It just gets UGLIER
Jack Thompson has sent out an open letter to the Entertainment Software Association in which he calls for Doug Lowenstein's resignation. Reading this letter takes me back to '50's. Its really that bad. Dark days ahead my friends, dark days ahead. Oh, and Hillary? Look who yr teamed up with now. Enjoy!
John B. Thompson, Attorney at Law
1172 South Dixie Hwy., Suite 111
Coral Gables, Florida 33146
305-666-4366
jackpeace@comcast.net
July 14, 2005
Open Letter to the Members of the Entertainment Software Association:
Activision, Inc.
Atari, Inc.
Buena Vista Games, Inc.
Capcom USA, Inc.
Crave Entertainment
Eidos Interactive
Electronic Arts
Her Interactive, Inc.
id Software
Konami Digital Entertainment America
LucasArts
Microsoft Corporation
Midway Games, Inc.
Namco Hometek, Inc.
Nintendo of America Inc.
NovaLogic, Inc.
SEGA of America, Inc.
Sony Computer Entertainment America
Square Enix, Inc.
Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc.
THQ, Inc.
Ubisoft Entertainment, Inc.
Vivendi Universal Games
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment Inc.
Wild Tangent
Dear ESA Members:
Today, United States Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, with initiatives she will announce at a 10 am news conference in our nation’s capital, is acting decisively in furtherance of what for her has been a strong leadership role on these issues since Columbine—a tragedy caused in part by the violent video game industry. Millions of American parents should be thankful to the Senator for striking back against what can be fairly called “Grand Theft Innocence” at the expense of our children by only some within your industry.
It has been my privilege, as a lifelong Republican, to provide facts—not feelings—about the reckless practices of certain members of this industry, some of which are Members of the ESA, in the midst of responsible fact-gathering by Senator Rodham Clinton’s staff. The Senator is not a newcomer on this issue. She has been an abiding and loyal advocate for parents who oppose predatory, fraudulent practices by some within your video game industry.
I am happy to help the Senator, just as I have worked with Democrats like Senator Joseph Lieberman and Washington State Representative Mary Lou Dickerson, as well as with fellow Republicans, for what for me have been nearly seven years of effort to try to get certain companies within the video game industry to start acting like good corporate citizens. Senator Rodham Clinton is today at the forefront of an issue that is not partisan in nature, nor should it be. The Republican Party would do well to wake up and realize that Senator Clinton is about the work that needs to be done. Today is a mere extension of her years of commitment. This is not politics. This is leadership.
As a lifelong Republican who ran against Janet Reno, I can note that whereas the largest chapter of the National Organization for Women, located in New York, has had me address them regarding the misogyny and violence against women depicted in the Grand Theft Auto games, the supposedly “family values” Republican President of the United States, George W. Bush, has consistently turned away from parents who have asked him to speak out against the entertainment industry’s assault on our children.
The evening in January 2000 that I appeared on NBC Nightly News to talk about the link between violent games and Columbine, Tom Brokaw asked then Governor Bush about that link and what he as President would do about it? George Bush simply said “Parents just have to be better parents.” He should trying telling that to my clients in Paducah whose three daughters were gunned down by 14-year-old video gamer Michael Carneal, who trained on Doom to become a more efficient killer. What did they, as parents, Mr. President, do wrong? Was sending their kids to school their mistake?
George Bush, as Governor of Texas, gave a state tax break to Id Software of Dallas, the makers of Doom, after Columbine, for Heaven’s sake, and it is his Department of Defense which has subsidized with taxpayer dollars the creation of violent video games for teen consumption at the Institute for Creative Technologies at the University of Southern California. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has increased funding for this taxpayer rip-off since my appearance on ABC’s World News Tonight more than two years ago exposing this scandal. Don Rumsfeld is supposed to be catching terrorists, not training them.
But I turn to the one man most responsible for the valuable initiative taken by Senator Rodham Clinton today. That man is the Entertainment Software Association’s president, Doug Lowenstein. Let me explain to you ESA Members exactly why that is the case:
The inept fashion in which ESA has “managed” the “Hot Coffee” mod scandal swirling around your industry and Take-Two’s Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has given Senator Rodham Clinton a reason and a mandate to act. She has filled the leadership void caused by Doug Lowenstein. For a month Doug Lowenstein and his ESA pretended that there was no mod, that there was no scandal, that there was no need for any action whatsoever by ESA. How wrong he was. Today proves it.
While Mr. Lowenstein dithered and fiddled, concerns about the scandal grew deeper, and knowledge about its details were more widely disseminated. When the scandal spread, I found out about it and acted, as did Dr. David Walsh, a clinical psychologist who is going to be at the Senator’s side today in Washington. Doug Lowenstein could have prevented what is going to happen today, but he preferred to shoot the messengers. It is his chronic style.
Instead of acting like a responsible adult by trying to get to the bottom of this scandal, Doug Lowenstein did what he has always done at the ESA: He has first said there is “no problem” and then he has embarked on his scorched earth policy to try to discredit anyone who suggests there is a problem. Lowenstein has unleashed his p.r. (pillory and ruin) squad on respected and powerful legislators like California Assemblyman Yee, also a psychologist, who have expressed concerns about Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and the mod scandal. Lowenstein’s approach, as always, is to question Assemblyman Yee’s motives. No opponent could possibly be acting upon principle, in the world according to Doug Lowenstein. Only he is the oracle of truth. All others are scum. It is his way.
His approach, as the President of your Entertainment Software Association, is to demonize critics and to engage in ad hominem jihads intended to obscure real concerns about real industry abuses. All this does is deepen the resolve of your critics to act. I know.
I saw this attack dog mentality by Lowenstein in full bloom in the two appearances I was privileged to enjoy on CBS’s 60 Minutes in 1999, the Sunday after Columbine, and more recently in March of this year. Lowenstein tried to bully CBS both times, achieving by his scare tactics the distrust of an entire news organization. News organizations don’t trust ESA because Doug Lowenstein is its head. Why should they? He treats them like dirt.
Lowenstein has done this time and time again, alienating lawmakers and turning off media with his “You’re a fool, and I’m a genius” mindset. With friends like Lowenstein, your industry doesn’t need any enemies. But he winds up growing them like topsy.
Jack Valenti, as the head of the MPAA, had the grace and the courage to debate me and other critics on occasion. He felt that was his job. Lowenstein, on the other hand, has a standing policy to refuse to appear together with me on any stage or on any television program in which I might debate him face to face. Jack Valenti had the courage of his convictions. Doug Lowenstein travels with his own private make-up artist. Did you all know that? Obscuring personal and industry warts is a full time job for this man.
Doug Lowenstein has merely the courage to stand up at E3 and rant to the video game faithful about people like Senator Rodham Clinton. This is not courage. This is cowardice. It is the cowardice that all bullies display.
Take-Two’s new game coming out in October featuring violence by students in a school setting (the next scandal that is brewing on Lowenstein’s watch) ought to be renamed “Doug.” Bullying is not real leadership. It is a stopgap measure until real leadership shows up. Enter Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Is Lowenstein’s the kind of “leadership” the Members of ESA are paying for?
When Hitler invaded Russia, opening up an Eastern offensive on the eve of winter, Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill noted that “Hitler must have been rather loosely educated, not having learned the lesson of Napoleon’s autumn advance on Moscow.”
Your Doug Lowenstein is similarly “loosely educated” about the United States Constitution. I have never, in my eighteen years of public interest law practice against the excesses of the entertainment industry, run into an individual more devoid of even an elementary understanding of the meaning and scope of the First Amendment. Even Howard Stern’s lawyers look like Alexander Hamilton compared to Lowenstein.
Doug Lowenstein embarrasses each and every one of you when he holds forth about what the “Founders” intended when they drafted the Bill of Rights. For Doug, the Founders are GTA’s Tommy Vercetti and Carl Johnson. Doug never met a pixilated prostitute he didn’t like, and I’m sure James Madison would be impressed.
If the ESA wants as its president a thug who demonizes critics of your industry’s criminal, frauduelnt excesses, thereby earning their wrath and their determination, then by all means keep Mr. Lowenstein at the helm. Only someone like Doug Lowenstein would embrace Take-Two, a company that just had to pay the Security and Exchange Commission $8.75 million for fraudulent auditing practices, while scourging under-siege parents.
My fervent prayer as a Christian is not “Lord, give me more friends.” It is rather “Lord, give me more enemies like Doug Lowenstein.” He makes what I do so easy.
Your ESA leader in all of this is a man who has gone way, way out of his way to mock every single parent who has said to the Take-Two’s of your industry “Enough already!” When well-intended citizens and legislators have tried to get your industry to adhere to the logic of the “M for mature” ratings label, Lowenstein has flown into a fury, claiming children have a constitutional right to consume pornography and violence. Nobody but Doug Lowenstein and the sociopaths at Take-Two believe that.
After today, when Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks the truth and calls upon Americans to act on that truth regarding the violence and the scandal and the hurt coming from the extremists in your industry, pause and ask yourself: Whom can we thank for this day? I, as a lifelong Republican, am going to thank Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
You all, in your industry, ought to thank Doug Lowenstein. His extremism has painted a bullseye on your industry. Doug Lowenstein has the brush and Take-Two has provided the blood red paint.
If you want your industry destroyed, keep Mr. Lowenstein right where he is. If those of you who understand that any technology can be used for either good or for ill and that “responsibility” is something that adults are supposed to exercise in all walks of life, even in the entertainment industry, then get rid of this highly-paid thug and replace him with someone with sense.
Maybe Jack Valenti should be asked whom he would recommend who can act like a grown-up in this role. I’ll bet he has a list without Lowenstein’s name on it.
Senator Rodham Clinton, thankfully, is filling the void of real leadership in your industry created by Doug Lowenstein. It is about time.
If you want your fledgling industry destroyed for all of you, keep Doug Lowenstein right where he is. Events, like Columbine to the factor of ten, will take care of that. You won’t be able to blame Senator Rodham Clinton. She is trying to prevent that calamity.
But if you want to be a partner with America’s parents by together taking our children out of harm’s way, then look for an ESA president who has the common decency to recognize the truth, speak it, and then act upon it.
It’s your choice. You’ve made some pretty bad choices to date. Make a good one for a change. Dump Doug.
Regards, Jack Thompson
