Protection of Minors for Dummies

Today I went to a nearby supermarket to buy some bread. At the checkout the line was stalled by a group of 10 years old boys trying to purchase Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I know that they were 10 year old because one of them said “he’s 10 years old, I’m 10 years old, so together we’re 20 years old”, probably because that’s the sort of argument that is likely to work in children media that are more appropriate for 10 years olds than GTA, which over here is rated 16+. But, of course, the 10+10=20 was not their main pitch. It was “my father has allowed it”. To which the cashier, who looked to be in his twenties and generally somewhat shy and awkwardly taken by the situation, at first correctly replied that it doesn’t work that way and the father needs to be personally present for that. And so the little boy produces his cell phone, dials his father and tells the cashier to ask him. The cashier, understandably weirded out by the entire situation, talks to the alleged father (maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t, who knows), explicitly asks and receives permission and sells a game with good reason rated 16+ to a handful of 10 years old boys who proceed to behave exactly like a bunch of kids who just successfully stole a lollipop.

The following is what I wish I’d told the cashier when it was my turn in line, except most of it – as usual – formed in my head when I was walking back home already.

Selling the game that way was against the law. Let us, for a moment, leave aside my own personal moral reservations I always felt towards the GTA franchise. Let’s leave aside that this, if any, is probably one of the games least suited to be in the hands of children not even old enough to be called “teenagers”. Let’s just look at the legal part.

The person on the phone may or may not have been the father. Even assuming it was, he may or may not also be a legal guardian. Assuming he was, he may or may not be aware of the nature and content of the game in question. He may or may not be drunk, on drugs, or generally give a fucking shit.

The attentive reader may at this point be objecting that most of these points do not really change with the physical presence of the father in the store. In fact, the only thing that changes is that the father receives the opportunity to actually personally inspect and evaluate at least the information printed on the cover – about the content and the proposed age restrictions, for example. But while this is a very, very, very important factor, the other possible factors still remain uncertain. It’s not like the cashier is going to ask for a birth certificate and a written brief essay on why the father considers GTA to be an appropriate medium for his son – and, importantly, for several other children whose parents now get effectively bypassed in their right to allow or disallow their child to consume that content.

What’s the difference? The difference is crucial. Not understanding the difference led the cashier to making the wrong decision. When a game (film, book, beverage, whatever) is purchased by a minor in the presence of an adult, it is not the minor purchasing the game, but the adult. It is a huge difference in legal responsibility that renders the above questions moot.

The law forbids anyone but the legal guardian(s) to grant minors access to rated media. Even after having received permission via phone, the cashier still sold the game directly to a minor, thus granting him access to a rated game, thus committing a felony. If, on the other hand, an adult – any adult – who accompanies the boy purchases the game, the responsibility passes on to that adult. If he is not actually the father, then it is him – and not the store – who is committing a felony by passing the game to the boys. If he is the father and grants access to the other boys without consulting their legal guardians, it is, again, him who is breaking the law.

By selling the game to an adult – and this is what is taking place when a child purchases something in the company of their parent(s) – the store passes the legal responsibility on to the purchasing adult. By selling the game to a child – which is what you do when you play along to a “permission via phone” – the store breaks the law.

The sad thing is that mishandled events like this make you understand a little bit more where those people are coming from who claim that rating is not enough but everything needs to be censored and forbidden. In the end it’s always the irresponsible actions of adults.

Nerdrage – will contain profanity

So, now the media is discussing, whether Michael Jackson’s children should or should not have attended his funeral (considering their young age and his always having been highly protective of them), should or should not his daughter have spoken, why they did it, who, what, where and so on. And by “media” I mean mostly people who earn their living as “high society experts”, i.e. detractors and gossipers who have never accomplished anything on their own. These people, who never were good at anything but turning other people’s dirty underwear, are now in the underwear of Michael Jackson’s children. Yes, I am making this sound doubly reprobate on purpose.

Children. Kids. As in, sons and daughter. Sons and daughter of a father. A father who died two weeks ago. Do you even know what that means? Do you retarded media-morons even know how much that hurts? At least when you’re still human, rather than a social atrocity making a living and cheap fame off sniffing other people’s farts? Children, for crying out loud! A little boy who saw his father die while they were playing and thought he’s just acting at first. This is, what, the single most terrifying, terrible, painful, shocking, awful thing that can possibly happen to a human being (again, referring to human beings here) in their entire life? Okay, probably second to having it the other way round and losing a child that way (hey everyone, let’s make fun of John Travolta! His son died! Isn’t that hilarious? Idiots). But a close second. By a wide margin ahead of the third, which would probably be the loss of a spouse, but that’s already debatable.

And now you even dare talking about them? Gossiping about them? Sullying their names with your dirty, worthless mouths? I would appeal to your respect and conscience, but you obviously do not possess either. I would call to dignity and humanity, but you probably don’t even know what that means. You – all the countless society reports and reporters, star magazines and gossip channels, as well as what became of most newscasts – have been pushing the borders of the tolerable for years now. I can’t tell you exactly when you overstepped it, but right now, you’re clearly beyond it, by far and wide. Just shut up. Shut the fuck up and go to hell. And leave the children alone!

Germany’s Next Flopmodel

This is something that was brought to my attention by my mother, so credits to her.

It’s probably pretty safe to assume, that most countries have their ‘s Next Topmodel show, so, not much explanation of the principle is needed. Basically, it’s a casting show, where every girl, who has ever been told by a dude who wanted to get in her pants that she’s model-material, can apply (and they apply in thousands, every year) to be judged by a jury, which consists of a leading supermodel of that country (the US-original is led by Tyra Banks, the German version by Heidi Klum) and a few others who no one ever heard of, but are big in model business … probably.

Getting to the point. The final 10 candidates, who get into the actual training- and elimination-shows, will tell you two things. All of them. It’s like the casting-version of “world peace”. Mind you, the punch line is in the concurrence of the two:

1. They have always dreamed of becoming a model.
2. They never, or hardly ever, wear high heel shoes.

That’s quite amazing. That would be, kind of, like … if I would show up to a basketball training camp and declare, that I always dreamed of becoming an NBA-pro, but so far never bothered to learn how to dribble.
Or if someone would say they’ve always been dreaming of becoming a singer, but cannot even read music. Oh wait. There’s the Idol-shows, where exactly this happens. Never mind!

But, hey, let’s not be too surprised. After all, this is exactly what all these shows offer and promise: fame, without that tedious talent-and-labour business.

Human Failure

Just read a random news bit on a sports site (German, thus not linking here).
Context: Formula 1.
Content: Ferrari testing (and intending to use) the electronic “traffic light” as replacement for the old school lollipop-guy to signal the driver when he can start again after a pit stop.
Background: Apparently, last year the system malfunctioned, signalled “green” to a driver too early, he started still having the fuel hose inserted, it all cost him time and (in one of those wonderful “what would have been if everything would have been exactly the same except for this one very event” scenarios) ultimately the championship.
Where it gets interesting: A person in the comments pointed out, that such mistakes did happen to human lollipop-men in the past as well. And, yes, although my F1 watching days are long gone, even I can confirm that such mishaps would happen a few times a year. You’d hardly ever go a full season without seeing at least one event of someone starting while still connected to the fuel hose ever since refuelling was introduced back in the 90ies.

And that reminded me of something. Something I was told during my computer science education (not to claim this is some highly complex truth, it’s just a question of when it’s pointed out to you). We are disproportionately harder on machines than on human operators when it comes to failure. Think plane crashes, to put forward a rather big scale example. When the investigation reveals “human failure”, the story usually ends right there, because, well, to err is human. But when, on the other hand, it turns out that some sensor gave the wrong reading, you can be sure a big headline scandal along with a whole stack of compensation lawsuits will follow.

There are good and rational reasons for it, of course. Technical errors are more likely to reoccur and be found throughout all instances (installed in many different systems, e.g. planes) of the component in question, assuming they are deterministic in some way. So it’s a generally good idea to go and find out exactly why the malfunction happened and how we can prevent repeat. Also, on a more cynical note, there’s just not much fun in suing a pilot who might be dead himself or being in a half-coma, spending every wake moment feeling extremely miserable already – your 50-million-claim might get through, but you’re unlikely to ever see any actual money.

But there’s also a very primal and emotional side to it. If we’re destined to die, we’d rather have it happen at the hands of a human than a computer chip. You know, sort of like .. keeping it in the family. We expect humans to fail. We expect machines to be flawless. And although this is a good expectation, one that ups responsibility and strengthens sound development patterns, we still need to understand, that machines are created by humans. And those still can err.

To add another thought and put the said in perspective: there’s also another phenomenon on the rise and spreading, on the other end of the scale of man-machine-interaction. The “computer malfunction” excuse. Usually used by clerks and sometimes accompanied by God’s Last Message to His Creation. It’s supposed to be a magic formula implying “hey, look, I told you it’s a computer malfunction, so it’s obviously not my fault and there’s just as obviously nothing I could have done to help you or prevent it, so there’s nothing you can reasonably be angry about”. Uh, sure, maybe my very health or financial existence was threatened, maybe I was forced to invest huge amounts of time into trying to achieve or fix something that should have been a triviality, maybe it’s the 20th time we’re having this conversation and you’re still unable to get it right, but, seriously, how could I reasonably be angry about all of this. Just because during all the time, repeated requests and demands you could not be bothered to actually take matters in your own hands and do your job, and now are blaming everything on a “computer malfunction”, that probably went somewhere along the lines of “you entered wrong data into the computer causing it to do wrong things to my life”? That’d be really insane of me, indeed.

Bottom line to this post: computers are not divine beings. They are neither perfect by nature, nor the ultimate excuse for screwing up things.