find him on Twitter@MrLukeReilly.

Excerpt from:
Australian Senator Attacks Game Censorship, Classification Board - IGN