PROPOSED censorship of music videos and video games could backfire, it has been claimed.

Critics of a call to censor video games because of fears they encourage violent behaviour say any censorship would immediately be subverted. Meanwhile a move to protect children from violent and raunchy online music videos by giving them a cinema-style age rating has also caused misgivings in the entertainment industry.

“I think giving an age rating might actually get people to make even more provocative videos than before as long as they get the proper rating,” said songwriter Ella on the Run.

It was announced this week that such age ratings will be given to online music videos following a pilot scheme introduced by Prime Minister David Cameron who vowed last summer to bring in controls.

“Bringing up children in an internet age, you are endlessly worried about what they are going to find online,” he said in justification of the move.

His statement followed controversy over the sexual content of videos by stars such as Rihanna, Kanye West, Miley Cyrus and Robin Thicke, whose 2013 hit Blurred Lines featured dancing naked women.

Major record companies including Warner, Sony and Universal have now agreed to send videos to the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) before releasing them online.

In the pilot scheme, the companies submitted 132 videos to the BBFC with 53 classified as 15, 56 rated as 12 and one – Dizzee Rascal’s Couple of Stack – rated an 18 because of its “gore”, “strong bloody violence” and “very strong language”.

Jessie Ware’s Meet Me in the Middle was rated 15 because of its sexual imagery as was Calvin Harris’s Open Wide because of its sexual references and “strong bloody violence”.

Independent record companies in the UK are to sign up to the scheme on a six-month trial basis but it will not apply to international artists like Rihanna as it only covers UK-produced music videos.

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

VIDEOS with an 18 classification will not load automatically on computer browser windows and the ratings will be displayed on YouTube and Vevo pages.

“These ratings are in addition to the controls we already provide on YouTube including the ability for uploaders to add age warnings to videos and a restricted mode,” said Candice Morrissey from YouTube.

Geoff Taylor, chief executive of the British Phonographic Industry, added: “Britain is a world leader in making exciting and original music, in part because our artists have a freedom to express themselves that we rightly cherish. While we must continue to uphold this principle, it is equally important that music videos are broadcast in a responsible way and that parents are given the tools to make more informed viewing decisions on behalf of their families.”

Ratings are already carried on violent video games but the American Psychological Association (APA) this week called for extra in-game controls after it released findings that suggest a link between playing games and criminal behaviour. Their findings were immediately disputed by 200 academics in an open letter that criticised the APA’s research.

The APA report said: “The research demonstrates a consistent relation between violent video game use and increases in aggressive behaviour, aggressive cognitions and aggressive effect, and decreases in pro-social behaviour, empathy and sensitivity to aggression.

“No single risk factor consistently leads a person to act aggressively or violently. Rather, it is the accumulation of risk factors that tends to lead to aggressive or violent behaviour. This research demonstrates that violent video game use is one such risk factor.”

WHAT COULD GO WRONG?


REFUTING the claims, the 200 academics said the research’s methodology was deeply flawed as a large part of material in the study had not been peer reviewed. “I fully acknowledge that exposure to repeated violence may have short-term effects – you would be a fool to deny that – but the long-term consequences of crime and actual violent behaviour, there is just no evidence linking violent video games with that,” said Dr Mark Coulson, associate professor of psychology at Middlesex University and one of the letter’s signatories.

“If you play three hours of Call of Duty you might feel a little bit pumped, but you are not going to go out and mug someone.”

He said he thought the APA’s call for more controls was “censorship by another route”.

“The worry I have is that any soft-coded censorship will be immediately subverted. The people playing these games are more competent than the people acting as gatekeepers.

“It’s kind of putting forward a solution to a problem I don’t think exists.”

Accusations of censorship have been levelled at attempted controls on the entertainment business ever since Parental Advisory, or PAL, was first introduced in the mid-1980s.

This was the result of a campaign by Mary “Tipper” Gore, ex-wife of former American vice-president Al Gore who was prompted to take action after listening to Prince’s Darling Nikki with her 11-year-old daughter and realising it referenced masturbation.

Co-founding the Parents Music Resource Centre with Susan Baker, wife of then US treasury secretary James Baker, she campaigned for warning labels for records marketed to children.

She said the aim was not to put a “gag” on music but protect children by providing parents with information about the lyrics.

Frank Zappa, John Denver, Joey Ramone, Dee Snider of Twisted Sister and Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys were among those who claimed it amounted to censorship but despite their protests, the campaign successfully gained an agreement from record labels to place warning labels on music with sexually explicit or violent lyrics.

The topic made worldwide headlines again this year when Kim Sears, now the wife of tennis star Andy Murray, wore a tongue-in-cheekT-shirt bearing the words “Parental Advisory” after she was criticised for what appeared to be a foul-mouthed rant at Murray’s opponent Tomas Berdych in the Australian Open semi-final in February.