Publisher of new South Park video game censors abortion content
Seven scenes of about 20 seconds each are censored in the EMEA console versions of South Park: The Stick of Truth.
“The decision to cut this content from the game was made by Ubisoft EMEA.”
The scenes censored include:
~ A mini-game where a doctor is performing an abortion on the player.
~ A mini-game where the player is performing an abortion on the character Randy.
~ Five “anal probing” scenes in which characters are “actively” being probed.
Even so, our time with the game so far has shown The Stick of Truth to have some serious potential.
But what do you think? Does it sound like necessary censorship, or is someone taking a joke too seriously?
~ Games journalist Ian Dransfield, questioning the censorship of abortion mini-games in South Park’s new Stick of Truth video game, BT.com, February 25
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Abortion is a joke?
They should either censor the stuff or give it the rating of a porno.
Well, really, the game and series probably should not exist in the first place, morally (not legally) speaking.
“AN EPIC QUEST TO BECOME … COOL” What!!!
Opposites: Cool vs Burning in hell.
n epic quest to become … cool
Our media culture celebrates evil and mocks the unborn child while ripping her apart, arm and leg at a time, while loudly proclaiming to all who will listen how much they care about other people. Some days I just can’t believe the depths of evil the human mind will sink to, while laboring under the delusion that they aren’t harming anyone.
Something associated with South Park being offensive? Now I’ve heard everything!
Censoring of the truth and of culturally relevant discussion, such as SFLA’s high school posters that were banned, is bad censorship.
Censoring of shocking, banal, and pointlessly offensive games devoid of any social relevance — that is good censorship.
I am just wondering about Dransfield’s seeming inability to discern when censorship is needed.
“…taking a joke too seriously ?”
Oh, yes. Ha-Ha ! Because ripping babies apart in the womb is just soooo funny ! *AHEM !*
(SARCASM, for those who are “sarcasm-impaired”)
Something associated with South Park being offensive? Now I’ve heard everything!
I have to admit I think some of their stuff is funny — like the infamous “Gay Fish” episode with Kanye West — but this is going too far.
“I have to admit I think some of their stuff is funny — like the infamous “Gay Fish” episode with Kanye West — but this is going too far.”
Oh yeah, I’m not going to lie, I love a lot of what South Park does. In particular, Make love, not warcraft is one of my favorite episodes of any cartoon ever. I loved it even though I don’t play World of Warcraft. But yeah, this thing sounds just awful.
Eh, South Park is pretty equal opportunity offender, they make fun of every subject imaginable. It’s hard for me to muster up any outrage over them deliberately trying to offend. And they’ve done shows on abortion before. If one of their episodes offends me (like the wonderful episode where Mr Garrison was trying to be sexually molested by his dad because “all the dads that love their kids molested them) I turn it off. Consumer power!
And phillymiss and JDC, those are great episodes but “Trapped in the Closet” was by far the funniest episode ever.
Jack – “And then I pull out my gun!” lol.
I love South Park. They range from totally offensive to insanely offensive, so if something goes over my limits, I just don’t watch. I have no desire to play the video game, however. I feel like that format would lack much of the smartness that makes the show worth watching. Offense for the sake of offense is not my thing.
HAHAHAHA CT I’m literally dying – ”I’m gonna shoot someone if Tom Cruise won’t come out of the closet!” Lol rofl. I love that episode. Scientology mocking + R Kelly, Tom Cruise, and John Travolta mocking = genius.
And I agree with you. I actually don’t get people getting all worked up about South Park. I get people complaining about Family Guy/American Dad, because yeah Seth MacFarlane picks on conservatives/Christians far more than he does anyone else… but South Park is very equally offensive to everyone. If it’s not your style of humor ignore them, because they love it when people get worked up. I can actually only think of two South Park episodes that upset me at all, the incest one I just mentioned and then the one where Cartman was trying to make selling aborted babies legal again so he could sell them. That was too far for me so I skip those episodes. But a lot of their social commentary is gold, and hilarious.
“Censoring of shocking, banal, and pointlessly offensive games devoid of any social relevance — that is good censorship.”
No no no. Sorry I meant to mention this yesterday but I forgot. You don’t get to decide what “good” censorship is. In a public place, yes, we should have some type of community standards (that’s why free speech is curtailed by obscenity laws and such). But when it comes to someone making a game/movie/etc, I’ve not seen a good argument for why they shouldn’t be allowed. Slap a warning on it for parents, rate it so teens can’t buy it, private stores can refuse to carry it, private publishers can refuse to publish it, yes. But once we go down the road of some types of subjects being taboo to make media about based on your personal comfort level, that’s gonna come back and bite you. I’d rather have offensive content I hate out on the market than run the risk that my right to express myself would be curtailed because someone thinks it is too offensive.
Well it’s kind of like SNL. They pretty much pick on everyone (like SP). So when people get all uptight about them picking on their favorite group…. it’s like welcome to the club.
I do think this is a little far. But our society needs someone to mock them, methinks. We take ourselves way too seriously.
Yeah, I agree: there is no such thing as “good” censorship. Any time you censor ANYTHING for ANY REASON, you are destroying the artist’s vision. Censorship is the assassination of an idea. And don’t give me that “morally, this game shouldn’t exist” crap. According to the fuggin Christians, morally, nothing fun should exist. Good can not exist without evil; you can not be a whole person when you deny the darkness in your heart. Hate to break it to you, but it’s good to be bad sometimes.