Sex, murder, and children: A debatable topic of a nexus rule.

[MotoSxorpio]

I find all of this funny, because it's ok to spend 5 to 10 years on a game that is filled with Vilolence to the teeth, some sex, and harsh language, but yet they somehow want to throw in the morality card, to obviously covers thier own butts, that's just my opinion but here in the U.S. our rules and laws are so half assed backwards it's unreal, there is Porn everywhere, T.V. shows that glorify partying and screwing who ever, but in a game if certain boundries are crossed it's taboo. I just don't understand it, talk about contradicting that's morality at it's best.

This is all beside the point.

 

The point being what is hosted here and the here's Terms of Service. Doesn't matter that you live in the U.S., you are using a site based out of U.K. and their rules apply before ours...but both may apply. This isn't about what you can watch on T.V.

 

The original poster asks why "pedophilia and rape are not allowed"...

 

Now, when one goes through the AP mod's description, the modder explicitly states that rape is not allowed due to nexus rules, and pedophelia probably is as well (implied, but not explicitly stated).

Now, it got me wondering why these aren't allowed. If we can kill people, and mods are allowed to kill kids, and mods are allowed to have sex with people, why not just go the one step further with children?

The simple answer is: both are illegal in the U.K. and the owner of the site just doesn't want that s#*! on his servers.

 

Makes me wonder what kind of person has the need to ASK about such things...no moral compass? Sociopath? Hell, Psychopath in the making?

[HeyYou]

It's an interesting ethical exercise, if nothing else....... On the grand scale of things, is pedophilia worse than murder? Is rape? Here in the states, you get more time for murder...... yet, in the game, you kill folks every day. Several times. And no one bats an eye. Of course, it is a 'medieval' society, so, that's more or less the norm..... but then, so was child marriage...... So what we get here is:

 

Taking away ALL of someones rights (murder): That's Ok.

 

Violating someones rights, and leaving them alive: That's taboo.

 

It IS a strange moral conundrum. :D

 

No, I am not a sociopath, psychopath, or pedophile, just a Devils Advocate. :D

[MotoSxorpio]

It's an interesting ethical exercise, if nothing else....... On the grand scale of things, is pedophilia worse than murder? Is rape? Here in the states, you get more time for murder...... yet, in the game, you kill folks every day. Several times. And no one bats an eye. Of course, it is a 'medieval' society, so, that's more or less the norm..... but then, so was child marriage...... So what we get here is:

 

Taking away ALL of someones rights (murder): That's Ok.

 

Violating someones rights, and leaving them alive: That's taboo.

 

It IS a strange moral conundrum. :D

 

No, I am not a sociopath, psychopath, or pedophile, just a Devils Advocate. :D

oh lord..murderers end up back on the street in 13 months. Must be a misdemeanor...

[HeyYou]

 

It's an interesting ethical exercise, if nothing else....... On the grand scale of things, is pedophilia worse than murder? Is rape? Here in the states, you get more time for murder...... yet, in the game, you kill folks every day. Several times. And no one bats an eye. Of course, it is a 'medieval' society, so, that's more or less the norm..... but then, so was child marriage...... So what we get here is:

 

Taking away ALL of someones rights (murder): That's Ok.

 

Violating someones rights, and leaving them alive: That's taboo.

 

It IS a strange moral conundrum. :D

 

No, I am not a sociopath, psychopath, or pedophile, just a Devils Advocate. :D

oh lord..murderers end up back on the street in 13 months. Must be a misdemeanor...

 

Well, it depends on your method of murder..... If you REALLY want to get away with it, get seriously drunk, and run them over with your car. Chances are, you will be out in 2 years, if you do any time at all.....

[obobski]

It's an interesting ethical exercise, if nothing else....... On the grand scale of things, is pedophilia worse than murder? Is rape? Here in the states, you get more time for murder...... yet, in the game, you kill folks every day. Several times. And no one bats an eye. Of course, it is a 'medieval' society, so, that's more or less the norm..... but then, so was child marriage...... So what we get here is:

 

Taking away ALL of someones rights (murder): That's Ok.

 

Violating someones rights, and leaving them alive: That's taboo.

 

It IS a strange moral conundrum. :D

 

No, I am not a sociopath, psychopath, or pedophile, just a Devils Advocate. :D

 

To play devil's advocate to your devil's advocate:

 

"Killing" (or "taking a life") and "murder" are distinct practices that are defined culturally, and Skyrim actually does enforce this distinction within its own created/fictional culture. As the player you can kill characters like bandits, and this is allowable, however killing/assaulting Jarl Elisif is not allowable, and will be punished. There's a distinction between guys you can hit, and guys you can't (killing vs murder).

 

Real-world cultures make similar distinctions. For example soldiers killing other soldiers in a war is not the same as a civilian walking into a bar and killing another civilian (Skyrim actually enforces this same distinction too). All cultures/societies have a taboo on murder, but they all define murder in different, socioculturally mediated, ways.

 

Within the medieval period, there were similarly enforced taboos on murder as distinct from killing within contemporaneous cultures. The concept of werguld, for example, comes out of the middle ages (Skyrim actually enforces/demonstrates this too, albeit in a limited fashion). It wasn't just "do as you will" with respect to violence, however by many modern sensibilities it may appear that way.

 

Marriageable age is another culturally relative topic, and can be thought of in a largely similar way. There will be variable definitions of what is and is not acceptable as you go from culture to culture. Arguably the fictional culture of Skyrim largely reflects modern-day beliefs on the topic (if you treat "vanilla game" as canon).

 

The same goes for conceptualizations of personal rights or self ownership.

 

As far as why some "bad" things are allowed within current law/culture and other "bad" things are not - again, it's all culturally relative (even thinking about actions in terms of a value-weighted dichotomy is culturally relative). And the great part about cultural beliefs and practices is they don't have to make any logical sense whatsoever - they're cultural beliefs and practices after all, not natural laws (however to cultural participants they very well may feel or appear to be rigidly fixed points, or "just the way it is"/"the way of the world"). In other words, it's not like Nirn will break/unravel if you were to kill/attack Jarl Elisif, even though you're really not supposed to, and Bolgeir Bearclaw will happily explain to you the error of your ways (as he's there to tell you which guys you can, and can't, hit).

 

Now as far as "morality" or "ethics" - that's an entirely different discussion. :teehee:

[HeyYou]

 

It's an interesting ethical exercise, if nothing else....... On the grand scale of things, is pedophilia worse than murder? Is rape? Here in the states, you get more time for murder...... yet, in the game, you kill folks every day. Several times. And no one bats an eye. Of course, it is a 'medieval' society, so, that's more or less the norm..... but then, so was child marriage...... So what we get here is:

 

Taking away ALL of someones rights (murder): That's Ok.

 

Violating someones rights, and leaving them alive: That's taboo.

 

It IS a strange moral conundrum. :D

 

No, I am not a sociopath, psychopath, or pedophile, just a Devils Advocate. :D

 

To play devil's advocate to your devil's advocate:

 

"Killing" (or "taking a life") and "murder" are distinct practices that are defined culturally, and Skyrim actually does enforce this distinction within its own created/fictional culture. As the player you can kill characters like bandits, and this is allowable, however killing/assaulting Jarl Elisif is not allowable, and will be punished. There's a distinction between guys you can hit, and guys you can't (killing vs murder).

 

Real-world cultures make similar distinctions. For example soldiers killing other soldiers in a war is not the same as a civilian walking into a bar and killing another civilian (Skyrim actually enforces this same distinction too). All cultures/societies have a taboo on murder, but they all define murder in different, socioculturally mediated, ways.

 

Within the medieval period, there were similarly enforced taboos on murder as distinct from killing within contemporaneous cultures. The concept of werguld, for example, comes out of the middle ages (Skyrim actually enforces/demonstrates this too, albeit in a limited fashion). It wasn't just "do as you will" with respect to violence, however by many modern sensibilities it may appear that way.

 

Marriageable age is another culturally relative topic, and can be thought of in a largely similar way. There will be variable definitions of what is and is not acceptable as you go from culture to culture. Arguably the fictional culture of Skyrim largely reflects modern-day beliefs on the topic (if you treat "vanilla game" as canon).

 

The same goes for conceptualizations of personal rights or self ownership.

 

As far as why some "bad" things are allowed within current law/culture and other "bad" things are not - again, it's all culturally relative (even thinking about actions in terms of a value-weighted dichotomy is culturally relative). And the great part about cultural beliefs and practices is they don't have to make any logical sense whatsoever - they're cultural beliefs and practices after all, not natural laws (however to cultural participants they very well may feel or appear to be rigidly fixed points, or "just the way it is"/"the way of the world"). In other words, it's not like Nirn will break/unravel if you were to kill/attack Jarl Elisif, even though you're really not supposed to, and Bolgeir Bearclaw will happily explain to you the error of your ways (as he's there to tell you which guys you can, and can't, hit).

 

Now as far as "morality" or "ethics" - that's an entirely different discussion. :teehee:

 

I think your last paragraph pretty much hits the nail on the head. We aren't permitted these things, as the society in which the game is is created (United States) finds them abhorrent. Even though, today, age of consent is as low as 12 in some supposedly "civilized" societies. (Vatican City for instance, you know, the seat of the Holy Roman Catholic Church.... And I believe Amsterdam as well.....)

 

So, here in the states, sex acts with children are considered "taboo", and killing children is "unthinkable"...... so, game designers simply don't permit you even the option of doing so.

 

Granted, you can find 'other' sites, that give you the option of all sorts of rude behavior, that is also considered 'unacceptable' here. Slavery springs immediately to mind......

[obobski]

 

I think your last paragraph pretty much hits the nail on the head. We aren't permitted these things, as the society in which the game is is created (United States) finds them abhorrent. Even though, today, age of consent is as low as 12 in some supposedly "civilized" societies. (Vatican City for instance, you know, the seat of the Holy Roman Catholic Church.... And I believe Amsterdam as well.....)

 

So, here in the states, sex acts with children are considered "taboo", and killing children is "unthinkable"...... so, game designers simply don't permit you even the option of doing so.

 

Granted, you can find 'other' sites, that give you the option of all sorts of rude behavior, that is also considered 'unacceptable' here. Slavery springs immediately to mind......

 

 

My point is that it's essentially all arbitrary (or to put it more nicely, "culturally relative") from an objective standpoint, because there is no universalizing criteria to judge things like "civilized-ness" or "moral correctitude." Because games are tending to be released internationally more often these days, debates like this thread (competing cultural values; not specifically cultural treatment of children) are more likely to become more common - different cultures will have different standards of acceptable behavior, and some things that may seen innocuous to one person may be entirely unacceptable to another. As these cultures come into contact with one another, you will see friction. For example Fallout 3's experience in Japan (you can read about that here: http://gamecareerguide.com/news/25670/interview_zenimax_asias_.php). This isn't to say that these taboos or rules are externally applied/artificially constructed. Taboos and laws are the product of the culture that creates them, and the culture in this case is against these things. In this case a gamer/user/etc may be located somewhere in the world where a given "thing" is not taboo and/or is acceptable, but Nexus cannot host it or promote it because it violates UK law, or Bethesda cannot host it or promote it because it violates US law. The relationship with ratings/censorship organizations like ESRB, CERO, and PEGI is also going to factor into this. For example if you remember the "Hot Coffee" mod for GTA: San Andreas - that game feature wasn't actually illegal in the US, but it pushed the game from ESRB Mature to ESRB Adults Only, which creates commercial problems for the publisher (because a lot of US retailers will not stock or distribute ESRB Adults Only titles), so despite not breaking any laws, there's an economic disincentive to producing such content commercially.

 

On the point of the Vatican City (because I looked it up), the age of consent is certainly higher than twelve; Wikipedia has a concise summary, with full-text links to the applicable laws, if you're interested: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe#Vatican_City Also interesting fact: the Vatican City has around 450 citizens; I couldn't find a population breakdown but I'm going to guess that it's largely skewed towards adult males.

On the point of slavery, it has featured in all installments of the Fallout series in their base configurations, and Fallout 3: The Pitt DLC features it as a major storyline component. It has certainly been done in other games and media formats too.

[HeyYou]

Seems pope francis raised the age of consent to 14 in Vatican city. Of course, so far as the law there is concerned, there is no such thing as 'legal, consensual sex' between folks that aren't married...... and they decided that girls need to be at least 14 before they can enter into that kind of contract. Supposedly, "Divine Law" takes precedence over Italian law....... but, if it actually works that way in actually pracitce is another thing entirely.

 

I should have been more specific on my last point. Should have read "sex slavery".

[MotoSxorpio]

:mellow:

[MotoSxorpio]

Good thing none of us are believers in the trinity.