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You Know You’re Getting Old When You Get Shannon Tweed References
As the Joe Lieberman’s and Tipper Gore’s of the world continue their political assault on nudity - while the country’s threshold for violence escalates - I have to applaud the efforts of the manufacturers of our pop-culture products for trying to slip a fast one past the “Man.” Indeed, Take-Two Interactive Software Corp., the folks behind the “Grand Theft Auto” video games - which have supplanted Metallica and Judas Priest as the nation’s #1 inspiration for real-life violence sprees - tried to slip some nip past the rating board in their latest release.
Last year’s “Grand Theft: San Andreas” was initially released as rated “M” (Mature 17+), until the FTC discovered that Take Two had included secret character nudity and graphic sex scenes that could be unlocked by installing a small modification. The FTC alleged that Take Two violated the law when it obtained the more lenient rating - rather than an Adults Only (AO) rating - even though it knew of the sex scenes.
Take Two settled this dispute with the FTC last week, agreeing to display content relevant to the game’s rating prominently on video game packaging, and also agreeing to create a system for reviewing content on future video games. In making this settlement, Take Two managed to avoid having any fines levied against it.
I suspect that anyone over the age of 11 had probably already discovered how to make that modification to “Grand Theft: San Andreas,” and gotten themselves an eyeful of pixels. If 12-year-old boys in the 80s could sit in front of a scrambled Playboy Channel for hours on end, with the small hope that the screen might unscramble for a millisecond so that Shannon Tweed’s left nipple might reveal itself, I’m guessing that “small modifications” are within the firm grasp of today’s teenagers. Hell, at least if our young’uns are inside watching cartoon nudity, they aren’t out shooting people in the face.
