Video Games: The New Gangsta Rap

One week ago, Patrick Wildenbourg released the Hot Coffee mod for GTA: San Andreas, which unlocks sexual content in the game. Let's jump forward a bit to yesterday, when CNN reported that Hillary Rodham Clinton has started pressuring the FTC to play a censorship role against the videogame industry. Forbes reported today that GTA: San Andreas has been re-rated Adults Only. Now an Orlando Sentinel editorial predicts that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has short-term plans to run for President, will reap a political windfall over this. And today, PatrickW pulled the Hot Coffee mod from distribution.

As I read all this I could not help but realize that videogames have become the new Gangsta Rap: the artform that conservative politicians from both parties trample on in order to make themselves look good. And the GTA Hot Coffee mod is the new Cop Killer:" the single example that these self-righteous censors attack to the exclusion of all else. The similarities don't end there; Ice-T, the singer of "Cop Killer," caved in and pulled the song from distribution too.