Soldat_Louis
11-08-2006, 01:13 PM
Well, in France, we don't have a lot of "anti-game personalities". Of course, our mainstream media frequently cover videogames in an execrable way. And from time to time, we hear people (psychiatrists, or intellectuals) denounce videogames or violence in them. But we have no French equivalents of Jack Thompson, Dave Grossman or even Craig Anderson : someone who opposes (violent) videogames regularly until launching a major crusade against them.
No one... but, maybe, Familles de France.
The Fédération Nationale des Familles de France (http://www.familles-de-france.org/) (their full name, but I'll call them FdF to be quick) is a non-profit and non-partisan parental association born after World War 2. Their main actions consist in promoting parenting policies and family values, defending consumers (in a Ralph Nader way, although they're politically on the opposite side), and struggling against pornography and indecency in the media. For example, they successfully made lawsuits against pornography on the Minitel (a French mediocre equivalent of Compuserve, used in the 80's and 90's, but quickly abandoned thanks to the Internet).
They became interested by videogames in 1998, when vice president, Dominique Marcilhacy, decided to buy a computer for her kids, and discovered there existed very violent PC games. Then, she read a column in French conservative newspaper Le Figaro (http://www.lefigaro.fr/) titled La Barbarie Cachée ("the hidden barbary"), that denounced explicitly the most violent games such as Doom, Quake, or Carmaggedon. She then decided to launch an action against violent games.
It happened in february 1999. Marcilhacy, held a press conference in the name of Familles de France, where she targeted "violent, cruel and degrading" games, such as Doom, Carmaggedon, Resident Evil, Duke Nukem 3D... She described the content of the games, called to stop their sale to minors, and threatened to sue retailers and big stores if they didn't retire them from the shelves. FdF also sent a press release to the editors of many mainstream media, who repeated it in their newspapers and magazines without verification. They also bring a "scientific caution" in the person of Doctor Samuel Lepastier, a French psychiatrist who made a speech in february 1999 about the "danger of violent videogames".
The consequences of this action were a media coverage that was mostly in favor of Familles de France's action (which meant mainstream media blamed games once again), and a small moral panic that forced retailers to retire targeted games off the shelves (they were available only in videogame stores, with restricted access). It was aggravated by the news of Columbine school shooting in Littleton, 2 months after FdF's action.
The game industry didn't react much (they just proposed a new game classification, supposedly clearer). But the gamers, and especially the gaming press, reacted very violently by bashing not only Familles de France for their action, but also mainstream media for their biased coverage. Plus, many of them used past accusations of anti-abortion lobbying, bigotry, fundamentalism and right-wing extremism against FdF and some of its leaders, which they contested (a lawsuit was intended against French gaming magazine Joystick, which was convicted in 2000 of defamation against FdF for a violent caricature). Anyway, Familles de France quickly became (and still is) violently hated to the death by French gamers, as much as Jack Thompson is hated by gamers all over the world and for the same reasons.
However, FdF's action calmed down two years later because of endless lawsuits, but also because of internal conflicts (see this site for more info (http://perso.orange.fr/triste-realite/index.htm)). At the beginning of 2001, FdF's president Jacques Bichot, professor in economy, decided to resign, and after a very controversial vote, the new president was Professsor Henri Joyeux, a very controversial figure himself. After series of conflicts between him and the former leading team, Jacques Bichot and Dominique Marcilhacy decided to leave FdF and found the Union des Familles en Europe (http://www.uniondesfamilles.org/), another parenting and consumer association. They published some articles about violence in videogames, but it didn't go very far.
So, from 2001 to 2005, Familles de France made almost no public actions about videogames (except during a TV debate in 2002, after Erfurt school shooting and Beltway sniper attacks). But in 2006, they came back.
First, they asked for reinforced controls (http://www.familles-de-france.org/customer/product.php?productid=313&cat=2&page=1&XCARTSESSID=5bf2f900af715a2af0ff608ae96690d6), arguing that the classification proposed by PEGI (Pan European Game Information, the European equivalent of the ESRB) was not enough to protect kids from violent games.
And last month, they published a press release (http://www.familles-de-france.org/pdf/Video.pdf) where they proposed a new "label Familles de France", in addition of the PEGI game classification, in order to reward "family-friendly" games. Surprisingly, their new press release was very favorable to videogames and their industry, although still denonuncing some violent games such as Manhunt or Postal 2. But it wasn't enough to smoothen the French gaming community : most of the gaming press was sarcastic over FdF's new initiative, and in most forums I've been, they disapproved completely. The main problem with their label was that they wanted to stick it on the cover of the game, although they had no legitimity to do that.
So here's the story of Familles de France. Well, in conclusion, I must say they're not exactly the French equivalent of Jack Thompson, but their 1999's action against violent games, and the following mini-moral panic that forced retailers to temporarily retire some violent games from their shelves, made this association the No. 1 enemy of the French gaming community for a long time, despite their recent "game-friendly" initiative.
No one... but, maybe, Familles de France.
The Fédération Nationale des Familles de France (http://www.familles-de-france.org/) (their full name, but I'll call them FdF to be quick) is a non-profit and non-partisan parental association born after World War 2. Their main actions consist in promoting parenting policies and family values, defending consumers (in a Ralph Nader way, although they're politically on the opposite side), and struggling against pornography and indecency in the media. For example, they successfully made lawsuits against pornography on the Minitel (a French mediocre equivalent of Compuserve, used in the 80's and 90's, but quickly abandoned thanks to the Internet).
They became interested by videogames in 1998, when vice president, Dominique Marcilhacy, decided to buy a computer for her kids, and discovered there existed very violent PC games. Then, she read a column in French conservative newspaper Le Figaro (http://www.lefigaro.fr/) titled La Barbarie Cachée ("the hidden barbary"), that denounced explicitly the most violent games such as Doom, Quake, or Carmaggedon. She then decided to launch an action against violent games.
It happened in february 1999. Marcilhacy, held a press conference in the name of Familles de France, where she targeted "violent, cruel and degrading" games, such as Doom, Carmaggedon, Resident Evil, Duke Nukem 3D... She described the content of the games, called to stop their sale to minors, and threatened to sue retailers and big stores if they didn't retire them from the shelves. FdF also sent a press release to the editors of many mainstream media, who repeated it in their newspapers and magazines without verification. They also bring a "scientific caution" in the person of Doctor Samuel Lepastier, a French psychiatrist who made a speech in february 1999 about the "danger of violent videogames".
The consequences of this action were a media coverage that was mostly in favor of Familles de France's action (which meant mainstream media blamed games once again), and a small moral panic that forced retailers to retire targeted games off the shelves (they were available only in videogame stores, with restricted access). It was aggravated by the news of Columbine school shooting in Littleton, 2 months after FdF's action.
The game industry didn't react much (they just proposed a new game classification, supposedly clearer). But the gamers, and especially the gaming press, reacted very violently by bashing not only Familles de France for their action, but also mainstream media for their biased coverage. Plus, many of them used past accusations of anti-abortion lobbying, bigotry, fundamentalism and right-wing extremism against FdF and some of its leaders, which they contested (a lawsuit was intended against French gaming magazine Joystick, which was convicted in 2000 of defamation against FdF for a violent caricature). Anyway, Familles de France quickly became (and still is) violently hated to the death by French gamers, as much as Jack Thompson is hated by gamers all over the world and for the same reasons.
However, FdF's action calmed down two years later because of endless lawsuits, but also because of internal conflicts (see this site for more info (http://perso.orange.fr/triste-realite/index.htm)). At the beginning of 2001, FdF's president Jacques Bichot, professor in economy, decided to resign, and after a very controversial vote, the new president was Professsor Henri Joyeux, a very controversial figure himself. After series of conflicts between him and the former leading team, Jacques Bichot and Dominique Marcilhacy decided to leave FdF and found the Union des Familles en Europe (http://www.uniondesfamilles.org/), another parenting and consumer association. They published some articles about violence in videogames, but it didn't go very far.
So, from 2001 to 2005, Familles de France made almost no public actions about videogames (except during a TV debate in 2002, after Erfurt school shooting and Beltway sniper attacks). But in 2006, they came back.
First, they asked for reinforced controls (http://www.familles-de-france.org/customer/product.php?productid=313&cat=2&page=1&XCARTSESSID=5bf2f900af715a2af0ff608ae96690d6), arguing that the classification proposed by PEGI (Pan European Game Information, the European equivalent of the ESRB) was not enough to protect kids from violent games.
And last month, they published a press release (http://www.familles-de-france.org/pdf/Video.pdf) where they proposed a new "label Familles de France", in addition of the PEGI game classification, in order to reward "family-friendly" games. Surprisingly, their new press release was very favorable to videogames and their industry, although still denonuncing some violent games such as Manhunt or Postal 2. But it wasn't enough to smoothen the French gaming community : most of the gaming press was sarcastic over FdF's new initiative, and in most forums I've been, they disapproved completely. The main problem with their label was that they wanted to stick it on the cover of the game, although they had no legitimity to do that.
So here's the story of Familles de France. Well, in conclusion, I must say they're not exactly the French equivalent of Jack Thompson, but their 1999's action against violent games, and the following mini-moral panic that forced retailers to temporarily retire some violent games from their shelves, made this association the No. 1 enemy of the French gaming community for a long time, despite their recent "game-friendly" initiative.