71st OREGON LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY--2001 Regular Session
 
HA to HJR 21
 
LC 473-1/HJR 21-1
 
                       HOUSE AMENDMENTS TO
                    HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION 21
 
    By COMMITTEE ON RULES, REDISTRICTING, AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS
 
                             June 13
 
  On page 1 of the printed joint resolution, after line 1,
insert:
  ' Whereas the American Academy of Child and Adolescent
Psychiatry, the American Medical Association, the American
Psychological Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics
have concluded that viewing entertainment violence can lead to
increases in aggressive attitudes, values and behaviors,
particularly in children; and
  ' Whereas the American Medical Association in its policy
statement on mass media violence and film ratings encourages its
members to speak out against the excessive portrayal of violence
in the entertainment media, including video and computer games;
and
  ' Whereas the FBI in its report entitled, 'The school shooter:
A threat assessment perspective,' September 2000, lists '
fascination with violence-filled entertainment' and 'spending
inordinate amounts of time playing video games with violent
themes' as warning signs of impending gun-related school
violence; and
  ' Whereas recent academic literature corroborates the findings
of earlier studies that exposure to violent video games produces
aggressive behaviors in children and young people; and
  ' Whereas growing evidence of the harmful effects of violent
video games led the 106th Congress to investigate the impact of
these games on minor children; and
  ' Whereas violent, point-and-shoot video games are such
effective combat simulators that the law enforcement and military
communities use them extensively to train soldiers to accurately
and effectively shoot real humans in combat; and
  ' Whereas, in the short term, playing a violent video game
appears to affect aggression by priming aggressive thoughts; and
  ' Whereas long-term effects are also likely as each violent
video game player learns and practices new aggression-related
scripts that can become more accessible for use when real-life
conflict situations arise; and
  ' Whereas in July 2000 the American Medical Association, the
American Psychological Association, the American Academy of
Pediatrics and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent
Psychiatry issued a joint statement, warning that more than 1,000
studies point overwhelmingly to a causal connection between media
violence and aggressive behavior in some children; and
  ' Whereas research by the National Institute on Media and the
Family indicates that children who play violent games see the
world as a more hostile place, argue with teachers more
frequently, are more likely to be involved in physical fights and
do not perform as well in school; and
  ' Whereas surveys by the National Institute on Media and the
Family indicate that only 24 percent of adolescents say their
parents 'always' or 'often' limit the amount of time children are
 
allowed to play video games, while 43 percent say their parents '
never' impose time limits; now, therefore,'.
  Delete lines 3 through 30 and delete pages 2 and 3 and insert:
  ' That we, the members of the Seventy-first Legislative
Assembly:
  ' (1) Recognize the efforts of Danielle Shimotakahara for
bringing the issue of video game violence and its effects on
children to our attention.
  ' (2) Commend Sega GameWorks arcades, owned by Steven
Spielberg, for prohibiting anyone under 16 years of age from
playing the most violent red-labeled games.
  ' (3) Ask that the rating stickers produced for the
coin-operated amusement industry's Coin-Operated Video Game
Parental Advisory System be prominently displayed on each
machine.
  ' (4) Ask that violent video games bearing red or yellow
stickers be placed in an age-restricted area separate from the
location of the nonviolent games bearing green stickers, thus
protecting young children from seeing or playing the more violent
games.
  ' (5) Ask that the 'Guide to Coin Operated Video Games ' poster
be prominently displayed in any business that has video games in
order to inform patrons of the meaning of each sticker.
  ' (6) Encourage video arcade owners to acknowledge the
long-lasting effects that violent video games have on children.
  ' (7) Urge owners of video arcades to voluntarily segregate
violent games from more innocuous offerings and to prevent
children from playing the violent games unless accompanied by a
parent or guardian.
  ' (8) Encourage parents to be proactive in monitoring their
children's exposure to violent video games.
  ' (9) Encourage Oregonians as a community to take steps to
empower parents and protect young people from extremely violent
and sexually explicit video games.'.
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